Happy Families

The Briefing on Cannabis and Children which was held in the House of Commons on 30 October went very well. Mary Brett and I had worked on little else for weeks before, and it’s so true that everything is in the planning.  It was wonderful to meet so many other parents there, some of whom I had only been in email contact with before.

Our family’s situation does not get better, except that our two remaining children at home are fine, although I am wondering about moving Alex,13, from his present school. He It has been apparent for months that he fears that he may turn out the way William has, and that being at the same school is going to bring that towards him. Despite our talks with him, he says he still does not feel safe there, so maybe time for a move.

Guy is still in a very good space, and so is Jack. Since the Briefing though, I have not felt great – I’ve had severe pain in my lower back, and have been forced to rest and seek out help from an osteopath, which may be working; I certainly feel slightly better today, if not weary and jumpy.  We have had a couple of turbulent days, though, so that’s not surprising. Both William’s and Guy’s birthdays are this week – Guy’s on Thursday and Will’s on Saturday. Having had no contact with William for some weeks now, not since I wrote the last Diary entry, I was half-expecting that Will would begin to contact me his birthday draws nearer. His birthday has always been important to him.

A text from him at the weekend asked me to ring if I could (please).

We were all eating supper in the kitchen on Saturday evening as my phone buzzed the message’s arrival.

Guy looked over at me, thoughtfully, as I read the message out, and said:

‘Evelyn Waugh once said ‘If someone wants to get in touch with me-  if it’s important- let them write me a letter’.

He had such a curious expression on his face, as he was recalling this, and I found myself laughing loudly.

‘Yes, that would be nice.’ I said, and decided not to respond to Will’s text. Yes, I would await a letter.

Will had promised us just that, of course, some weeks ago (about six I think). A cheque would be sent to us, he said (‘Would a thousand do?’ I remember the words vividly).

Then there were the various telephone calls saying he had was carrying around both a necklace and a cheque to give me (the necklace was to replace the one he had stolen and later sold, during the 80^th birthday party we were throwing for his grandmother. Whilst we were singing happy what-nots around a cake, he was upstairs swiping said necklace and a ring.) As detailed in these Diaries last time, when I did meet him for supper weeks later, he had neither article to give me, and no missive has been delivered subsequently by Royal Mail either.

The day before the Briefing which was probably one of the busiest in my life, I got a call from William. Sitting at my computer, scanning emails, fielding scores of calls, and trying to not give in to the fear that was trying to paralyse me since the weekend at the very thought of what I had let myself in for with the event, (just whose idea was this anyway?), the phone rang again. I was hoping it was GMTV firming up their invitation for me to be on the sofa with Lorraine Kelly the next morning. I was dismayed to hear Will’s voice.

‘Hello Mum, it’s me.’

On one of my busiest days after weeks of silence? I was that morning working on getting as much publicity as possible. Our secretary, Lynne, had decided to take matters into her own hands after we were let down by a pr guru contact, who had said he’d write a press release for us and then seemed to  enter some black hole. She’d penned one herself and emailed to many, and we were now getting lots of calls, also calling were delegates anxious to have questions answered. And now here was Will.

‘I’m at Grandma’s’ I could hear my mother in law’s voice in the background saying something to him.

‘I’m not sure why I’m phoning. I know that the last time you told me you didn’t want to see me again and told me to fuck off in the village.’

Oh, nice, in front of the aged relation who hates swearing.

‘Yeah, well I’m still waiting for the necklace and the money.’ I snarl, feeling that familiar trapped sensation, as I prepare to be played with like a mouse by a tom-cat.

‘Well, I’ve got them here but my flat’s been flooded and I’m down here staying with Grandma until I can get another place’.

‘Well, look, I’m up to my eyes in it here I’ll call you back when I’ve got a minute’. I put the phone down angrily. More likely is that friends’ parents have got sick of him staying and he has to disappear for a couple of days.

The phone rang again almost immediately.

The voice on the other end sounded like the Queen, I didn’t think she’d been sent a press release. Oh, no, it wasn’t her, just my mother in law in posh ‘I’m going to give you a piece of my mind, so I’ve put on my best cut glass accent’ mode.

‘Debra, it’s me’ she sounded grim, and angry.

Oh, god, I could feel she was going to mention the fuck-off incident. Good mothers don’t swear at their offspring. I knew I wasn’t good enough for the job. I am suddenly transported to my days as a twelve-year old girl, in a new school whose mother is dying in a huge local hospital, yet no-one is talking about it, being singled out by the Headmistress for not having the right indoor shoes on.  (Please just leave me alone, I’m trying to fit in and know I don’t.)

