#199 – Lynn Rothenberg
Lessons From The Mother Of An Addicted Son
Lynn Rothenberg is a former social worker, writer and photographer whose son struggled with addiction from a young age. Lynn and her husband split up when her son was only 3 years old and she noticed the effects of the loss early on.
Her son’s addiction began with Marijuana then progressed and at each phase she just wanted the drugs to stop. Words like addiction began to surface from professionals but she knew her son, that wasn’t him. He was her sweet boy. It was just a phase and once he was able to stop the substances they could go back to the way things had been before.
There were rehabs and detox and with each came the promise that things would be different. He would feel so clear about everything but it was only a matter of time before they were in the same place again, but this time things had moved on to heroin.
Her son was eventually arrested and sent to prison for 6 years and Lynn was forced to live an even lonelier existence than she had as the parent of someone in addiction. Each time she visited it was like leaving her son in a war zone where she could never be certain of his safety.
Today her son is sober with a job and a family and she has done incredible work in healing from the experience. She is back to working in photography and is in the last phases of her manuscript about her experience.
Journey Through Addiction and Recovery: Follow the powerful narrative of Lynn Rothenberg, a former social worker, writer, and photographer, as she navigates her son’s addiction journey from early signs to eventual recovery.
Addiction Progression and Denial: Explore the harrowing progression of her son’s addiction, starting with marijuana and escalating to heroin, while unraveling the emotional complexities of denial within families facing addiction.
Challenges of Incarceration and Redemption:Learn about Lynn’s unique experiences as her son faces incarceration for six years, the emotional toll it takes on her, and the ultimate redemption story as her son achieves sobriety, gains employment, and starts a family.
Healing through Art and Writing: Discover how Lynn Rothenberg’s return to photography and her manuscript about her experience serve as therapeutic outlets, providing valuable insights and hope to others dealing with addiction-related challenges.
To find other similar episodes by topic, click here.
Connect with Lynn
Facebook | @lynn.rothenberg
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Episode Transcript
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Coming up on this episode of The Courage To Change, sponsored by Lionrock.life.
Lynn Rothenberg:
When you have an addicted child, you tend to not talk about it, not reveal it, and when you have someone in prison, you tend not to disclose that. My close friends knew, but then everyone kind of goes back to their life. It’s over now, thank goodness it’s settled. Now he’s in prison. Okay. He’ll serve his time, he’ll come out. People don’t understand going to prison, it’s not going, it’s living it and what happens inside.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Hello, beautiful people. Welcome to The Courage To Change recovery podcast. My name is Ashley Loeb Blassingame, and I am your host. Today we have Lynn Rothenberg. Lynn is a former social worker, writer, and photographer whose son struggled with addiction from a young age. Lynn and her husband split up when her son was only three years old, and she noticed the effects of the loss early on. Her son’s addiction began with marijuana then progressed, and at each phase she just wanted the drugs to stop. Words like addiction began to surface from professionals, but she knew her son. That wasn’t him. He was her sweet boy. It was just a phase and once he was able to stop the substances, they could go back to the way things had been before. There were rehabs and detox, and with each came the promise that things would be different. He would feel so clear about everything, but it was only a matter of time before they were in the same place again.
But this time, things had moved on to heroin. Her son was eventually arrested and sent to prison for six years, and Lynn was forced to live in even lonelier existence than she had as the parent of someone struggling with addiction. Each time she visited, it was like leaving her son in a war zone where she can never be certain of his safety. Today, her son is sober with a job and a family, and she has done incredible work and healing from this experience. She’s back to work in photography and is in the last phases of her manuscript about her experience. Everything about this interview is so important for parents to heal. No matter where you are in this journey, even if you’ve never had a child that has struggled, this episode will be such a resource for you to send to other people who are struggling and to reduce stigma.
This is such an important episode. I hope that everybody who’s listening pays close attention to all the different aspects that we talk about, including the fact that marijuana can be addictive, that a child or an adult child who has a history of substance use who is using marijuana instead of their drug of choice or alcohol instead of their, quote, “drug of choice,” that that does not mean that they are out of the woods. Lynn’s growth through this conversation and through her son’s experience is palpable. She walks us through what her beliefs were, what the thoughts were for her when people started to bring up addiction and how impossible it was for her to imagine where they actually ended up. Please enjoy Lynn Rothenberg. Let’s do this.
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Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Lynn, thank you so much for being here.
Lynn Rothenberg:
I’m honored to have been invited, thank you.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
So Lynn, tell me a little bit about your background, where you grew up and how you became a social worker.
