Chapter 09: Linda Starts Using

Chapter 09 - Linda’s Drug Addiction Begins

As the morning of February 23, 2002 started, Linda was still out dancing. I could not sleep and was concerned when midnight had passed, and now 1 a.m. was quickly approaching, then 2 and 3. Finally, at 5:30 a.m., Linda got home. I was sitting on the couch and she sat next to me.

“Odell, I am so sorry. I was having such a good time. This guy started talking to me and then he wanted to know if I would like some cocaine. I told him I’d love some and we went to his dealer and got some.”

“Oh, my God. Linda, are you all right?”

“Yes, but I am still a little high. I wanted IV cocaine, but he got us crack instead.”

“I feel like you cheated on me. I feel totally betrayed and lied to. I could not feel any worse if you had sex with the guy. Did you have sex with the guy?”

“No, we just did the coke.”

“WHY?”

“I just wanted to. I have been feeling so bad about not having a baby and the way things are going, I just wanted to escape. What are you going to do?”

I was devastated. I did not know what to do. When I ran my ad on the singles site, I said “no smoking and no drugs,” and now my wife was doing both.

Most of you reading this will be thinking that you know what you would have done, pushed her out the door. I do not know whether it is a character flaw in me, or in you, but I could not do that. I had sworn to live with her for the rest of my life, and I loved her.

“I know what I am going to do. I am going to get some breakfast. You want to go to IHOP?”

She smiled and said she would.

I needed time to think. I knew that this was not just a small mistake. Linda was a recovering drug addict. She had now taken us both onto that rollercoaster. But she was my wife, and I was raised to believe in “til death do you part.”

“Linda, I want you to know that I love you and nothing you do can change that.”

Then she dropped a real bombshell. She said that this slime had told her that he did want to have sex with her. In fact, they had a date set for that afternoon and she was going to go.

I could tell you what I said to that if I could remember, but I do not. You are thinking you would have killed her or him or both of them. But I was thinking about killing myself. I was thinking about how much I loved this woman and how I was now a failure at the most important thing I would ever do in my life. I wanted to know how I was going to win her back.

That afternoon Linda left for her liaison, but quickly returned. This piece of filth had stood her up.

As I said at the beginning, I did not know that I did not understand drug addiction. I had heard all the talk. It is a disease, not a decision. The addict cannot control what she is doing. I just did not understand that. I knew the words like some prayer, but the reality was far more than I could possibly understand. There is something in my makeup that was a hindrance. I have a hard time giving up. I am not saying I should have given up or just walked away. I do not know what I should have done.

After that day I tried to win my Linda back, to treat her even better than I had. One of the things we started doing was looking into why we could not have children. They say you should be trying for a year before you take this step, but Linda wanted to find out now.

We had me tested and found that while my sperm had some problems and it would be difficult for me to get someone pregnant, it was not impossible, and I should be able to increase my odds by changing the style of underwear I wear.

Linda also had some tests done and we met with an infertility expert. During this meeting, I made a huge mistake. We were talking about the possibility of using someone else’s egg to get Linda pregnant, and I asked if that technique could be used even if Linda had stopped having her periods. The doctor said, “You mean complete ovarian failure.”

Linda heard those words and was convinced that the doctor told her that her ovaries had failed.

This deepened Linda’s depression. Linda was now convinced that we were not good together and that she should get herself an apartment in Portland. We could see each other on the weekends. I told her that I would not live that way. If she wanted a divorce, then we could divorce. But I was not going to have a sham marriage or support two households. I also told her that once our marriage was over, I would not have anything more to do with her. This was not going to be like when we were “broken up.”

On Tuesday, March 20, 2002, while I was at work, Linda went out to a bar and met someone who was simply interested in drugs, and she was introduced to cocaine and heroin. On the way home from her little party, Linda was pulled over for speeding. The cop never noticed that she was higher than a kite, driving under the influence.

I was constantly trying to find some way to give Linda the hope I felt she needed to climb out of her depression and start living our life. In early April, we went shopping and bought a video camera so we would be ready to make videos of our kids.

