Remarks at Cape Cod Drug Overdose Vigil
Melissa Weiksnar
September 25, 2011
Last week at my town's farmer's market, I thought back two years, when my daughter Amy was home for the weekend and we shopped together. We bought fingerling potatoes which she loved, especially when I roasted them. She took some back to her apartment, where she was a few weeks into her junior year at Boston College. That summer she had taken a 3 week microbiology course, part of her nursing curriculum. She earned an A, scoring 108 on the first test, and "only" a 104 on the second.
But she was also scoring drugs. Big time. We knew she was on suboxone, but she told us it was because of oxycontin. On November 16th, she brought me to meet her drug counselor, where she admitted that she was a heroin addict, needed to go to treatment, and would not be able to finish her semester. She entered detox the Saturday before Thanksgiving, rehab six days after, and a sober house the Monday before Christmas.
We picked her up for a 12 hour pass on Christmas day, took her to the stipulated AA meeting, and retrieved her 90 minutes later, After dinner, I hugged her goodbye and told her I loved her and to stay safe. Her brother drove her back to her residential treatment house. We had had a picture perfect Christmas. The next day, Falmouth Hospital pronounced her dead at 6pm from an overdose at her treatment facility. The ER had worked on her almost 2 hours and couldn't bring her back from her final speedball. We'll never know from where she obtained the fatal drugs.
Nobody expected this outcome. She was young, had entered treatment voluntarily, had the support of her family, career goals, and so many wonderful friends. She wrote in her journal the day before Thanksgiving:
I know the real Amy is inside me somewhere and I need to get her back...I'm sick of leading a double life.Further into treatment, she journaled:
I feel like the drugs have taken over my soul. What happened to the strong, motivated young woman I was last spring? The impending doom sets in as I realize my disease has never been this bad. I stand today as heroin's puppet, feeling as if every fiber in my being is dull, responding only to the stimulation of potential drug use. But just like they say, you can't scare an addict.
As our family walked behind Amy's coffin into church for her funeral, it struck me -- what an awful way for her father to walk our daughter down the aisle. Amy's childhood friend told us "I'll always remember Amy as a smart, beautiful, caring young lady and I'll always be proud to be her friend, and know that whether she knew anyone for five minutes or five years that she most definitely touched their heart." As we took her serenity prayer card to the stores she frequented near her Brighton apartment, people remembered "Oh yeah, the tall skinny girl with the blue eyes who was always smiling." Amy, my Red Sox fanatic, Celtics fan, runner, drummer, baker and soulmate. These were her glasses frames [point to them]. When she died she was wearing her high school ring. After she died, I learned that another piece of jewelry she always wore is known as a Cape Cod necklace -- how ironic, given that she died here.
But addiction doesn't care if you're from Cambridge or Carlisle or the Cape.
... if your skin is dark naturally, or from tanning.
... if your eyes are deep brown, or sky blue.
... if you mother has a GED, or a Harvard MBA.
... or if you're flipping burgers at BK, or studying nursing at BC.
Addiction is an equal opportunity disease. Amy wrote:
the disease has a stronghold -- a white-knuckled fist, fingernails ripping through my skin, prying deeper and deeper into my body. I wonder what I can possibly do to break free from it's [sic] grasp and remember the life I used to love and show up for.
We have to make sure Amy's death was not in vain. Every day, opiates -- both street drugs and prescription drugs -- still kill two people a day in Massachusetts. That's two too many. Nationwide, more people are now dying from opiates than from motor vehicle accidents. Effective prevention of substance abuse is key. Please keep telling Amy's story, and any story that will help someone make good choices. But there IS help out there for those for whom the message of prevention was not effective, and there IS hope. The field of addiction medicine is changing rapidly, including research on what is, and is not, working. So I hope you will encourage anyone you know who needs treatment to find a program that meets their needs.
For those who do overdose, Linda just spoke about Narcan. I appreciate the work the AIDS Support Group of Cape Cod others who are making this life-saving drug available. Much like we now expect epi-pens in schools, and cardiac defibrillators in public places, I look forward to policies that would require Narcan training and supplies in all facilities that treat opiate addicts, and beyond. Recovery can only happen if the person who is addicted is still alive. In MA, since 2007, over 1100 children, grandchildren, and siblings now have another chance at recovery due to Narcan. But since the opiate epidemic extends across the age spectrum, the next person saved could be a parent, or even a grandparent. We cannot lose any more.