Lynn Rothenberg:
Okay. I grew up in upstate New York and I wasn’t initially a social worker. I’m a little bit of a restless soul. I wanted to always be a photographer, so I became a portrait photographer and I had a studio for many years, maybe about 10 or 11, and then I didn’t care for the business of photography anymore. I just got tired of it and I’d always liked to write, so I became a journalist. I started working for a newspaper and I really loved that, and I did that for a number of years. I did some freelance work as well. I left the newspaper after a few years and then I did some freelance writing, and one of the articles I wrote was about psychiatry because I had noticed, I’d heard through people that psychiatrists were not doing therapy anymore, they were just prescribing.
And my father was a psychiatrist, and so I was especially interested in this. So I wrote an investigative article about how this shift had come about. It’s old news now, but I guess this was around 2003 or something like that, it was just starting to be like that. And so I interviewed a lot of psychiatrists and all of that, and as I was doing the article, I thought why am I writing about this? I’m getting 8 cents a word. I want to be a therapist. So that’s when I went back to graduate school and got my MSW, because everyone said that’s the key to becoming a therapist. I graduated in May and I sent out many letters and I wanted to work in a mental health clinic, I was very interested in mental illness.
And I had an almost offer, but what they did was they didn’t hire me, but they sent my resume over to a substance abuse agency and said, “You might want to have a look at this,” which was really strange. Why didn’t they hire me? So the agency called me and they said, “We’re interested. Do you think you could work with this population?” And at that time, my son was using drugs but it wasn’t severe, and I thought if I hesitate, I’m not getting this job and I need this job. So I said, “I’m completely comfortable. No, I would look forward to it.” So he said, “Well, come in tomorrow,” and that was it. So that was my first job.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
How old was your son when you took this job?
Lynn Rothenberg:
I think he was 26 or 27, something like that.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Okay, okay. So let’s talk a little bit about raising your son, and you’re no longer married to your son’s father. When did you guys get together? When did you divorce?
Lynn Rothenberg:
So we were married in ’76. We had David in ’82 and we moved back to the East Coast for a variety of reasons, but we lived in San Francisco. That’s where he had his job. So we moved back here and then he left a year later. He wasn’t really here for that first year. He had a case, he was a lawyer and he was finishing this case. And I encouraged him because it was an exciting case, and I said, “Finish the case. Just go back and forth and then you’ll be settled,” because he had a job here as well. And so we did that, but then at the end of the year, he left. That was right before David started kindergarten, and so he started school, frankly, with a broken heart. I saw it.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Yeah. And what about your heart?
Lynn Rothenberg:
Yeah. I think I was in shock. I couldn’t believe he was leaving. I couldn’t believe he was leaving David. I understood okay, he wasn’t happy with me anymore. I tried to get him to work on the marriage, we went to a therapist, but he was gone. But I remember saying to him, “Think about David. What about David? We need to work on this. You need to at least be in the area.” But he moved 3,000 miles away. I just tried to carry on. I was the only parent, so I was going to be strong and I had to just carry on. That’s all. There was really no choice.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
What kind of kid was David like? What was it like raising him after that as a single parent?
Lynn Rothenberg:
David, I would say he had some darkness that I saw in him. That sounds funny to say about a young child.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
No, I know exactly what you’re talking about.
Lynn Rothenberg:
Yeah. He often would be difficult, but I felt like why is he so unhappy? And I thought he was unhappy because his father left, but I thought maybe it’s something more. I always kept our dialogue wide open. I would say to him, “Is something bothering you? Let’s talk about it.” And sometimes as he got older, he was still young, but he wasn’t four anymore, I don’t know how old he was, but for the most part, I felt pretty alone and David did, he said to me as he was older, “I’m the only one. All my friends have a father living in the same house.” And this was very difficult for me because I felt guilty the marriage hadn’t worked, and also, I did not want to poison his relationship with his father. So I didn’t say things like, “Well, I wanted your father to stay, but he wanted.” I didn’t say anything like that, and my husband and I both agreed we would not say anything negative about each other, we would be supportive, so that’s how we carried on.
But I did take David to a therapist when he was fairly young because he seemed so contrary, and as a working single mother, even though my parents were nearby, I was on duty all the time and it was hard, and I just wanted to make him more compliant. I don’t mean to make a blanket statement, but in my therapeutic travels, I never landed on a good child therapist for David. So he had trouble in school, he was disorganized. He did have ADHD, that didn’t come out until much, much later, and he had a trouble being organized, but he was always a nice child. He was kind and he didn’t have social problems with other children. But I kept thinking to myself, something is underlying this moodiness in him because sometimes he really seems so into himself, and he was a child. I just thought I don’t expect him to be happy all the time, but I couldn’t. And so my search continued through many, many years.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
When did you become aware of David using any substances?
Lynn Rothenberg:
It’s hard, the years kind of blend, but I noticed that he was tired a lot. And he would say, “I’m a teenager, mom. What do you expect? I have to get up early every day, I’m in school all day, I’m tired.” But you know that intuition that keeps needling you?
