When my son left home, just before he went to rehab, I totally cleaned his room and it just about killed me. But I did it I think I will always feel sad when I go in there but I felt like he needed a clean start when and if he does come home. I also had his cell phone number changed, your carrier can do that for you they just give you a new SIM card and destroy the old one. I think we grieve for the person that we always thought our child could be. I read a poem once written for parents of special needs kids and it compared having a special needs child to planning and packing for a vacation in a certian place like Spain you pack the right clothes, learn the language, buy the tourist books, learn the customs, etc and then you get off the plane in in Russia the clothes are wrong, the language is different and you have no idea how to speak it, the customs are different you don't know if you are doing the right things or not. AT the end it talks about the journey being a good one (I'm not so sure anyone could call this journey a good one) but just very different than what you had planned. I think that is a lot like having an addicted child. The journey is total hell and not at all what you wanted or expected in life but maybe we can learn from it.