The Chair

January 5, 2015 / djuanadreed / 7 Comments

Here I sit at my desk, in my office, looking out my window at a winter day in Kentucky. I haven’t left the cabin in two days and am still in my pajama bottoms. This is where I pictured myself writing when I bought the cabin. I kinda feel like I finally made it to this spot. The furniture has been in my garage for months and the desk is very heavy so I had to wait for help to get it in here. My office is cluttered and very unorganized. But the desk is where I dreamed it to be. I’m sitting in Riley’s chair. It still smells like him. He lived in this chair sitting at his desk listening to music, playing music on his guitar- heck he learned to play guitar from this chair. He gamed on the computer, did homework and even when friends were over, they were often gathered around him in his chair looking at the computer and listening to music. If Riley was home and awake, he most likely was in this chair at his desk.

When I first brought it into the cabin, I rolled it into the middle of the family room, sat sideways in it and twirled it around and around. I put my nose to the back of the chair and breathed in his scent. I ran my hands along the arm rests and felt the wear and tear on them where his arms laid once upon a time. I tried to feel Riley. It has that chair sound. You know, that creak not a squeak when you lean back in it. There’s a bit of cat hair from his cat, J (named after Dinosaur Jr’s lead singer, J Mascis) tucked in where the back of the chair meets the seat. I think I’ll tuck it back in there. I told him “No” every time he asked for a cat then one day, we were looking at horse property and there was a stray kitten. After the second time of seeing the kitten at that property, I said “Let’s take it home” and we did and we gave him to Riley. That was a happy day for Riley.

Now I am writing about Riley from his chair. I sure wish he was still in it. All the times I tracked up the stairs to talk to him while he sat in this chair. I brought him medicine when he was sick and laid it in front of him on his desk. I sat quietly next to him listening as he played his guitar. I yelled from another room, “What’s the name of that song?” when I heard something he was listening to that I liked. I talked to him while he sat in this chair. Sometimes hard conversations. Sometimes it was Do you have homework? How was your day? conversations.

In the early morning hours of the day he died, some time after he had taken the LSD, he wrote the following from this chair. It appeared just like this.

May 3, 2014

i remember what joy feels like

i now know what it means

what it means to be happy

i swear

i figured it out

i’ve been waiting all my life

it’s happening

guh

i can’t stop smiling

acid

Several hours later, Riley made a phone call seeking help. They didn’t answer. I have been told you can think an acid trip is gone and it can come back with intensity. A trip can go bad. He typed a text message to a girl across the country in reply to her Happy Birthday message to him, saying “On Acid” then another right after, “Halp” (spelled just like that). Not long after that, he shot himself. The toxicology report says, he died from the gunshot wound. The medical examiner added “Note: The findings and totality of the circumstances in this gentleman’s case indicate his injury was self-inflicted. However, in light of the high concentrations of the hallucinogen LSD in his blood, in my opinion , the manner of death is best classified as undetermined.” You see Riley thought he bought a tab of 185 mcg of acid which the dealer bought online. The dealer being a high school kid- same school, same choir. The tab actually contained 950 mcg- that amount in one body was more than the medical examiner had seen in the 30 yrs of doing his job.

The drug dealer still deals drugs. The company still sells its drugs online. Kids are still buying drugs and experimenting with them. Riley won’t ever sit in this chair again.

Kids are dying from drugs. How do we stop this? I ask. How many more parents will lose a child by a drug? It only takes one time.

I HATE DRUGS.

I Love You, Riley.

One Holiday Down, One More To Go

December 16, 2014December 23, 2014 / djuanadreed / Leave a comment

As I sit at a dead stop watching a train go by at a railroad crossing on a back road in Kentucky, I think of the crossroad I am at of two very painful holidays this year. One holiday down, one more to go! I can’t help from be impatient in my seat anxious for the cross bars to come up so that I can move on. It is the same kind of wait for the holidays to pass.

Christmas has always been my most favorite holiday. I love everything about Christmas. The lights, the decorations, the baking of cookies and sweets, and the giving. I love to give! As I finish dropping off gifts for children in need in the area, as I finish gathering gifts for my friends and family, there is only a numb feeling on my insides. I move through the motions. I do the things I think I am supposed to, the things that brought me joy every year yet the joy is not within reach this year.