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Yes, I do.
Lynn Rothenberg:
So one day he left for school and I took it upon myself to snoop, and I had never done that. We each respected each other’s privacy, but I went into his room. At first, I didn’t find anything. I did notice a tan metal box, and I picked it up and I couldn’t get it open. It was locked. So I thought well, I don’t know what that is. Good, I don’t have to deal with that. But for the next day or two, I kept thinking about the box and I didn’t say anything to David, but I went in with pliers and a paperclip and I unhinged the box and there was a big, fat bag of marijuana, like a gallon bag, one of those. And I was shocked, really, really shocked. I confronted him and that was probably the beginning of the dance we did, where he would tell me something and I didn’t know how to react.
I would believe him or if I didn’t, I didn’t know what to do. This was new. This was all new. And he said, “Oh, that’s not mine. That’s not mine, mom. I’m keeping it for a friend. He asked me to keep it.” So I said, “Well, who’s this friend?” And he said, “I can’t tell you. I can’t tell you.” And I said, “I’m calling his mother. And he said, “Oh, if you do that, there’s going to be big trouble.” So that intimidated me. I thought big trouble? What are they going to do? Will they kick David out? Will they kick? What’s going to happen? This kid, is he violent? I don’t know who this other kid is. So I said, “Well, okay, I won’t do that, but don’t you ever bring drugs into this house again.” “I won’t, mom. I promise. I promise I never will. I’ll return it first thing tomorrow.”
And I thought, “Well, that was a close one. Okay, that’s over.” That’s over. I intimidated him. I can laugh about it now, but I kind of believed him. I wanted to believe him. My son, you have to know, he was so cute. Now, I know every mother says that, but people used to say to me, “Oh, he is so cute.” He had red hair, blue eyes, freckles. He looked like a Tom Sawyer or a Huckleberry, just like this sweet little boy. And he went to a school that had a uniform, so I looked at him and I would think he’s not a drug user, not someone who looks like this. Remember, I was in my innocent days.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Right. So what did you know about addiction at that time? What’d you think? Talk to me in your innocent days, what did you think addiction looked like or was?
Lynn Rothenberg:
I didn’t think about addiction. I never knew anyone who was addicted. No one in my family had a problem, no one in my husband’s family. I never thought about addiction. So in my mind, if I look back, I probably envisioned addiction as scrawny people strung out in the alleyways. And at this time, heroin had not hit the suburbs. I just never thought about addiction, not at all.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
It’s interesting, there’s so much that I either relate to or know that went on in our house and that my parents would relate to, and I think the hardest part when thinking and talking about addiction, and I’m 17 and a half years sober, I got sober at 19, my parents went through very similar things that you did, including navigating the legal system. I was a ward the state of California by the time I was 16 years old. So very similar feelings of wait, whoa, whoa, I just lost control of my child. How is this happening? You really want to believe your child. And that’s where this total pathology, this lying pathology comes in. And if you haven’t experienced it or been in it yourself, it’s really tough to understand how your child could go from this wonderful little sweet creature to this person, an alien inhabiting your child’s body.
Lynn Rothenberg:
I think the other thing that makes it difficult is if your friends have children not having any of these issues, people tend to try to placate you and say, “Oh, you’re worrying too much.” People told me I was a worrier when it became more serious. Friends said, “David’s good.” They knew him. They said, He’s a good boy. You don’t need to worry. Just this is what people do in high school.” And some people do and when they leave, they stop. But there’s a percentage who don’t and can’t, and I just was very frightened by it. Again, I didn’t think he was going to be a compulsive drug user. I just wanted him to stop drinking and using marijuana, that’s all, because he wasn’t doing well in school. The first time the word addiction was raised was when he was in his senior year and things were ramping up, which as we know, that’s a sign of addiction. It doesn’t stay the same, it’s a progression.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Progressive.
Lynn Rothenberg:
And the therapist, I remember exactly where I was standing in his office when he said to me, “You want to get ahold of it now because it gets much more difficult later when it goes into addiction,” and I thought addiction? I thought oh brother. I just want him to stop David from using alcohol and marijuana. I thought he’s just exaggerating this situation completely. Addiction does not apply to this situation. The addiction came very late in my mind. My recognition came very late.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Knowing what you know today, what would you tell yourself, the parent, in that moment when he said that?
Lynn Rothenberg:
Well, I would tell myself to listen and ask him, find out what is addiction?
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Okay. Ask questions.
Lynn Rothenberg:
I would’ve said, “Well, why are you mentioning addiction?” So that he could give me more information. Instead, I shut the door and I just stayed focused on his substance use.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
At what point did you say, “Oh my gosh, they were right. This is addiction”?