‘Look,’ I say ‘I’m really up against it here, we have our meeting in Parliament tomorrow, we’re launching our campaign to try and help the next generation. I can’t talk to you. I’ll call you back.’ I’ve almost stopped breathing. All these years of doing yoga and meditation and I seem spectacularly useless at any form of adequate breathing techniques in the face of supreme stress.  

The phone rang again, I let the machine get it. A message from Grandma this time.

‘I’m very worried about William, he’s really ill, please phone me back.’

So, I phone back ten minutes later unable to concentrate on anything else.

‘I’m so worried about William, he’s so ill, his place has been flooded and everything is ruined. It’s so sad for him.’

‘Do you believe him?’

‘Yes, I do, I think we need to help him. You are his mother after all, it’s all very well helping other people like you say you’re doing but what about Will’s future? Who’s going to sort that out that’s what I want to know. You are his mother you know!’ she said with a yodel in her voice.

Oh, god, please let me cope well with this and not lose my grip.

‘Do you think he’s got a future then?’ I say, wanting to cry.

I know I’m his mother, I want to scream. This is not fair I’ve tried to be a mother to him and every time I get screwed over. I don’t feel I can defend myself though, especially with other people’s mothers, hence the desire to cry. Whenever I’ve tried in the past my words seem to evaporate as I speak.

‘Look, things are really impossible here, I’m so busy. I can’t speak to you today, give me till Wednesday when things are quieter and I’ll call you back then.’

The phone rings again, must be GMTV this time.

Will again. I could hear Grandma whispering in the back.

‘I’m not sure what I’m supposed to be ringing about.’

I could hear ‘tell her about…......’ and then Will obviously getting cross with his grandmother hovering as he’s on the phone.

I speak instead.

‘Look William, you know I love you don’t you, but it’s time you started to keep your promises, fulfill what you say you’re going to do. That’s important. You said you’d give me a necklace and the cheque, so where are they? I’ll call you on Wednesday, maybe we can do something then.’

Wednesday came and I didn’t phone. Lack of courage I suppose, I was also exhausted and wanted a day to myself.

We had, the four of us, some months ago, discussed what we would do at Christmas. For years we have been taking it in turns to host Christmas. Last year was at my sister’s turn.  It had not been an easy day because Will wasn’t living with us.

We had thrown Will out of the house during October half-term for stealing, lying, smoking cannabis in our drug-free/smoke-free home – the indictment was a long one. By Christmas he was living with his grandmother in Guildford, unrepentant of the chaos he had caused us, mainly because he was stoned permanently. The nightmare was truly closing in.

This year, he is living elsewhere, we don’t know where. We could ask him, but what he says would probably be a lie, so what’s the point? We’re all so tired of this not-so-merry-go-round that we have given up hope of there being a happy conclusion for years. Alex’s view is ‘Good riddance, after all the problems he’s caused this family. Let him go, I’m not interested anymore.’ Jack is too busy with A levels, his band, his friends and My Space (not in that order!).

As a family though, we had agreed some months ago, that we would have Christmas Day as a family, just us (and little Lily, our puppy, this year of course). Guy suggested that we have a meal with his family, and William, in a restaurant in London, the week before, and whoever wanted to go could do so. He would also meet William for a drink on Christmas Day with whoever of us wanted to go. Alex said that he doesn’t want to see William at all for the moment, and so he wouldn’t go. The rest of us would do so.

The restaurant has not been booked. After my last meeting with William there seems little point, I can’t bring myself to see him again – more lies to cope with. Guy has been wondering what to do – whether to go ahead and book something and invite his mum and sister or wait for them to talk to him about Christmas. No-one is saying anything as a result.

But, Guy’s mother rings on Sunday night, and leaves a message saying she is very worried about William and would we call her.

I can hear Guy talking to his mother, beginning with the how are yous. It seems she had been with Will on Saturday. She had gone up to London to meet him with a bag of clean clothes, things he’d left at her house the week before, she’d done that to save him the trip down to her house.  I could hear Guy asking her why she was running around after him. Then he begins to say that if William is ill he’ll have to go to a doctor, or to a hospital.  A few more minutes of this, and he then went on to tell her that if she is worried about William she is going to have to keep her worries to herself because we are distanced from him now and intend to keep it that way, he is no longer our responsibility.

‘I’ve got two other children here, who I nurture. That young man has made his decisions about his own pathway and until he turns his life around I will not get involved with him anymore. The last time Debbie met him he told her he had gifts and then didn’t turn up with them, we can’t keep going like this it’s too hard. If you feel we are being too harsh just read his last college report that you have, just a year ago, those were the damning things that his teachers were saying about him, people who had only just met him. We fought hard for him to not to be expelled from there, and he couldn’t even be bothered to turn up for the one morning a week that we negotiated so he could get some basic AS levels. But you don’t remember any of this, and you refuse to read those comments. You say he’s ill, well I’m not surprised are you? He’s abused his body so much. A lot of these kids end up committing suicide, he’s a drug addict mum, and you’ve got to start accepting that. He will never come into this house again, we’ve tried everything and we’re not going to do it anymore.