I have decorated the outside of my cabin with big obnoxious multicolored lights. I have baked my traditional cookies and sweets. I have put up a live tree that smells wonderful and has soft pine needles. Mostly Riley ornaments hang from the branches of my Christmas tree. That is about all I have here. I brought with me part of the ornaments I had bought him each year since he was born. A tradition I had for the kids was that I bought an ornament for each one of them that represented their age, their likes and interests. My thinking was that they would have ornaments to take with them when they moved out and had a Christmas tree of their own. Riley’s ornaments will stay with us. He won’t be taking them and putting them on his tree some day like I had planned.

My Christmas tree sits by my fireplace burning warmly. My cabin smells like a camp fire. All of the new here doesn’t keep me from remembering the old. Oh how I miss my kids this year. I will hold two of them again. I wish to God that my boy was still here, alive, breathing, smiling, laughing and entertaining us with his ever present personality. I cry and I cry. I ache and I ache for him. Christmas will never be the same. My life will never be or feel the same.

I think of Riley’s smile as he opened presents. He was just as vibrant at age 17 on Christmas morning as he was when he was 7. Always thankful for his gifts even as he opened the boxes of clothes though you know he was anxious to get to the good stuff.

When he was young, he was the first to wake up. We would give him the go ahead to sort the presents and make our piles of gifts around the tree so that we could have a little more sleep. Then when he let us know that he was done, we would get up, wake up the teenagers and take our spots around the tree. Our tradition was to open presents youngest to oldest. Riley was the first to open a gift each year. He opened his last Christmas gift ever last year. We didn’t know. He didn’t know.

I wish Riley was opening a present from me this Christmas morning. I am glad that I cannot see his empty spot next to the tree. If only he could give us the gift of being here this year.

Just let it be over. Let the stabbing memories of this time of year pass. As the train passes, as I think the crossing bars will raise, another train comes going the other direction! That is where we are this year. Waiting for another Riley memory to pass with yet another one on its way. Though Riley memories give us smiles, the pain that there won’t be another moment in time created with him in it is the uncomfortable stabbing reality of now on. Riley’s choice to try acid on his 18th birthday ended his life and changed our lives, our holidays forever.

Riley, a graduating senior in high school, accepted to NAU, band kid, choir kid, computer whiz, entertainer for anyone in his presence by guitar, jokes, smiles and hugs, a brother, a son won’t sit underneath another Christmas tree and open a present. If only kids would realize that messing with drugs of any kind is dangerous.

Do you really know what is in that joint, pill, tab? Do you know what it will do to you? That possible high, that idea of an experience cannot be worth the outcome of what might happen. It happened to Riley. It is not worth it.

I Love You, Riley.

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Fall Leaves Fall

October 26, 2014October 31, 2014 / djuanadreed / Leave a comment

As I sit on my porch, I can hear the the leaves falling off of the trees in the front of my yard. The colors of gold and browns of various shades float to the ground and scatter in the green grass below. A squirrel busily moves around the yard. The sky is overcast. The sun will appear later today. There is chill in the air as I sit here bundled in my jacket. In the middle of my front yard, there is a dead tree. It needs to come down. It is brittle losing branches. It sits there with no life to it. I feel that sometimes- lacking of life. I won’t fall down. I will not.

As I emptied boxes yesterday, I came across the things I brought with me to hold onto memories of Riley. I hung my head and sobbed more than once during the hours I was amidst his things. As I settle into my new home, as this place becomes more comfortable and familiar, the pain of losing Riley gets strong again. I was so busy for the past few weeks. My mind was distracted. I now am settled in. The pain, the unending pain of losing my son to drugs grips me. I can’t get away from it. I can’t get out from under it. It sits on me like a heavy load. Why can’t he still be here? Why did God allow this to happen?

He was a vibrant young man who had a future set before him. Many years ahead to conquer the world or at least make a dent in it. His intelligence was unyielding. He spent his time making friends of strangers and effecting lives by his sheer presence. Chasing an idea. chasing an experience that he somehow thought would be worthy of his 18th birthday celebration, he took acid. He sent a snap chat with the blotter on his tongue. He wrote of the joy he felt at the beginning of the trip, he begged for help at the end of the trip and in the end, he took a gun and shot himself. I shutter at the terror he must have felt in the end. I cringe at the thought of the gun to his chin and the sound it made as it went off. His smile forever gone in that moment. My smile forever changed in that moment.

