Drugs

Tonight my heart is heavy for the drug addict and for the people who love them
I spent fifteen years believing for his miracle, trying to set boundaries, to deliver ultimatums, to be the understanding supportive wife, to find him places to go, to rescue him, nothing worked.
I started over again and again.
I kept hoping and continuing to help him over and over again.
I picked my life up from the ashes and started over and over again.
Nothing worked.
My love couldn't save him, or myself.
Chance after chance he only disappointed me, took advantage of me, stole from me and chose the dope over me.
I spent years trying to figure it out, trying to help, trying absolutely everything and nothing worked.
He wanted to get high and there was nothing I could do about it.
I'm not God.
I brought him to Alabama and he just found more people to get high with, nothing about his life changed.
His facebook was covered up with people from the streets, drugs dealers, folks he's convinced himself are his friends, people who mean more to him than his own wife.
He's been gone a year in sixteen more days and I have never ever had a happier year in my life since I met him.
It's over, I can't do it, I won't do it and in the end it was him that walked away.  I was taking a nap with the baby, on my day off, when I woke up the car was gone, money from my desk was gone and him with it.
My truck was in the shop because he tore it up the weekend before, all the lawn equipment and my trailer gone, everything that wasn't nailed down or locked up, gone.
He took the car and went back to Atlanta.
No note telling me good bye.
No kindness for me before he left.
He wasn't the same person when he came home from jail the last time, wasn't kind or thoughtful, didn't do anything to help around the house, just had this attitude of he's doing everything and I'm not.  Never mind I've supported us the entire time, that he's never had to pay a bill, pay to take me out, pay for clothes on his back, for his cigarettes or food.
He left.
He always left, if it wasn't jail it was the streets for all those years.
I was wasting my time.
I was wearing myself out for something that would never happen.
Tomorrow, someone is picking up the car, almost a year later, bringing it back, so it can cost me more money to fix.
I bought the car to keep him from stealing my truck and it worked.
When the car is dropped off at the shop a chapter of my life will be ended forever.
A win I never got before will be experienced.
My mother in law will never see or hear from me again and to tell the truth I don't believe she even cares.
She wouldn't even walk outside the house to see if the keys were laying in the floor board.
He can never come back.
I wouldn't care if he showed up twenty years from now and could prove every single day of it clean and put a million dollars in my hand, he still couldn't come back.
I don't want him anymore.
I don't even love him anymore.
I don't even want to be his friend.
God freed me from my own bondage and I turned around and chained myself to his.
What a stupid girl I was.
I destroyed my life in the name of love.
I'm seeing others go through the same thing, but I can't do anything but stand aside and be their friends and not say a word that isn't encouraging.
I'm seeing the man who helped me get out of the streets do the same thing, can't tell him anything just like no one could tell me.
Love makes you do stupid ass stuff.
I hear him saying the same things I've said, heard my girlfriend say the same things I said just today.
I can't do or say anything to either one of them, because they won't hear and they have to make their own way.
There are others, but I can't say a word.
It won't change their hearts, their minds or what they feel like they need to do.
I can only offer encouragement and prayer.
I know what that road looks like, it's long and desolate and costly.
Boundaries mean nothing to the addict, they have to have their medicine.
They are going to get high by any means necessary and nothing else matters.
Love doesn't matter, marriage doesn't matter, family, homes, nothing else matters to them, they have to get high and they are going to do whatever they have to do to get what they want.
They know what they are doing, they are not stupid by any means, they just don't care and no matter how much we care, we don't matter.
You can't make them stop, fix them, make them care, send them to rehab, it's all on them and they don't want it.
Sure, they can function and do pretty good for a minute, but it's always there.
Every time he got some money it was on.
Every time he got a job it only lasted a paycheck or two and those paychecks sent him right back where he came from.
We love them, we want to help them, we know God has better in store for them, but that doesn't matter.  It's always their choice and they choose to get high.
I'm not mad at him, I'm actually grateful.  I'm glad he's gone, my life has never ever been better.
He's taught me I won't ever settle for second best, I don't want anything to do with ex addicts, I won't ever put my hope in a man who was ever an addict and I don't need a man in the first place.  My Daddy takes care of me just fine.
He's taught me no matter how much I love someone it doesn't mean they love me back.
He's taught me just how strong I am.
I gave it my all and it didn't matter to anyone but me.
I gave it everything I had again and again and got nothing in return, except bills and heart ache.
There are those right this minute doing the same thing, they feel terrible, their hearts are broken, their lives are shattered again and again and my heart is so sad for them.
There are those who wish to change and can't believe it could happen, my heart is heavy for them.
There are those who silently suffer with addiction, those who live with those people and others still who love them, it's up to them.
Deliverance is available, you just have to want it.
There is life beyond drugs.
I wish I had all the answers but I don't.
I can't for the life of me figure out what it is with him.
I no longer care.
He made his choice and it wasn't me.  It never was me, I chose him.
I'm praying for those who wish to be well and for those who love them.
I'm praying for those who silently suffer and feel there is no one they can talk to.
I'm praying for anyone and everyone who has dealt with the pain and heartache of drugs and addictions and madness in their lives.
I'm so thankful to be able to walk away and never look back.
I'm so thankful Jesus came and got me when I was in that hell.
I'm so thankful my life today is not what it was a year ago.
I'm so thankful for deliverance.
I'm so thankful it's over.