I have my memories of the son who was mine, I’ve got photos here to remind me, what Will has become is not my son. I have two other children that need my attention and I’m going to do my utmost to make sure their childhoods aren’t ruined by what’s happened here. But I will not have you ring me up and talk to me about Will and say how concerned you are, you’ve got to stop doing that. I don’t want to hear about it.’

Firm, solid stuff, but also deeply upsetting.

William rang me the next day to ask if I wanted to meet him.

‘No, I don’t’ I say. ‘Funny how you ring me now it’s going to be your birthday at the end of the week.’

‘Well, its’ just that I haven’t seen you for ages. I know I’ve been the world’s worst son and all that – but I’m not doing a lot of the things I used to do, I’m getting my life back together. It’s not easy when your family don’t want to see you. I wanted to apologise, I don’t want anything from you.’

‘Well, I’d like something from you.’ I say becoming the hardened me that seems to come out whenever I talk to him. ‘I’d like the necklace which I know you never bought, and I’d like the cheque you promised us.’

‘I did have the necklace’ he starts to say. ‘But it was in a JD bag with other things and I was in a pub and it was stolen.’

I begin to laugh, the merry go round is starting up again – roll up, roll up. Not this time, are you kidding?

‘You know what, you are so full of rubbish. Do you think I’m stupid? I don’t believe a word you say. And where’s the cheque you said you had – you can send that through the post can’t you?’

‘Oh, well I haven’t got a cheque-book’ he says.

‘Right, well I tell you what William, why don’t you just go away and leave me alone. I don’t recognise you or anything you say – the son I had would not speak like this. Just leave me alone’.

With that I slammed the phone down.

Guy’s mother was phoning at the same time as I was speaking to William and left a message. She sounded tearful and said it was quite urgent. I didn’t return her call. More messages followed. She then rang my mobile.

I rang her back a couple of hours later, hoping by this time that she would be calmer.

The gist of her call was that we should have Will back to live with us.

‘I think you’re going to have to, darling, it’s the only kind thing to do, the Christian thing you know. He can’t cope on his own. He loves all of you, misses the boys dreadfully. He’s got no-one to do his washing, it’s awful. I’m so worried it’s breaking my heart. You’ve got to have him back with you, he should be with his family.’

I ask her what her vision is of him coming back here to live – and as I did so I remembered this time last year when she had told me that he should come back to live with us, and we took him back. He then spent most of his time lying in bed smoking dope day and night watching television. Within twenty four hours of him being back we had found stolen property in his room, and the police were called.  Later we found that he’d written himself a cheque on our account within a day of arriving too.

‘Oh, he’s different now. He’s changed. He knows he needs to get A levels, and says there’s a college in London where he can do evening classes but he needs his family’s support, you need to have him back to live with you’.

‘Are you insane?’ I say.’ I’ve got two other kids here who I’m trying to bring up, he will never come back here to live.’

‘Oh, Debra, how can you say that and you’re his mother. It breaks my heart.’

The conversation went on for some time. I mentioned the promises Will had made, and had broken, and she began to say she had a chequebook at her house. What? She just doesn’t get it – it’s not the money that’s the issue here.

I told her I was too upset to keep talking to her and would have to ring off.

When Guy came home, he rang her.

‘I won’t have you ringing up my family and upsetting them. I told you yesterday not to ring here and talk about William and the next day you’re doing so. Do you understand me when I say he will never live here again? Do you, just answer the question. Do you understand that I mean that? Good. You are meddling and it’s got to stop.’

I do understand that Guy’s mother wants to put things right, and of course at birthday and Christmas-time she wants us to be a happy family again, but it doesn’t work like that with drug addiction.

I now feel I’ve been beaten up – twice.  It’s very hard for anyone to understand teenage addiction and what it can do to families unless you’ve experienced it yourself. It’s also very confusing for the older generation to cope, of course. It must seem so simple and logical: young people need the support of their families, yet in our case we can no longer offer that. We’ve tried to help him, sorting out accommodation, paying off debts and frauds to prevent him being prosecuted, you name it… We have tried to protect him, but each time he goes and does something else, so we have to give up. It can’t be good for him either, being constantly bailed out. This way he has a chance of sorting out his future, if his scrambled brain will allow it

Maybe in the future – possibly ten years from now, we can be a family again. But this being that was once our sunny, handsome ambitious boy will have to take responsibility for his actions and make the changes, and be able demonstrate that fully to us, because without that we could never trust him even to enter our house again.

© Debra Bell 2007