We spent a lot of time talking about names. Linda was set on the idea that if we had a daughter she should be called Vivian Violet, after Linda’s biological mother. However, our second daughter’s name was a much harder problem. I have loved Tolkien since I first read him in high school and I always wanted to name a daughter after the most beautiful woman who ever lived, in Middle-earth, Luthien Tinuviel. Linda never liked that name, but I think with time it grew on her.

The problem we had with boys’ names was not the name but the number. I am Odell Sneeden Hathaway III. I am the sixth Odell S. Hathaway and the fifth Sneeden. When I was born, someone told my folks that the number is based on the number alive and changes during the person’s life. I was given III in 1961. In 1965, OSH Senior died, but my father stayed the II and I am going to stay the III. Linda wanted to know what number we were going to give our son. I said VI. But Linda wanted to know how we would explain that the father was III and the son VI. We laughed for hours over this.

The second son we were going to name after my longtime friend and mentor, Weaver.

From this point on, whenever we talked about having children, it was always about having Deli and VV. Often Linda or I would say, “Deli, VV, come and see me.”

On TV and from politicians we hear the words “War on Drugs,” but that is not so. Drugs are far too much a part of who we are. Recently we have had presidents tell us they did not inhale and others who were alcoholic and may have used cocaine. Drugs are just a huge part of who we are and much too easy to get to be stopped. We are going to have to change who we are in order to free ourselves.

A few days after we bought the camera, April 10, 2002, Linda was treating herself, as she often did, to a very good lunch at one of the top restaurants in what they call in Portland the Hawthorne District, when she decided that some nice cocaine would be a wonderful dessert. So she walked out the door onto a busy street, walked up to the first person she saw, and asked where she could find some. This person was accommodating and took her to a dealer a few blocks away.

On April 18, Linda did the same thing again.

I was going out of my mind trying to figure out what I could do to stop this out-of-control drug use and bring back my wife. I was so afraid of her dying.

I tried to remind her of better times we had known in our relationship. One weekend we drove back to Astoria to have dinner at one of Linda’s favorite restaurants and visit the beach. On the way home we stopped at a small and somewhat sleazy-looking hotel for a romantic interlude. At least, that was my plan. Linda was much more interested in getting another deposit. I can still hear her asking me, while I was trying to make love to her, “Are you done yet?”

On April 30, 2002, Linda had another party. Linda was getting good at this. She no longer had to ask people on the street for dealers. She now had what she considered “friends” who were more than willing to supply her with drugs whenever she wanted, and had the money. These slimeballs were even willing to inject her. She was not good at injecting herself.

In May, something strange happened that was never explained. Linda and I were sleeping in separate rooms. One night Linda called me into her room to ask me a question. As I walked in, I found a broken glass lying on the floor next to my side of the bed. This was not a glass that had fallen and broken. It had been smashed. There were no large pieces left. Stranger still, after I picked up what I could and vacuumed, it was not embedded in the carpet. It must have been smashed somewhere else and then put there.

I showed this to Linda and she was genuinely shocked. She had no idea where it had come from. I pressed her, but she continued to assert that she had no idea how it had been broken, that it must have fallen off the nightstand. I pointed out that such a fall might not even break a glass, let alone smash it like this. She thought it must have been defective. I told her that the only way a glass could have been broken like this was if someone had broken it deliberately.

So we had a little mystery. Either some stranger was breaking into people’s houses to break glasses, Linda had done it deliberately to hurt me, or Linda had done it when Linda was not herself.

In a few days Linda had an appointment with her psychologist to review her medications. I went and we told him about the glass. He was not surprised that Linda might have episodes where she could not control herself or remember what she had done, especially if she were doing drugs. In fact, he warned her that he would soon stop prescribing for her if she continued using.

Somehow Linda made it through May without going out or using drugs. But in June, the pull overtook her again on the 19th and the 22nd.

