"HI, my name is Shawn and I'm an addict." and I fucking hate everybody in this room I thought to myself.
I don't know what it was, but something inside me burst. All of a sudden the urge to do things differently and ask for help overcame all my fear and I began to spill words I had never spilled before.
"Hmmmm..... where do I begin? How about the beginning....
I am the youngest of four to a single mom. All of my siblings and myself were awarded to the state at some point in our childhood and we all had DSS in our lives throughout our youth. Only my sister was lucky enough to get out when she was put up for adoption.
I am ten years younger than my brothers at least but eleven years difference from my oldest. They were my male role models whenever we were lucky (or depending on how you see it unlucky) enough to be home at the same time from whatever foster home or institution we happened to be in at any given time.
Our mother suffered from alcoholism during her early years before I was born, and then suffered a severe life threatening brain injury that left her with severe frontal lobe damage and an inability to control her emotions. Especially unable to control her anger. She spent a long while in a coma where her parents and her siblings all thought she would never come out. The family received a cash settlement while she was in her coma and bought a house in Hyde Park that had to be deeded with my mom's name included since the money they used to purchase was legally hers if she were to ever come out of coma. She did, and the family never told her about the money.
I don't know why she never pursued legal actions herself, but my guess is the family kept her from doing so for fear she would find out about their sudden good fortune.
When I was born I was a miracle baby! Both my brothers and my sister were born before her accident and during her coma my sister had been put up for adoption. Sadly I never got to meet...