fml23

Sorry in advance for this long post. My dear friend who had struggled with severe mental health/addiction issues since high school died this weekend. I believe she overdosed on heroin. I had lost contact with her after noticing altered behavior and learning bits and pieces about her abusing prescriptions. We had been close as sisters at one time but had had ups and downs because of her various issues. I told her my concerns about her behavior, she was angry, and I just realized that I didn't need to be around someone hell bent on self destruction. She told mutual friends in the last 15 months of us not talking at all that we didn't speak anymore because I didn't approve of her 'life style'. I considered this the end of a friendship that had run its course. I also had a gut feeling she was hiding the severity of her drug use from me and I felt like I didn't need a front row seat to a prolonged suicide. My husband struggles with a drinking problem and I have an a child and work and school and it was a big healthy step for me to move away from situation that was unhealthy for me. Its strange to say, but I think deep down, without any real proof, I knew I would eventually get a call that she had died and I knew I couldn't be right there when it happened.

So anyways, I find out she died through her father's social media post. I assumed it was from an overdose or suicide because of her history but to this moment don't have confirmation. I emailed back her father to offer condolences and after very vague exchange of emails during which I said I was devastated to hear the news and I had hoped she would get better, he emails me to say he had NO IDEA SHE WAS DOING DRUGS and how really I should have told him so he could fix it. It was far more directly blaming then my paraphrasing and full of judgment about what I should do for future addicts I know. Please note my husband has publically struggled with alcoholism including a DUI and job losses ect. I am no stranger to addiction and I know damn well an addict can become a rock dragging you down to the ocean floor if you don't have boundaries. I never could fix them. They help themselves when they can and will.

I am hurting from this blame and sitting with my own tremendous grief. 1) because I was never TOLD my friend was doing drugs. I noticed her altered behavior and asked her questions and set boundaries because I cared. Why didn't he? 2) I still don't know what she was or wasn't doing or how she died and I have no idea if she also cut her father off and he thinks I knew she was using for all that time 3) Because I witnessed her nodding off and other tell tale signs of drug abuse IN HIS COMPANY and assumed he also noticed her altered behavior 4) Because when I first emailed him to offer condolences I said I am sorry she was hurting so much and I hoped things would get better. I meant this not knowing if she has committed suicide or overdosed. Because of her long term struggle with depression it was more of an acknowledgment that she has had a very painful struggle that got the best of her.

I can't imagine the grief of loosing a child to drugs. I don't pretend to. And I know anger and blame is probably natural. But I'm really feeling f***ed about his laying a hefty load of responsibility on my shoulders for someone else's drug use. I feel like if you have a kid who has was in rehab for ODing on heroin in high school you at least know signs of addiction. I also feel like the struggle between mental illness and substance abuse overlaps. So why is he saying that oh he knew she was massively depressed but if he had known it was addiction he would have done things differently.

I'm sorry for the long rant. I feel like I'm in a place where I have lost a dear friend to a f***ed disease. I picked myself and distance over her specifically because I didn't want to be so closely intertwined with an addict because it wasn't helping either of us. To have her father project blame on me for the steps I took to save myself feels like more bs back to being responsible for someone else's choices.

To be clear, I had no proof of her using, no reckless or illegal behavior to report to authorities and no idea she was in imminent danger. I would never have enabled or covered her drug problem. I just didn't think it was my place to blow up her life and contact her parent about my opinions about her choices. all the signs of addiction were there for anyone to see. I am understanding that she had been doing heroin but I was never told that. I cannot believe that if I saw the symptoms of opioid use BEFORE heroin was in the picture, and I have been out of her life for nearly 2 years, that there were not way worse signs as her disease progressed. On facebook, random people she worked with were expressing how troubled and lost she had been. It didn't seem like a secret.