Lynn Rothenberg:
After high school, he went to his first 28-day rehab for marijuana. He was practically failing high school and they told me that he might not graduate, and it gets complicated, but he changed schools several times. He went to four different schools. And so he was back to the public school for his high school year and was not doing well and things had ramped up, weirdness were happening, just chaos and I was more and more worried. And then he was stoned at his graduation, and this therapist I mentioned earlier had said to me, “He needs inpatient.” And when he told me that I didn’t believe him because I didn’t know the topic. I just didn’t know what that meant, and I thought he’s too young to go to an inpatient. There’ll be adults there. There’ll be older people, they’ll tarnish him. I had all these distorted views.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Let me ask, let me drop in right here. So if a plumber told you that you had a massive plumbing issue… you can tell I don’t know anything about plumbing because we’ll leave it at that. A major clog in the system. I probably should have picked some other analogy… but if a plumber tells you you have a plumbing problem, if an electrician tells you there’s an electrical problem, if a physician tells you you broke your femur, if an expert, a subject matter expert tells you, “This is a problem”-
Lynn Rothenberg:
Why don’t we believe it?
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
… most people believe them.
Lynn Rothenberg:
Yes, that’s right.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
What I find interesting and what I’m sure you can relate to is this piece that I see all the time where when it comes to this topic, for whatever reason, the subject matter experts are not deferred to in the same way. There’s a resistance because we don’t want to believe that that’s true. But if we had some sort of similar situation in all these other areas, we would believe it.
Lynn Rothenberg:
Well, I think your analogy is good because I often thought about the doctor one, and I thought if a doctor diagnosed someone with chemical dependence, there’d be a shutdown. But if they said let’s say liver disease or something, it’d be, “Oh my God, what can I do to fix it?” Not so with this. I think that my feeling, if I revisit myself at that time, as a mother, you have that history with your child and you’ve seen all their cute little moments and their loving moments and their hugs. And my son and I were very close, especially I think when there’s just the two of you, I think there’s a more intense bond.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
For sure.
Lynn Rothenberg:
And so I knew I had all of that. and now I have a man who hasn’t known David very long, and he’s telling me he needs inpatient drug rehab. And I think part of me is probably thinking, “You don’t know my son. You think you do. You’re just judging him based on some of these behaviors.” It’s not rational what I was thinking, but that I think is what my mindset was. And it’s very hard as a parent to have someone tell you. This is my only child, and this was not the plan I had.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Of course.
Lynn Rothenberg:
My expectations were he was going to do really well in school, and he had told me he wanted to be a lawyer. What’s this? Where did this come from?
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Correct.
Lynn Rothenberg:
But when I saw him at graduation, I thought rehab time. That’s it.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
There are things about this that you hear people use and try to rationalize. And your person, your loved one who is addicted is 100% going to absolutely run circles around you about the topic. So you are going to leave questioning your own reality when we are done with you, because that is how we protect our addiction. And that’s, I think, the hardest thing. Even when I deal with people who are stuck in addiction now, I find myself questioning my reality, and that’s when a little bell goes off in my head and goes, “Ding, ding, ding. I’m dealing with someone who’s in active addiction.”
When I am questioning my reality and as it relates to something that doesn’t make sense or drugs or any sort of intoxication, as soon as that happens, I immediately know what’s going on because I did it to people I love more than anything. To people I care about, I’d jump in front of a bus for, I did it. I did exactly the same thing, and I know what that feeling feels like. And it feels like, “Wait a minute, am I going insane?”
Lynn Rothenberg:
It’s chaos. They create a chaos where I was thinking if he would ask me for money, I’d think, “Wait, didn’t I just give him the money for that?” And I couldn’t remember because things start happening faster and faster. And your memory, you cannot keep track unless you have a notebook. Put the date, how much you gave, what it was for. But they come at you, as you might know, so quickly, and it’s survival.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
By design.
Lynn Rothenberg:
It’s survival.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
100%.
Lynn Rothenberg:
There’s sort of a chaos in their life, but there’s a parallel process. It’s in your life too.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
The ways that we as professionals intervene and handle addiction are counterintuitive to what you would do. The ways in which you can help your child are counterintuitive. You have a book and a manuscript that talks about how you inadvertently contributed to your son’s addiction, and I am so grateful that you’re coming out and talking about this because when I work with families, when I do interventions, what I tell them is, “Please, dear God, don’t give them any cash. Don’t give them money.” And they’re like, “Well, I didn’t give them cash. I gave them a grocery card,” but you don’t understand how we work. We can turn anything into cash. And, “Well, I don’t want them to be homeless.”