Linda and I would talk after she went out. We would try to figure out what was wrong and why she would do this. We talked about the fact that Linda for some reason found that she did not have any friends in Vancouver. Every other place she had lived, she had made friends. We talked about how awful she felt because she was so out of shape and how she felt like a failure being married.

I saw one thing clearly in everything that Linda was telling me, and that was that Linda was sabotaging herself. She was upset about so many things but made no effort to correct any of them. We weren’t pregnant, get depressed. Our house is not clean enough, get depressed. Don’t try, just feel bad, was her attitude.

The more we talked, the more I could hear the voice of an overly critical mother coming from the face of the woman I loved. I told her it sounded like she was doing her best to make all the bad things she was told about herself as a child come true. Her mother telling her she was lazy and no good, her father telling her she was fat. As a child she had rebelled; now she was doing everything she could to prove them right.

We talked about Linda’s addiction as though it was a different person, because I believe it was. I told her that she had a monster inside of her trying to kill her and that we had to fight it every day for the rest of her life.

I told her that it felt in many ways like she was doing her best to make me break up with her. My leaving her was her way of proving that she was worthless. Leaving her would never really be an option. I loved her too much.

In August, Linda and I celebrated our first anniversary. Part of the celebration was to give her a necklace shaped like a tortoise. The salesperson told us that this was a sign of fertility among the local Indians, and we needed all the help we could get. That weekend I took Linda to Ocean View, Washington, for a rest. On the way home we stopped at PETCO and Linda fell in love. She got a dog.

Linda continued to visit her friend in Seattle every few weeks. On Monday, August 19, Linda went up to visit her, but she never made it. She was driving through Olympia when she got thirsty. She stopped in a bar there and got ripped, so drunk that she could barely, and nowhere near legally, drive. She met some guy in this bar and followed him to the nearby Holiday Inn where she got a room for the night.

Worried that Betty might call me and let me know that she had never shown up, Linda called me to let me know that she only got to Olympia and was too tired to go on, so she had taken a room for the night. Unfortunately, I could hear sleazy music playing in the background. I asked why I heard a porno playing. She told me that she was drunk and some guy had her follow him to the Holiday Inn, that he was gone now, but he must have put the movie on. At least, that was what she thought had happened, because she did not remember getting the room or how the porn was turned on.

I told Linda that I wanted to come up and get her. It was only about 5:00 p.m. But Linda would not hear of it. After that she would not accept my calls for the rest of the night. I did not sleep much that night. The next day I had to take off work because Linda was so hung over that I had to go up and get her. When I got to the room, the porn was still playing. We had to abandon her car and drove home in mine.

We talked on the way home, but it was the same song I had heard before. How Linda would start going to AA meetings, how she really wanted help, and how she really loved me.

I did not know what to do. I went to an Al-Anon meeting, but I did not find much there for me. I felt awkward at the meeting because I was the only man there. I was told that men leave and women stay. I was also told that the only real control I had was over when I would leave.

I tried seeing a therapist myself. I really do not remember much of what we spoke about.

This was September 12, 2002. Before I went to see my therapist, Linda told me that one of the girls she worked with at Same Day Services had called and wanted to go to a movie with her.

When I got home, Linda was not there. Around 9:00 p.m. Linda called and said that she was going to this person’s house and would be home late. I went to bed.

About 2:00 a.m. the phone rang. I answered it and was told that my wife had been in an accident and I needed to come to the hospital. I got in the car and drove straight there. When I arrived, I found that things were better and worse than I had thought. Linda had not been in an accident. Linda had overdosed. In fact, Linda had died.

Linda’s heart had stopped beating and the paramedics had revived her.

I spent the rest of that night in the ER with Linda.

During the day, while they were waiting for tests to get back, they moved Linda to a private room. They were very concerned that this was not an overdose but a suicide attempt. They wanted to know whether we had a support system to help take care of Linda and get her off drugs. We told them yes, she was going to AA and I would make certain that she went more often. We also told them of her therapist and psychologist who would help us. Finally, they let us go home. This was Friday the thirteenth.

