The phone rang..........again.
It had been ringing all morning.
I didn’t want to talk to another
anxious or frustrated parent of a child old enough to know better.
My voice must have sounded abrupt even though I tried to sound professional.
Then I was speechless - my eyes brimming with tears.
A quavering voice reached through the wires
“Thank you. Thank everyone of you, from the very bottom of my heart.”
I had heard these words before,
“My darling child has died of this horrible disease.”
I recognized this parent’s voice
and recalled how many, many times
this parent had stayed beside the child
through each attempt to get and stay clean and sober.
There had been many hard lessons learned along this road, with always tired celebration at each success.
This child did acquire one long, and
very rewarding period of abstinence,
before several that were less so.
The last relapse was the last.
We shared a very emotional moment
at that busy nurses station,
the maelstrom of a busy Monday
swirling in the background.
I knew that not all of the family would grieve.
This ‘child’ was fifty-two years old.
“The truest form of love is how you behave
toward someone, not how you feel about them.”
~ Steve Hall
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