Unfortunately, if you remove all the consequences from our lives as people in active addiction, we have no reason to stop, and we are only listening to rewards and consequences. We’re not listening to the, “If you loved me, you would stop. Why don’t you care? You lied to me. We lost trust. How are we going to build this relationship? Your sister doesn’t want to talk to you. How could you do this?” We can’t hear you. We can’t hear you. What we’re dealing with is a completely different way of a person thinking. People are trying to talk to their child’s frontal lobe, the logic piece of their brain, and it’s not on. That’s where you get the monster or the person that you don’t recognize. It’s because they’re responding from their brainstem. So David goes to treatment for 28 days for marijuana as a senior. Did you think that he was going to be cured?
Lynn Rothenberg:
Of course.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Yes, of course.
Lynn Rothenberg:
He was getting treatment. That’s easy. He’ll go to this rehab and it’ll all be over. He’ll stop all of this. They did have a family afternoon when they talked to us about. They didn’t have a weekend. I’ve been to many where they have family weekend, but this was just an afternoon and everyone that was in the room, most of them were husbands or wives, so that was easy for me to single myself out and think, “Oh, well”-
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
We’re different.
Lynn Rothenberg:
You know in the movie 28 days with Sandra Bullock? I remember she went into the clinical director and she said, “Well, I’m not like them,” and she points to the people in the other room. “You’re not thinking I’m like them.” Yes. So I thought well, he talked to us about addiction, and that was the first time I’d heard. He said, “When it hits the brain and when they take a drink, it’s like they’ve had a shot of heroin. It’s very intense, more intense than for a non-alcoholic.” And I thought well, okay. David’s not an alcoholic and he’s a teen. He just graduated from high school. This is good for him, but he’s not in the same category as the others here. When he came out, he felt so good and he said, “Oh, mom, you were right. I did need that. My head feels so clear,” and I thought, “Wow, I did a good thing. This was good.” But it wasn’t the end, of course.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
When did you realize that he was using again?
Lynn Rothenberg:
I didn’t know because he moved out of the house. He got an apartment with a friend, so I didn’t know what he was doing, which is more confounding because you see all this weird, unreliable behavior, but you don’t think well, he’s using drugs. I just think what is wrong with him? Sometimes I’d say, “David, why can’t you call me back?” Most of the time I was baffled. I was annoyed with his behaviors, but I was confused. You’re right when you say it’s a confusing time. I was confused because I didn’t recognize the beast that was in front of me.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
I’ll never forget my parents arguing, my dad saying, “Why are you spending so much money? Where is this money going? What is happening?” And my poor mom, she wasn’t keeping a really close track on what she was spending, which I knew. I was taking money out of the ATM, so it looked like it was her. There was no reason. It was the same ATM, I was taking it. I was gone and came right back, put it back, and I’ll never forget that. And my poor mother, just my dad grilling her and her having no idea. And eventually, because that’s where a normal person would go, “Okay, I’m going to leave it alone because they’re paying attention and I got what I needed and this well has dried up. I need to stop taking money from the other”-
Lynn Rothenberg:
No such thing.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
No sirree Bob. My parents, I continued to do this, and then they pulled ATM footage. The bank pulled ATM footage, and how you doing? There I am. But I let them argue about it. I heard them arguing about it and I was very aware, and I had guilt. I did have guilt. It didn’t feel good. I wasn’t happy about it but in my mind, there wasn’t a choice.
Lynn Rothenberg:
I have some turning points. I was in graduate school, so up until now, I know he has a problem. I know he has a serious drug problem, so I knew that. Of course I had been giving him money because your thinking is if I give him this money, then he’ll be on the right path. If I give him money for a used car, then he will have what he needs.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Drive to work.
Lynn Rothenberg:
He can go to school, he can work, so this is all he needs. And that’s a pure misunderstanding about addiction and everything that you just described. You think that the external will take care of the internal, and it doesn’t. It’s all an internal process. You just do not have the power. But that’s a hard lesson for a parent to learn. And finally, I had moved out of my house and he was renting it from me with his girlfriend. And I came in and as the counselor said to me, he walked in later and he said to me, “This is an addict’s house.” And so I knew then, that was the first time I would have attached addict to my son.
And then the next moment of awakening was in the fall of 2009. I didn’t know how much he was using, but I knew that he had been taken over by heroin. He had just been taken over. We stayed close throughout everything. There were gaps of time when I didn’t hear from him at all, and every time I called, I’d get his voicemail and I knew something was going on and I was getting really frightened. And then I was running my men’s group one day. I ran an intensive men’s group five days a week-
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
As a social worker?
Lynn Rothenberg:
… right, at the agency. And this was a great group. I loved this group. And one of them was talking, and they all were clean. They had been clean for a little while, I don’t know how long, and one was saying his poor mother. He said, “I feel so bad about what I did to her.” And he said, “I would ask her for money,” and she would say, “I don’t want to give you money. I’m afraid you’re going to buy drugs.” And he said, “I’m not going to buy drugs. I’m going to play miniature golf.” So then he said she’d be really happy and relieved. She’d give him the money. He’d go out, he’d buy drugs. He’d go to the miniature golf, get a scorecard, fill it out, come back and hand it to her and she’d be happy.
