Memoir Excerpt:
In a letter to my daughter:
“‘I imagine in your mind you feel justified in treating me so badly. But I’m here to tell you: no, you’re not, not now, not ever again. If you can’t muster the consideration and respect that I deserve, then we need more space. And that’s my recovery at work.’
She was in San Francisco now and crashed on her sister’s sofa. Caroline, still recovering from her initial bout with Crohn’s disease back in October, was very welcoming and didn’t put too much pressure on her to find her own place. But Angie needed to find some space of her own and was fortunate within a couple of weeks to find a group home right around the corner from her sister, on Harrison Street. She bought a bike and enjoyed tooling around the Mission.
Then, while I was still reeling from December, she ended up in another hospital at the end of January, on IV antibiotics for the second time…
Angie ran away from Virginia only to find out that she couldn’t leave the addict behind. I’ll never know exactly how she ended up in the hospital for the second time, and it doesn’t matter. Angie was a grown woman learning to live in a new city. Her sister was close but unlikely to be drawn into her drama. Caroline knew a few addicts and knew plenty about addiction. But she was carefully and lovingly detached. Angie was really on her own again with no parents around. She was at yet another crossroads where she was faced with the same choices that had confronted her many times before. Would addiction continue to squeeze the life and humanity out of my daughter as it had in the past? Or would she be able to fight her demons on her own? “