Babies die. Especially adult babies.

“Heroin Just Killed My Baby”

So says a grieving mother.

Heroin addiction has ruined our family. The day my 15-year-old son, Brendan, took his first hit, he changed my life. Yes, not just his, but mine too. And not just mine, everyone who loved him.

My daughter, Haley, found him unresponsive. She is 12 and has never gone back downstairs to her bedroom. She probably never will. She sleeps on the floor next to me. Most nights she wakes me, her long blonde hair drenched with sweat from nightmares.

My husband, Scott, is a retired police officer. He’s seen grief before; I can’t hide it from him. Nowadays, he spends most of his time guiding me through this emotional minefield littered with sixteen years of breathtaking memories.

And — despite my belief that drug prohibition is immoral — I am sympathetic to her loss.

Just as I would be sympathetic to any of the following statements:

“Alcohol Just Killed My Baby”?

Or “A Gun Just Killed My Baby”?

Or even “A Car Just Killed My Baby”?

Is there something uniquely terrible about heroin?

Back in the old days when I was much younger, people said things like “AIDS Just Killed My Baby.”

What I don’t think we’ll hear is a mother saying “Abortion Just Killed My Baby.” The reason is that not only are fetuses not considered babies (even though teenagers are), but mothers who have abortions are not allowed to complain.

Politics is endlessly confusing.


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10 responses to “Babies die. Especially adult babies.”

  1. captain*arizona Avatar
    captain*arizona

    or capitalism just killed my baby! or if you live in the middle east vietnam war draft dodging chicken hawks just killed my baby! or if you live in flint michigan the republican party just killed my baby.
    or if you live in newtown or chicago then.r.a. just killed my baby.

  2. CapitalistRoader Avatar
    CapitalistRoader

    Except that heroin didn’t kill her baby.

    Ironically it was not Heroin but a mix of other drugs I can only assume he thought were less dangerous than Heroin.

    I fail to see the irony. It seems as if her kid was determined to kill himself. Blaming his suicide on a particular narcotic is just sad.

    He was the son every family dreamed of – and he died from an addiction that started in 7th grade with some marijuana at a local park, progressed to an addiction to opiates after an accident where he was prescribed pain killers, and eventually ended with a Heroin addiction that took his life.

  3. Man Mountain Molehill Avatar
    Man Mountain Molehill

    If the family all loved their kid so much why did he start injecting heroin age 15?

    Something is missing in this story.

    In a nation of 350 million maybe this is just an extreme statistical outlier, worst possible case. Which is a terrible basis for public policy. Or something was seriously wrong at home, also a terrible reason. 15 year old kids don’t just stick a needle in their arm for no reason.

  4. Simon Avatar

    MMM,

    PTSD will do that to you.

    Eric,

    Had the family said “PTSD killed my son” it would have made some sense. But as long as people blame the drugs we will be getting no where.

  5. Man Mountain Molehill Avatar
    Man Mountain Molehill

    Drugs are inanimate objects. A baggie of heroin doesn’t inject itself, or hold a gun to some poor kid’s head forcing him to do it. Something led him to do it.

    Any evidence for PTSD in this case, and where does a 15 year old kid get the trauma to be post traumatic about? It’s not like he was in combat.

    I still think something was seriously wrong with that family.

  6. Simon Avatar

    MMM,

    I was an alcoholic at 15. Child abuse. And for those very sensitive to it (it is a genetic thing) it may take only one incident.

    In my case it was years of abuse. Ironically from a father who had PTSD and didn’t know it. He was an alcoholic until about age 60. Then – at my urging – he gave it up.

    The PTSD never goes away. You just learn to stop giving in to it. Very difficult.

  7. Simon Avatar

    We have a child abuse epidemic in this country and no one notices. And why should people notice?

    They have drugs to focus on.

  8. Simon Avatar

    I still think something was seriously wrong with that family.

    Probably. PTSD is genetic. It tends to run in families. It runs in mine.

    Funny enough when it comes to mating, people with PTSD tend to be attracted to each other. So despite a low frequency (about 20% of the population has the genetics) it continues.

  9. Man Mountain Molehill Avatar
    Man Mountain Molehill

    20% of the population isn’t a small percentage, it’s enormous from a genetic perspective, on the order of hair color.

    What does that gene do, exactly? A genetic variant that shows up in 20% of the population does something useful, somehow, otherwise it would have been bred out over time, basic evolutionary genetics. Most real genetic illnesses, cystic fibrosis for example, only appear in tiny percentages of the population. OTOH, something that appears to be a common genetic illness, such as sickle cell anemia in blacks actually confers an advantage against malaria. So, what does a predisposition to drug addiction confer?

    Over most of history most children had lousy childhoods. 20% turning into hopeless drug addicts because of abuse, beatings, rape, starvation, not getting a new bicycle for birthdays, whatever, just doesn’t make sense.

  10. Man Mountain Molehill Avatar
    Man Mountain Molehill

    The pathetic fallacy – attributing human emotions and motivations to inanimate objects. As in “xyz killed my baby”. My baby died from xyz is more correct.