She tried to step away from drugs after her father died from cancer in early 2017. She had lived with him up until the month before his death. That’s when she was placed in a group home by the Department of Children and Families after fighting with a neighbor while high on drugs. “I made a real attempt to stop using because he wanted me to stop, but I woke up to the realization it was an obsession. After a number of arrests, the court ordered me to DATA.”
Some get speeding tickets. Some get in fights. Some get tattoos. Jonathan got strung out on marijuana. He was 14 then. He’s 18 now, and it took him four years – and DATA – to get clean. “I don’t know if she was impressed or not,” he says, a soft-spoken, dark-eyed young man from West Palm Beach. “I don’t think so. But then I started smoking more often and leaving school early and not going at all. I just wanted to stay home and smoke with my friends.”
It’s been a long time since you laid your head in my lap and just let me hold you for a while. It brought back such memories of how close we once were and how far apart we had become. You feel as though DATA has provided you the will as well as the means to live a drug free life. I feel as though DATA has given me my son back.
– Love, Mom