The Lost Children of Crack Addicts
Our mothers and fathers are the punchlines of your jokes
Readers please note: this story includes descriptions of addiction, suicide, and child exploitation. If you need help, contact the National Helpline.
My mother was a crack cocaine addict for more than twenty years. Being her son was a lonely thing. It was not easy. Everyone thought it was a dirty thing. Filthy. Inhuman. Crackhead jokes sound differently when it is your own mother who walks among the ghosts that haunt street corners and lonely parking lots. You laugh at the jokes like everyone else, hoping the laughter will provide you with cover from the shame of it all.
Even as a small child, you are unprotected. There is nowhere to go. There is no one to turn to. There is only hunger and tears and shame. Always shame.
I suppose that in the course of what is known as a normal life, one would usually go through at least high school and perhaps college before having to take on the responsibility of providing food for one’s self, of being your own sole source of the food that would allow you to go on living each day. That day came at about the age of nine for me and seven and a half or eight for my younger brother. Some days we had better luck than others. Some days we just hoped to be able to eat the next day.
