It has been years since I have started a new year with this much hope! Our family has been dealing with the repercussions of addiction for such a long time, the recovery process has been as long a road for my husband and I as it has been for our son, Jackson.
We moved to the Chicago area in 2010 when my husband retired from the Marine Corps, to live near our extended family. At that time I thought life was about to get easier for all of us without the stresses of perpetual deployments and moving every few years. I was SO wrong! Two of our three sons go in with the wrong crowd and started using drugs and drinking. Jackson was out of control and the older he got, the harder it was to set limits. He was lying to us, stealing, bringing strange women into the house in the middle of the night, and driving drunk. Nothing we said or did made any difference to him and we started to isolate from family and friends because our home had become a war zone. We finally had to ask him to leave our home and pray that he would choose recovery. We heard about New Life House from friends at Families Anonymous and when Jackson came to us with no place left to turn, we got him out to California as soon as we could. When I dropped him off at the house and got to my hotel room, I slept for 16 hours straight!
Although it took time for him to see the benefits of sobriety, we started to see changes in him soon after his arrival to the house. Over the last year, we have watched him change from a self-centered child to a compassionate, confident man! We could not be more proud of him for his hard work or more grateful to all of the men at New Life House for their commitment to recovery and to each other. Jackson is now a graduate, about to start a whole new life far away from family, but we know he will be just fine with the support of all his new brothers at New Life House.
- N.G.
Last Updated on May 24, 2022
