"An Open Letter To The Parent That Chose Drugs Over Me" A Year Later

A year ago I wrote a piece called An Open Letter To The Parent That Chose Drugs Over Me.

I wrote the piece at 3am one night after receiving a text from my mom. The words she sent to me brought back all of the hurt and anger that comes along with growing up with a drug addicted parent, which is why I wrote the article in the first place. It was a way of telling my mom all the things on my mind without actually having to respond to her texts.

Before writing this piece, I hadn't had more than 100 views on any of my Odyssey articles, and I thought this would be much of the same. I assumed a handful of my facebook friends would read it, but that's about it. For me, writing it was a way of fulfilling my weekly article submission requirement at Odyssey, while also releasing some of my stress of the situation.

For the first couple days after the article went live on the internet, the response was exactly what I expected. But then one day, a close friend's mom shared my article, and then it spread like wildfire. People all over my hometown started sharing the article. Teachers, guidance counselors, my highschool classmates and their parents started giving me feedback. One night I went to bed with less than 100 views, and the next morning I woke up to a message from my editor congratulating me for hitting 3,000 views. It literally happened overnight. I refreshed the stats every hour, watching as the views climbed up by the 100s, until it hit about 5,000. The views slowed down, and I thought it was done.

I was wrong.

Within a couple weeks, my article had garnered over 100,000 views. It was on the front page of the Odyssey website. My social media accounts were blowing up. There were hundreds of comments on the article, and just as many private messags on all of my social media accounts. People came to me to tell me that my article made them feel like they were not alone in their struggles, that they were relieved that their feelings were normal. There were messages of encouragement to continue doing things with my life. I had young people asking me how I coped throughout school and seeked advice on how to handle the things they were going through. Some people even had the audacity to message me telling me I was ungrateful, that I didn't understand addiction, and I didn't have a right to be mad because at least my mom was alive. But the positive replies were definitely more frequent than the negative. There was even an incredible public response written about my article by Callie Little (published in Marie Claire, Cosomopolitan).

Eventually the traction on the article really slowed down, but then Odyssey posted it on their social media accounts and it blew up...again. To this day, the article has just over 690,000 total views, with a steady stream of about 1,000 new views per month.

When I sat down to write this letter, I never imagined the viewing it would get. But I am thankful. I am glad that at 20 years old, I published a controversial piece that got people talking.

To this day, I still don't talk to my mother. She will occasionally call and leave voicemails for me, but I never answer her phone calls and I have not seen her in years. There is so much more to the history of her treatment toward my sister and I that another person could never grasp simply by reading my article, and frankly, I could probably never even be able to describe it accurately anyway. There is no hope of us ever having a productive relationship. She knows that. I will die never having a close relationship with my mother, and I accepted that a long time ago. She will never see me graduate college or get married. My future children will never know their grandmother. The only way she will ever know what is going on in my life is if, by chance, there is someone in my family that she hasn't already burned bridges with willing to inform her. I know that sounds harsh, and believe me, I wish things were different, but sometimes your own mental health and sanity is more important than accepting someone in your life simply because of your shared blood.

As exciting as the experience was, I hope that my legacy will include more than just a single angry open letter. I dream of producing literary work that is worthy of this kind of attention.