And as he was talking, I’m standing there listening not as a social worker, as that mother. And I thought oh my God, that’s me. This is my son and that is me. This is what’s been going on. After group, I ran downstairs and I immediately asked a colleague if they could recommend someone that I could see, because I realized now I was in a life or death situation for myself. And that’s when I started seeing this counselor, but that was right around the end. We were in stage four here. But it took hearing my client tell me that because no one was trying to teach me something. It wasn’t someone saying to me, “You need to grasp that,” blah, blah, blah. You don’t listen to that kind of information. But he was telling me his experience with his mother and I identified. It was really powerful.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
For whatever it’s worth, whatever one might think about Al-Anon and the family programs, the value is that people are telling their stories and that there’s a lot of stuff. There’s a lot of feelings that you can relate to, and the relation is where the value is because again, it’s not telling you what to believe. I’m telling you what happened for me and you might relate to that, and therefore there may be similarities. And the value is huge in just sharing what we call in 12 Step experience, strength, and hope. This is what it is, this is what I went through. You may or may not relate to some of it. What happened when you realized that you were unknowingly contributing to your son’s disease? What happened for you when that realization came over you and then you started this therapy? How did the therapy go?
Lynn Rothenberg:
This therapist was very good. And I went to him, I told him what was going on and he met with both of us a couple of times and me alone. And then I do remember the moment he said to me, “If you keep giving money to your son, you are speeding his path to his own death.” And when he said that to me, I got it. I really got it. So the next few meetings we had with him, we talked about getting David off my financial assistance and support, and he was all for it. He said, “I don’t like asking for money,” and I thought you don’t? This was news.
And the therapist was very smart, and he said, “I bet you don’t like feeling dependent on your mom.” He said, “No, I don’t. I do want to be on my own.” So we made a pact that at the end of the month, that was November 2009, the end of the month all support was cut off. And in that time, between now and then, this was early November, he’d find a job so he could be self-supporting. Well, that’s not how it happened. He got arrested. He was good until the end of the month and then in December, he was arrested.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
He was arrested for trying to get money for drugs. Is that accurate?
Lynn Rothenberg:
Burglary, because he stole and he went straight to this combination jeweler pawn shop and would get the money and buy heroin. This was not for self enrichment.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Oh, yes, yes, of course.
Lynn Rothenberg:
Obviously.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Yes, yes, yes.
Lynn Rothenberg:
This was you get the stuff, you drive to the jeweler, get the money, go buy the heroin. And his use had grown to such enormous proportions, he needed a lot of money.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
There’s a couple ways to look at it, right? So one way to look at it is that I can see parents saying, “Oh my gosh, I don’t want to cut them off because then they’re going to go do something desperate for drugs, and then now we’re involved in the legal system,” et cetera. So I could see that point of view, and then I could see another point of view that says, “Well, I funded the steady increase of this amount of the tolerance of the amount of drugs required, and then when I pulled that, the fall to the consequences, the fault, the amount that they needed at that point that they were reliant on was so large because they had been dependent.”
So I could see looking at this a bunch of different ways, and I think one of the things that I want to insert here for parents to understand is that there are lots of ways to remove financial help and to work with your adult child who’s struggling. One of the things that I often recommend to people is a way that if the adult child is willing to do X, Y, Z, then some of the basic needs will be funded. And so there are a lot of different ways to, quote, unquote, “cut someone off,” from this stream of income, and the important piece is that the consequences are really important for people struggling with addiction to experience. And it’s really painful for the family to see that and experience that and allow that to happen.
Lynn Rothenberg:
If you go back to stage one or stage two when there’s drugs, but nothing serious, if they get arrested, this is a time to take this step. Let them get arrested because it’s not that serious yet. It’s early on. If they go to jail, do not bail them out. They won’t die. Just let them stay in jail for a night, two nights, three nights. Let them stay there. It’s very hard for a parent to think of their poor child in jail, but jail is a lot better than prison. The earlier they get that consequence, the better. When David was in one of the rehabs in Florida, someone said to him because he was talking about how he had been living his life, and they said, “You’re going to end up in prison. And he told me this. He said, “I thought no, I’m not.” It’s like no one thinks they’re going to get addicted.
