From The Huffington Post:
"I'm scared, Mom," Mike said over the phone. "I'm scared and I need help."
My 21-year-old son, Mike, was talking to me from a cheap, drug-infested motel a few miles away from his college in Vermont. After hours of me trying to track him down, I was overcome with emotions of relief, fear, denial, and shame.
Mike's fight with addiction started when he was in high school. He was injured playing lacrosse and needed surgery on his shoulder. Following his surgery, Mike was given prescription painkillers, which he began abusing throughout most of his high school years. It wasn't until years later that I discovered my son's internal battles with insecurities and anxieties which drove his need to use drugs during school hours, before lacrosse games and during social gatherings. Once Mike reached college, he discovered heroin, which inevitably led him and our family to rock bottom.