My tears fall like the leaves. I am dead and brittle with the pain that overwhelms me. I will not fall down. I will not allow this pain to drop me to the ground. There is beauty in all emotions. If there was no pain in life, we would not be motivated to move, jump, leap, change something. We endure the discomfort after a work out knowing there will be a gain, strength in the future. An addict must feel discomfort, pain in order to want the change in their life. If we hate our job enough, we might just get up and find a new one. Happy. Sad. Angry. Mad. I have discomfort. I am aware. I cannot shed it. I will not sit still and be overwhelmed with my pain. I will do something with it.

Riley’s story needs to be told. It is of a kid who had been accepted to college who played tuba in the school band, won debates, sang in the choir, hugged freely, made people smile by his smile, changed the unsuspecting lives of those that crossed his path, grew up in church, gave to others, took or asked for little, smart as a whip and funny too. He helped people accept themselves as they are. He showed love no matter what the circumstances. He played guitar, piano, tuba, and saxophone. He was one to hear a song, sit and pound it out on the piano or self teach it to himself on the guitar. He knew computers well. He was/is my son. One I am still very proud of. He died because he tried LSD. Teens should know this story and realize it can happen. I am here to tell the story, to plow through the pain so that perhaps one teen will remember Riley’s story in that moment of making a decision whether to try a drug- any drug. Drugs kill. It’s not worth it. We are not invincible. It can happen. It happened to Riley.

Riley’s memory stays. Our love for him doesn’t falter. That love and memory will sustain me. I will not fall down.

I love you, Riley.

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Clean Sheets

September 27, 2014 / djuanadreed / Leave a comment

One week from today I am hitting the road and moving to Kentucky. I have purchased my very own log cabin in the woods to write in. As I get ready to leave, I am savoring the heat of Arizona summer and the convenience of McDonald’s french fries being a hop, skip and a step away. There’s a list of things, relationships, feelings, smells, sights I have soaked in as I know it all changes soon. I am a third generation native of Arizona and this is all I know. I picked a place that holds new and different experiences ahead. I am up for the challenge! Yet while I am here, I have had some hard tasks.

One of those is going through Riley’s pictures, school projects and papers that I had saved over the years. There have been many smiles as I pull things from boxes and files. Like this one which I absolutely love!

I also feel the sadness of seeing pictures of Riley as a baby and realizing at the moment the picture was taken, there was a promise of a life that would last to an old age. I counted on that. I assumed it. I dreamed of what his life would be like. I smile when I see the ‘I love you’s’ written to me from him over the years. From preschool age to 17, there are notes and messages telling me what I say to him daily.

If that hasn’t been hard enough, cleaning his room for the last time took a big toll on me. I finished it yesterday. Alot of tears have been shed in the last 48 hours being in that room. Alot of talking to Riley has happened. Mostly I tell him to please come back and that he should be here. In the last almost 5 months since he died, I have taken naps on his bed and laid there hugging his pillows. I have stood in the middle of the room and looked around for long periods of time absorbing the feel of his space and how he made it that. You can see what he loved in the space of his bedroom.

Now it was time to clean it up. The first task was to strip the bed and wash the sheets and comforter. His smell is gone now. I had buried my head in his pillows and cried over the past months. Now the sheets and comforter have a clean smell to them. That’s a familiar smell too but still, the last time he laid in that bed is gone. There were still dirty towels and the shorts he wore that night on the floor. I washed those too. It felt like a goodbye as I put them in the washer.

On his dresser there were tuxedo shirt buttons that I missed when I returned his choir outfits in May. Many times I had gathered those and made sure he had them for a choir concert. There were pens, pencils, concert stubs, receipts and a lot of dust. There was a receipt for dinner where he had taken his girlfriend on prom night only a week before he died and a short Golfland pencil that he had used to keep score when they went goofy golfing after prom. There were guitar picks sat on shelves, his desk and by his bed. Loose change, empty glasses, school passes and broken sunglasses. I picked these things up and organized them in a cup of change, a cup of pencils and pens. I threw away things like the broken sunglasses though even that was hard since they had touched his face at one time. He started wearing this exact style of sunglasses at a very young age! Look what I found!