They’re just using some drugs. They’re having a good time at first. Well, he had a consequence, but the problem was it was like short of death, it was the worst consequence. So everything was too late. It was all too late. It’s nice that I finally realized what I was doing was not helpful. Helping is actually stealing your child’s opportunities to find themself, to feel their consequences and developmentally. Because when they’re using, the developmental process doesn’t take place. And by continuing to give the money, I was stealing that opportunity for him to get back on his normal developmental process. And so if you look at it that way, that’s a good mantra. Helping is hurting. It’s stealing from them. I didn’t know it. Why would I?
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Will you tell us a little bit about what happened when he did finally get arrested for burglary?
Lynn Rothenberg:
Well, he called me at night. It was about 10:30 at night and he told me he was in the police station, and I was shocked. It proceeded along a very harsh criminal route because I had to get a lawyer and the DA was charging him with second degree burglary. He removed the addiction component. This was a district attorney who ran on a single issue platform, and that was drug reform. His words were, “Drug abuse or addiction should be treated in the mental health zone, not the criminal justice system.” So when this happened, I thought and David’s lawyer said, “Probably, he has a chance at drug court because of his history. He’s been through so many rehabs. It’s clearly without this drug, he never would’ve done this.” So I was kind of hopeful, but the DA made it clear very early, there was no chance David was going to get drug court.
But the lawyer kept fighting for it while David was in rehab because after his arrest, he went to long-term rehab and he had to go through detox. And he was so full of drugs the night of the arrest, I don’t know how he survived, quite frankly. But so while he was in rehab, the lawyer was taking his time. He said, “We don’t want to rush things. You never get anywhere in criminal cases when you rush things. We’ll take our time, let David get clean.” And the ADA kept pretty firm. He had a firm stand about it. He said he was representing the DA, and the DA did not want it. And then our lawyer said, “I’m going to meet with the drug court judge,” because in the legal system, it’s all how it’s prosecuted.
And if the DA prosecutes with this second degree burglary charge second degree, that means he’s taking him off the track for drug court because second degree burglary by statute, it’s a violent crime in New York state, and so they typically do not accept violent offenders into drug court. The lawyer met with the ADA and the drug court judge, and the lawyer told me the judge was, “Obviously this is a drug-related charge.” He said, “This needs to be reduced to third degree burglary. There was no violence.” This is not someone, it was daytime burglaries, and he said to the ADA, “Go back to the DA and have him reduce the charge.” So he did and the DA refused, so that was the end of it. That was the end of drug court, so we knew prison was coming. That was the end.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
And how long did David go to prison?
Lynn Rothenberg:
Well, he was sentenced for six years. The lawyer worked out a deal with the ADA that was a plea deal of no less than three and a half years and no more than five years, so we were okay with that. It was still horrible, but it was better than six years. On the day of the plea, the judge, not the drug court judge, the other judge, I don’t know his title, I have a title for him, but I won’t mention it, his official title, he rejected the plea and he said, “That’s not harsh enough.” So he changed it to three and a half to six. He gave him the six.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
What was that day like?
Lynn Rothenberg:
Well, that was a pretty horrible day. It was in January and it was cold and it was raining and gray, and some friends went to witness it as support. The judge had the opportunity to sentence him to three and a half, and so we were hopeful. We thought maybe, maybe because the pre-sentencing memorandum, which is something that the lawyer puts together, arguing for mitigating circumstances, not to say you’re not guilty, you’re guilty. But the idea in the legal system is mitigating circumstances prevent too harsh a sentence. That’s why they look at them, but this judge had no use for mitigating circumstances.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
How many years did he serve?
Lynn Rothenberg:
Five and a half. He would’ve been out a little sooner because you get a little reduction, not much. But in the prison, it was a week before he left and the COs adulterated a drug test, so he ended up in solitary confinement past his release date. I had to get a lawyer because if I hadn’t, he would’ve stayed the full time.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
And the lawyer was able to prove it was adulterated?
Lynn Rothenberg:
Yep.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Wow.
Lynn Rothenberg:
And the CO was transferred to a different section of the prison.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
How were they able to prove it?
Lynn Rothenberg:
Well, I don’t know the details, I just know that I knew someone who knew someone who worked in there and the word was this particular correction officer was known for adulterating and some of the other COs didn’t like it. They even said they didn’t like that, and so the word was around. And then they heard that we had a lawyer. Most inmates do not have the money to hire a lawyer, so when they heard a lawyer was on board, they transferred this CO.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
What was the experience like for you having a child in prison for drug-related crimes?
Lynn Rothenberg:
Well, it’s a lot like having an addicted child because they’re both very isolating experiences. When you have an addicted child, you tend to not talk about it, not reveal it, and when you have someone in prison, you tend not to disclose that. My close friends knew. They knew, but then everyone kind of goes back to their life. They figured it’s over now. Thank goodness it’s settled, now he’s in prison. Okay. He’ll serve his time, he’ll come out. People don’t understand going to prison. It’s not going, it’s living it. And what happens inside or what may happen inside, and how traumatizing it is for everyone in prison, and how our prison system is such a squandered opportunity when instead of creating a rehabilitative system, it’s purely a retribution. It’s not rehabilitation.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Well, it’s penitentiary. Right? Paying penance.
