Even Non-Treatment Moms Face Challenges

by JOHNSON, Member 

Early Sunday at about 4:30 AM, I settled down with a nice cup of coffee and a warm comfy sofa. I like to wake up early, before my husband and three sons, so I can have a little quiet time for myself.

I happened to notice my 19-year-old son’s cell phone. Being the curious mother that I am, I read his text messages.

To my horror, I realized that my son was dealing drugs.

Emergency Meeting

I woke my husband and gave him time to digest the situation. Then we called an emergency family meeting with our three sons: 22-, 19- and 14-years-old. We confronted our son, who admitted that he was helping a friend make marijuana sales. His friend has a medical marijuana card and uses it to buy and sell the drug.

As context, my son is a full-time student, works 24 hours a week, and helps out his grandmother every weekend. You would not peg him as a drug dealer.

We asked him if he thought this behavior was acceptable. He said, “No,” but showed little remorse. He put on a “tough guy” attitude, telling us that all the kids were doing it. (Our other boys chimed in and agreed.)

Our 22 year old son said, “At least he isn’t selling it out of our house!” We had to say with force that drug transactions are against the law, no matter where they take place. We reminding our sons of the boundaries in our household. We also went over the real life consequences of this offense, like jail time and a permanent criminal record.

We explained that he needed to remove himself from his current social circle for his own sake and if he continued to hang around his current “friends” he was going to become one of them. He became angry and told us that his friends are very good people and we shouldn’t judge them.

“Okay, fair enough,” we said. “How many of his friends are going to school and holding down a job?” No answer. He agreed to severe all ties.

Strike Two

The next day, I checked his phone activity online and sadly found that he was still in contact with his drug dealer friend. This forced us to take his cell phone away and restrict his driving privileges. He was not happy.

Now he feels like he has no friends, but he is following our rules. We can’t watch him every minute of the day, but we have lined up activities for the next two weekends to keep him busy. We are taking it one day at a time.

We hope that we can help him make the right choices by giving him support, and holding him accountable for his actions.