We lost our boy Jay February 16th 2016.
He had been fighting addiction for at least 2 years, and had finally agreed to go to California to attend a 90 day rehab program. He was discharged and sent home, where we were told he should go to a sober living house, bit nobody knew where or when he was supposed to go there. So he came home, and he was still very sick. He seemed sad. He was happy to be home, and went to NA meetings. I was working from home so I was glad to be able to be with him. On Thursday morning I woke up late. I ran down to start my class, and then before I knew it 2 hours of the class had passed. I finally had a break and went to the restroom next to my office. I had a picture that Jay had painted, a self portrait, hinging in there. I knew I NEEDED to check on him. I ran to the stairs and I started up them. I was on the fourth step and I heard him, making a crying sound. He was in the bathroom and the door was locked. I ran to get my cell phone and dialed 911. It had snowed, a lot and the streets were frozen. I broke down the door and saw a lot of blood. I didn’t know what it was and I started screaming at Jay. I was trying to turn him over to start CPR and the fire department came. They took Jay into my room and took off all of his clothes, and tried to Narcan him. He was breathing, and they rushed him to the hospital. He had anoxic brain injury caused by Heroin toxicity. His tolerance was lowered because he had been abstinent for 90 days. He was unable to recover and he died 2 days later.

by Carol, Jay’s Mom