The next day I had to take Linda back to the house where she had overdosed and her heart had stopped. Linda’s purse, car keys, and car were all there. I did not go into the house and sat outside with the doors locked and the engine running.

When we got home, Linda told me about what her “friends” had said. They told her that she was lucky to be so fat that if they could have lifted her body, they would have dumped it in the river.

Linda also found out that the person she was allowing to inject her loved to give people just a little too much.

That weekend we went to several AA meetings and Linda seemed like she was working hard on her recovery, but that soon subsided.

The next six weeks Linda did her best and stayed clean, but at the end she started going out again. In fact, she went out or had drugs on October 25 and 31. I think Linda was worried and using that as an excuse to do drugs.

Linda and I were going down to California to attend the wedding of my brother. I was scared, and with good reason. I did not know what would happen with Linda in a place so oriented around drugs. While we were there, Linda did not do drugs, but her drinking became quite a problem. At the wedding reception she must have had four or five drinks. Please remember that Linda had hepatitis C and was not supposed to drink at all.

After the wedding, we drove to Yosemite for a few days of rest. When we would go out to dinner she would drink. At the airport waiting for the flight home she had a few, and on the plane home, because the flight was delayed, they started handing out beer like it was soda. She must have had a six-pack.

By the time our plane landed, I was so upset that I confronted her. I told her how angry I was, that I loved her, and did not want to waste my life watching her kill herself with drugs and booze.

We returned to Portland on November 10, 2002, and by the 14th Linda was out doing drugs again.

This was once again the last straw. Something had to be done. I knew it and so did Linda. Finally, Linda was willing to get some help. So she went to drug treatment, outpatient.

On November 18 we went to the treatment center and answered all the questions they had. I did not think the process was invasive, but Linda felt that they were violating her privacy to a huge degree. It was so bad that after we were done I took Linda out to dinner. We ordered, and Linda had the gall to order a drink. I wanted to stand up and leave right then, but I did not. I just sat there as she downed four drinks with dinner.

When we got home, Linda went to her room and I went to mine. After a little while I heard her going to the garage. I ran out and found that she was starting her car and going out. I did not know what to do, so I stood behind her car where she could see me and where she would have to run me down to leave.

Linda yelled, “Get the hell out of my way!”

“NO!”

“Move, you idiot!”

“You are drunk. There is no way I am going to let you drive!”

“I am not drunk!”

“Yes, you are!”

We must have stood there for about ten minutes when she finally gave up and went back into the house. I disabled the garage door so she would not be able to get it open.

In the house I found her cell phone and noticed there was a message. I listened to it. It was her drug dealer. He was upset because Linda had stood him up. He was telling her that people do not treat people like that.

Linda started seeing a drug counselor, but on November 24 she decided to do drugs again. After what had happened, her old dealer would no longer sell to her, so she had to find a new one. This is not a hard process. She had found that strip clubs are a perfect place to find people willing to sell drugs. Also, she liked to look at the strippers and dream about being one or being with one.

That night she met a guy and his girlfriend, a stripper. His name was James. He was more than willing to sell Linda drugs and help her shoot up. In fact, he invited Linda back to his apartment for a party. Linda withdrew cash from the ATM and they were off.

This was one of the worst nights of Linda’s life. When I next heard from her, she was locked in the bathroom of this slime’s apartment, calling me on her cell phone.

“Odell, I don’t know what to do.”

“Are you all right?”

“No, I met a guy and his girlfriend at a bar and we got some cocaine for a party. Now we’re all naked and they won’t let me leave.”

“Where are you?”

“I’m in the bathroom.”

“No, what is the address?”

“I don’t know. Odell, help me!”

Then I heard other voices and banging on the door as she hung up.

I am certain that she had already been raped at least once, but she would not admit to that. There was nothing I could do. A few hours later Linda called me. She had escaped and was lost out by the airport. I had her give me the street names and had her park while I came to get her.

The woman I found was scared out of her mind, ashamed and crying. I put her in my car and we drove home. I put her to bed and just held her.

