By SUZANNE ROOK, Senior Writer
Posted: Tuesday, July 1, 2008 10:40 pm

(Editor’s Note: Identifying characteristics of the subject of this story have been changed.)

Alexis didn’t stop using — not after her parents saw the needlemarks on her arm or her heroin and her syringes.

Not after they begged her to get help.

Not last year when her father broke down her bedroom door and discovered her purplish body slumped over and realized she wasn’t breathing.

Even as the Northfield teenager agreed to treatment, packed her bags and checked herself in, she was using.

The fall

It’s still difficult, even after a year of sobriety, for Alexis to listen to her mother recount Alexis’ addiction and the pain it caused.

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As Ellen talks, Alexis pulls her legs and arms into a ball and nibbles on her nails. “Mom…” she pleads. Talking, Ellen says, reassuring her daughter, is cathartic.

Her divorce from Alexis’ father was amicable, and her children had adjusted, Ellen thought. But looking back, she’s certain her parenting skills left Alexis feeling isolated and adrift.

Alexis started drinking and smoking pot at 15, then moved to pills — OxyContin — and then heroin. First she snorted, then injected the powder she’d cook into a liquid. She was 17.

Heroin, Alexis said, made her feel confident, happy, carefree. But she didn’t see what Ellen saw — a young woman who had become defensive, secretive and angry. Ellen knew something was wrong with her child, but didn’t know what.

After months of uncertainty and spurred on by a rumor floating around town, Ellen confronted her daughter, forcing Alexis to pull back her shirt sleeves and admit the addiction that had consumed her.

Alexis says she was angry, but relieved that her secret was out.

Ellen’s heart broke that day. For a week she shut herself in, trying to absorb the reality.

“I just grieved,” she said. “I actually grieved (Alexis’) death. And she was still here.”

She worked to get Alexis into treatment, but her insurance company would only approve outpatient treatment, too little to keep Alexis from using. Only after her daughter’s overdose did the insurance company finally approve 21 days in an in-patient facility.




There, Alexis realized how far she’d fallen. “I went all the way to rock bottom,” she said. Three of her friends have died using heroin and OxyContin. Ten others have overdosed, but survived, she said.

She’s clean today, she says, because she left Northfield.

Alexis’ drug use forced Ellen to take stock and consider her role in Alexis’ problem. She wasn’t the parent her children needed, she said.

The key, she says, is communication; realizing your children are individuals, not objects.

“I had to work hard on letting her know I’m trying to be a better mother and that I love and believe in her. But the journey is still a struggle,” said Ellen. “I feel blessed we could both turn the corner.”

— Suzanne Rook can be reached at srook@northfieldnews.com or 645-1113.