Lynn Rothenberg:
Yes. Right.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
It’s a punishment. It is a penitentiary. We like to think of it as some sort of rehabilitation, but it is punishment. It’s penance. Did your son stay sober through prison?
Lynn Rothenberg:
I don’t know. I know that he used Suboxone in there. I know of one time when he did and he was put in solitary for that, but beyond that, I really don’t know and I haven’t asked him because I don’t care.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Talk to me about healing from this. What does life look like now? How do you reconcile and manage in the world today?
Lynn Rothenberg:
Well, the healing process was slow and it’s taken a long time, but for me, I’ve found my balance and I feel I’m back to my original photography. And so art is very healing, and I’m a writer. And working on the book, I won’t say it’s been healing, but I will say it has given me a serious focus because I worked on it every single day. It’s been like eight, 10 years. So I would say I’m in good shape.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
What’s your relationship like with David?
Lynn Rothenberg:
It’s still very close. We never lost it. It’s amazing, but we really never lost it. And I think we got even closer when he was in prison. We talked on the phone all the time, I visited him, I sent him packages. I think it’s important for parents actually to always stay connected to their child who’s using drugs.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Yes.
Lynn Rothenberg:
It does not mean you approve. By staying connected, it’s not approval. They need to internalize your presence because addiction is very lonely and there are very dark moments, and at least they can think, “Well, mom or dad or whoever is with me. I’m not completely alone.” And it’s critical, no matter how upset you are and angry and if they’ve stolen from you, no matter what they’ve done, stay connected so they feel loved and they know you love them because they’re struggling. They’re in pain.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Absolutely. Absolutely. Something we do in our house, we say two things. I tell my boys who are six and we’ve been doing this forever, when they’re in trouble, I always tell them, “I love you and this has nothing to do with how I feel about you.” And then the other thing I tell them every night before they go to bed is, “There’s nothing you could do, say or be to change how much I love you.” And I do, I think you’re right. It’s important that we need to know that you still love us because we can’t imagine a world where someone would love us. We feel so unlovable. We don’t love ourselves, that’s for sure. And it’s unimaginable to us, particularly if you don’t have children, how you could possibly love us given what we’ve done. And so that reminder, you may think it’s obvious because you’re still showing up and all the things, but we need to hear it. What is his life like now?
Lynn Rothenberg:
David has put together a good life for himself. He’s married and she knows his background, she accepted it, and he has two children. He has a three and a half year old and an eight month old, and he has a job. He’s supporting them. So I’d say I’m amazed at his strength. I’m just amazed. The whole time he was in prison, I would think sometimes I couldn’t believe how strong he was.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
When does your book come out?
Lynn Rothenberg:
Well, that’s a good question. I’m on the final edit now and I’m going to be sending it out to agents probably within two months.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
You are incredibly altruistic and brave and bold for being willing to come out and say, “I did stuff that contributed to my kids’ addiction.” That’s a scary thing to come out and say, and yet it’s so important because it’s happening all the time and people have no idea, and of course it’s not their intention.
Lynn Rothenberg:
That’s kind of why I did it. I did it because believe it or not, I’m pretty private here. I’ve written a book and I’m on a podcast, but I usually am pretty private.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
But you see the importance.
Lynn Rothenberg:
Yes. I can see other parents, I see myself, and I also want parents to know they’re not alone. This has happened to others. Embrace them and say, “Look,” because I felt so alone. “This has happened to others. It’s happening to others, and this is what could help you maybe.”
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Yes. Do you have a website or social media or any place where people can follow along so that when the book comes out they get notifications? Or do you have any email address or something where people can connect with you?
Lynn Rothenberg:
I have a Facebook page and that’s probably the best place. I’m on Instagram too, just my name. It’s L-Y-N-N, R-O-T-H-E-N-B-E-R-G.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Awesome. So if people want to connect with you, they can go to your Facebook page or your Instagram, which are your name, and connect with you. And we are so, so excited for the book to come out. Please keep us posted.
Lynn Rothenberg:
I will.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
We will post about it, we’ll let people know.
Lynn Rothenberg:
Thank you so much. Thank you.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Awesome, awesome.
Lynn Rothenberg:
This has been wonderful. Thank you, Ashley. Thank you so much. This was really, it was just exciting to be speaking to you and to so many other parents like me.
Ashley Loeb Blassingame:
Yeah, yeah. Thank you for doing this. Thank you for letting us invade your privacy and talking about it. I promise you, so many people are feeling the same way and need to hear, need to normalize it, so thank you. Thank you very, very much.
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