"everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way."
Malika - I would never come down on you like a ton of bricks. And I know it's hard to imagine turning away your child in an apparent time of need. When my difficult child was a precocious 4 year old - there was NO WAY i could imagine EVER being out of touch with him - and closing the door to him would have been unfathomable...
which is why I am here, on this board. Because it's still unfathomable and unnatural and I look at him and see the 4 year old whose eyes lit up when I entered the room. And I type here to occupy my time and direct my thoughts and to get some support. And most of all to to keep myself from driving 300 miles and throwing a pillowcase over his head and bringing him home and locking him in his room while I lovingly prepare his favorite foods and try to nourish his mind and body while I keep him safe from the path he has chosen.
He has chosen his way. I did everything I could to try to convince him otherwise. I raised him to be a good, honest, studious man of faith. He has chosen a carefree lifestyle of bad choices and freedom (though of course he doesn't realize that substances have a greater hold on him than his dad and I ever did)
My way of choice would have been an intact, happy and healthy family.
I can't have that no matter how much I want it and no matter how hard I tried. Which leaves me with a fork in the road...which way should I chose? Empower my child to continue making horrific choices which fly in the face of my very core being? Or choose to make a life that does not empower his bad choices and is my only shot of freeing MYSELF (and my family) from his substances???
Rock meet hard place