Sue D.

Sue is about 40 years old and from bayous of Louisiana. She had been nearly catatonic for the past three days before I spoke with her, sleeping nearly all day every day after her arrival. She was outside smoking with Liz, a worn woman of similar age but with the stress of life deeply engrained in her face who I believe to be the Mystery Scatter. The Mystery Scatter has been leaving foul droppings wrapped in linens in the ladies restroom trashcan and shower.

Liz had taken Sue under her wing the way a sick animal nurses a smaller sick animal to health in the same den. It was a horrible and potentially explosive conglomeration of neurosis’s… a Mystery Scatter and accused thief taking on the position as friendly elder and egging a woman on to continue sleeping eighteen hours a day. Nothing good could come from that.

I sat down next to Sue after the incident with Seth. After dinner I had regained my composure and went back to dealing with patients - she happened to be the first. I started asking her questions about where she was from. The dam burst open.

She accused late-night staff of being apathetic to her late night crying, accusing one of them of telling her to stop wallowing in her self pity. Her whole story was on the verge of coming out.

Her story really involved two people, her angelic and innocent seventeen year old daughter who had been raised in a very protective environment. The second actor was the kid next door whose parents had nearly abandoned him for being a “bad seed.” As so many sick people do, she took him in and acted as a surrogate mother.

The neighbor kid joined the services and had come home after boot camp for final a final goodbye. He stayed with Sue that night.

Sue heard crying that night. She walked down the hall to and heard it coming from her daughter’s bedroom. She was being raped. She had been a virgin.

Once back at school, her daughter was teased for it by the other students. An accomplished member of the school’s marching band, she refused to participate in her final recital out of embarrassment. In the eyes of the school, she was merely that girl who had slept with the neighbor boy.

Sue fell back on the pain killers she had for a prior surgery. It’s pretty easy for addicts to get extra pills from their family doctors… pain is something that can only be measured by the individual feeling it. Most doctors won’t fight a patient who says they merely want to feel better.

It got bad, such that her daughter was taking care of her.

“You can stay here, Mom. I’ll take care of you,” was one of the last things her daughter told her before she left.

“You don’t need to take care of me anymore. That’s my role. It’s time for me to be a mother again.”

I had the talk with her that I have with most patients that have family issues. You have to leave it all back at home for a little while. The only way they’ll get better is if they spend this time focusing on themselves enough to fix themselves. Focusing on fixing a marriage or the pains that brought them to addiction while they’re supposed to be focusing on the addiction itself is a shortcut to relapse.

It’s a hard, if not impossible, yet entirely necessary task.

“You’re here to fix yourself now so you can deal with that stuff when you get out.”

It’s a hard argument to make. Forget about your failing marriage, except during the ten minute phone call every night. Forget about your hurting daughter, except when the group therapist asks about it. Forget about how much you hate being in some clinic in the boiling Florida heat away from your friends and family.

I told her it’s like trying to get to an emergency in an ambulance. You’ve got to open the door, get in, turn the ignition, and drive there. It’s an ordered process, with a necessary first step. Her first step was getting “clear.” She didn’t like the words sober or clean. Once “clear,” then she could be the mother she needed to be to a wounded daughter.