Back in the older days when I still had baby soft clear skin and added two plus two for my homework to be complete for the day I spent my time watching a woman's life slowly drift away in front of me. Young skin the woman had but I began to notice these dark eye circles starting to form and a fair complexion that once contained a rosy natural color diminished into a ghostly appeal. Nights became her days and days became her nights a nocturnal life she now lead. A lifeless person my mother had become and I never fully understood why for I was simply a young daughter.
"Mommy is asleep she can’t talk right now" I had to tell to every visitor knocking on our door, or whoever had called us on the telephone that tried to get in contact with my pretty much dead to the world mother. Our life inside of our house was a secret to everyone except to my father, brother, and I. All three of us were the only people actually were aware of the truth behind her.

I remember going to family affairs on my father’s side of the family. Without my parents knowledge I would be taken in to another room and asked personal questions.
"Is something happening at home that you would like to tell us we promise you wont be getting in trouble it's for the best."
No one in my family was stupid especially my grandmother she has the mind of an elephant along with an excellent memory a pure detectives eye. My grandmother cared about my life to much and I had the hardest time wondering why I was being directly confronted and not the other grandchildren.
It started my first grade year of elementary school just simply to young for me to realize and comprehend the truth and it had ended my seventh grade year of middle school. Seven years. Seven years long years of a childhood greatly ruined all because of over medicating of prescription drugs. My mother was not addicted to an illegal substance but merely a pill that her unintelligent doctor handed over to her each month. Later on down the road of her doctor’s visits she came to learn that her pain doctor was taken to court where he had his license removed from over prescribing a medication to a teenage girl in high school almost ending up killing her.
Its amazing how one man can do so much harm to so many people? A complete corruption over a mind that makes patients believe that that the medication they are taking will actually help them lead healthy lives even though in reality it's killing them. The patient is not the only one suffering but the family of the victim suffers more. Watching your mother's life getting taken away faster and faster each day is not an easy thing to have unfold in front of you. Then I did not know but today being in high school where I can actually comprehend the truth of things I dread the actual thought of it.
I remember my mother had became paranoid to a point where she thought that if I walked to the mailbox right in front of my house I would be kidnapped or end up hurt. With her new psychotic fear my childhood was taken away. Maybe once or twice I actually had a social life outside of school with my friends, and more than likely she was there with me. I was my mommy's little side kick that never and I mean never left her side. For my brother he wasn’t close with me mom being a teenager where he realized the reality of everything actually happening and he was opposed to it causing him to rebel and keep a strong distance away from my mother. He always locked himself in his room enveloped with video games while I stayed beside my mom as her little side kick on our pull out couch in the basement. Our basement was so filthy everywhere you walked there was some sort of clutter. Our house was a wreck because no one had the initiative to clean it especially not my mother who barely did anything productive I thought it was a play land with all of my toys strewn everywhere the basement was our room.
Through all of this my father remained just as distant as my brother did. He had a twelve hour work shift which had to have been his personal vacation away from our home. For me I spent my days after school watching way to much television, which my mother had on 24/7 for her viewing when she was actually awake. My brother became tired of this chaotic life and decided to join the army. He wanted to have a fresh start.
After my brother had left I felt more alone then ever having really no friends I ended up having really no one except family. After time I slowly started to realize something was wrong…
We actually ended up living in an apartment at a point in time, while we waited
for our real house to be renovated was when our world came crashing to a halt.
My mother had taken me along with her for her monthly doctor’s visit. I remember riding in our old silver corolla to pull up in front of the office to see a sign posted on the door. The office was completely black inside and I vaguely remember my mother walking back to our car in tears. The first thing she did was reach for her cell phone to call my father at work.
"His license got taken away what I am going to do?" she kept asking the same question over and over again with tears all in her eyes. I remained sitting in the passenger's seat picking my fingers which I came to learn I do when I become really nervous.
After that day things became better and worse for our lives. My mother immediately called up her old doctor and set up an appointment since she believed she had to see someone to keep her alive in her mind. When my mother had visited her rheumatologist she looked at her and realized that she was a completely different person from the woman she saw two years before. Sitting in the seat in the office my mother slouched greatly along with a super pale face slurring most of her words.
“If he didn’t lose his license when he did a week more of this abuse and your family would have found you dead."
My mom listened to those words and began crying non stop we didn't leave the doctors office for three hours after she heard that statement. Withdrawals my mother ended up dealing with and so did I. With my brother not being home it had left me to pick up on the responsibilities of everything in our home cooking and all of the cleaning. It was hard and I will always remember that I just always wondered how I kept up really good grades in that time. I was acting like a mother to my own biological mother which was a horrible mix up of family status that can never ever be taken back.
After a few months the color had came back to my mother's past ghostly face and she began getting a full nights sleep. She ended up getting through her addiction and I was the one to thank. My mother to this day still has problems because of her addiction to her pain meds and she will never be the same. I don’t know the normal side of my mother the thought of that turns my stomach. .
Living in the after effect of it all and being older I now know that in my experience no child should have to endure what I had to deal with. To blame her for everything is hard because I wonder did she actually know what was happening and could she have stopped it? I now see what the drug abuse now actually did to my mother and the rest of my family. For my mom she now lives with so many medical conditions from the drug abuse and her teeth are pretty much falling apart each day. I watch this and become sad but at least she is still alive. Her mind being off majority of the time is hard to cope with and yes it does make me angry at her doctor for doing this to her but I have to sit back and endure it. My experience made me a smarter person and much wiser to what in reality is right and what is wrong.