You would think that after being raped by someone you would not trust them anymore. But Linda was quickly back to buying drugs from this worthless human being. I had taken Linda’s cash card to prevent her from getting more drugs, so on November 27 Clyde  showed her how to use Western Union to charge drugs to her credit card.

On December 15 Linda and Clyde  took a hotel room near the Portland airport for another little party. This time it was just drugs, I think. After seeing the way Linda handled a syringe, Clyde  was worried that Linda was going to kill herself. He did not want to lose a client or have police looking into her death. So he taught her how to make powdered cocaine into crack cocaine and how to smoke it. Linda loved it. It felt better than injecting the stuff, but it did not last as long.

Unfortunately, Linda was lost the next morning, so after Clyde  had left she called me and had me come get her.

She told me what had happened and said she had decided to give up drugs. She was going to sell her car to repay all the money she had spent.

I thanked her and told her that if she did, we could use what was left of the money to pay for a trip to Hawaii, a sort of second honeymoon.

Christmas came and went without much trouble. Then came New Year’s Eve. Linda and I had no plans. When I woke up on December 31, 2002, I looked into my wife’s room and found she was not there. I walked into the dining room to find the woman I loved half naked with a syringe stuck into her breast.

Linda had very large breasts and found it easiest to inject there since she could see what she was doing and have both hands free.

There she was shooting up in front of me. She was shocked to see me. I yelled at her to stop. I could not deal with the sight of the woman I loved holding the breast I had so often kissed and fondled, injecting cocaine into herself.

I begged and pleaded, but nothing would stop her. She ran to the bathroom to continue. I followed her there. Never in my life had I come so close to hitting her, not out of anger, I just wanted to get the syringe out of her hand, but I refrained.

Linda kept going and I was terrified she was going to kill herself. She had no idea what she was doing. Her breast was covered with pinholes. Sometimes she would pull out and blood would spray onto the walls and ceiling.

Finally, she was out of cocaine and ashamed of what she had been doing. That day we went to five AA meetings and more the next day.

I think this experience did one thing. It finally convinced Linda to change from IV use to smoking cocaine.

On January 7, Linda went out once again.

In mid-January, Linda sold her car and we booked our flight to Hawaii. I know now this was a mistake and we should not have gone until Linda had some time clean, but frankly, I needed a rest.

Once the car was sold, we needed a replacement. I hoped for a beater we could fix up over time. Linda wanted a Camaro. She found an ’87 she wanted. It was her car, so we bought it, and it quickly started falling apart.

January 15, 2003, Linda’s monster surfaced and she went out again.

Frankly, I was at the end of my rope. Linda was still using drugs even though she had already died once. What made it worse was that she was still going to the same dealer who had raped her weeks before. Linda had given him her cell number so he could call when he had good stuff.

Looking at the phone bill, I could get his number, his name, his address. I found the bar he sold from and a plan formed.

I am a deeply spiritual person. I believe in the sanctity of human life. I oppose capital punishment. I think of myself as a pacifist. But I believe in protecting others, especially those we love. I had tried talking to Linda. I had tried calling the police. Nothing worked.

I knew I had to do something. Confronting him would do no good. I thought about getting a gun. I did not want to go to prison.

Watching too much TV taught me that the people he bought drugs from would not want attention. They might push him out of the way. I made a flyer announcing that Clyde  was a drug dealer. I sent copies to Clyde , his landlord, the strip club manager, the Portland Police, and the Liquor Control Board. I may have even sent one to the newspaper. I did not care if he left on his feet or in a box.

To avoid traceability, I used self-sealing envelopes and stamps and mailed them from a post office across town.

Of course, it did not help. Linda continued buying from him. When Clyde  showed her the flyers, he thought it was a joke.

They say be careful what you wish for. A few weeks later Clyde ’s girlfriend killed him and is now in prison.

Linda, of course, continued using as we headed into February and away for our vacation.

Next: Chapter 10 - PASTE TITLE HERE

Previous: Chapter 08 - Our Life Together Before Drugs

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