I also found a treasure in a shoe box in Riley’s closet. His WWF wrestlers had been safely tucked away. Oh how Riley and his best friend, Ryan loved everything to do with WWF. He had a plastic wrestling ring and a pretend champion belt. I heard, “Let’s Get Ready to Rumble!” in my head as I held the plastic figures in my hand. I can picture Riley’s joy and I’m up to something grin as he and Ryan were running up and down the stairs playing and doing little boy things. We did have to keep an eye on those two!

The things that I have collected from his room to take with me remind me of parts of him. His gray and purple Vans that used to sit at the bottom of the stairs, an ASU sweatshirt I bought him to remind him of my alma mater knowing he was going to go to NAU. I have a guitar pick, books, his tuba mouthpiece, a rock he had saved along with all kinds of random tiny small things that were held by him at one point in time that will surely bring a smile and a tear to my eye in the days, months, years to come. I can pull them out when I need them. I have this sense of did I get everything I want to take with me? How do I pick the physical things that represent Riley as I leave? Did I get what I need? I’m not sure. The most precious and important things are in my head. That goes with me wherever I go.

As I finished dusting and vacuuming Riley’s room for the very last time with the sad realization that he is not going to come home and mess it all up, I stood back, looked at the clean space in front of me, cried a little more then took a deep breath. One step in front of the other! Just one step at a time is all that is needed. That I can do.

I Love You, Riley.

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A Trip to the M.E.

September 19, 2014September 19, 2014 / djuanadreed / 1 Comment

As I stood in front of the window of the Medical Examiner’s office waiting for the woman to come back with Riley’s toxicology report, I cried. It has been four months now since he died and in some ways it has been a long wait to find out exactly what was in his system. I was nervous driving through traffic to the building. Every time I do something related to his death, I open up a whole new can of worms but I have to know. Why? Because I want a clear picture of how this happened. I won’t know every detail. Only Riley knows those. My heart beat out of my chest as I was beeped in through the doors. I stumbled over my words as I told them what I wanted. I had called earlier and the ladies had set aside the case information in case I really did show up. They were nice, cordial, business like and were more than willing to help me with directions to the building on the phone. In person they were the same way. It took too long for them to hand me that paper.

I had to pay $5 because my address wasn’t the deceased’s address. Only next of kin get the report free. Geez! I am his Mom. I am next of kin. I wanted to say, “Can I show you all of the pictures I have of us together from birth to 17?” “Can I show you my stretch marks from carrying him in my belly for 9 months?” I was still at that address at least half of the month for the last year and a half. I was still cleaning it, grocery shopping, picking up dry cleaning and managing it for all three men that lived there. I didn’t stop being Riley’s Mom because I didn’t have the same mailing address anymore. I took him to get his wisdom teeth pulled and slept there with him in case he needed me overnight. I still was getting phone calls from him when he didn’t feel good. I was still following him around that house asking him questions and was enduring the rolling of his eyes when I said something mother like.

I didn’t argue. I didn’t grumble. I paid the $5 and sucked it up. I paced while I waited for the lady to come back with the report. I looked at the ceiling. I walked over to the glass case of items that was all about death, deceased, skulls including pictures of drawings of people that had died with no name. I quit looking in that direction and went back to standing at the window. Then the tears started quietly rolling down my cheeks again. I kept thinking when will it stop being so hard. I was standing at the medical examiner’s office window waiting for a paper that would detail what caused my son’s death. It is kind of a reason to cry. So I cried and I wiped the tears away as they handed me what I was waiting for. I said, “Thank you” and walked out the door.

I was afraid to look. I was sick to my stomach. I got in my car and I did a quick glance. I couldn’t wait. It was Lisergic Acid Diethylamide, LSD. It was the real stuff. It wasn’t synthetic like I thought. They found LSD in my son’s blood. It is easier to buy the synthetic forms nowadays. For those of you that don’t know, you cannot overdose on LSD. The deaths that occur from using pure LSD are from the psychological effects which cause behaviors that result in death. LSD is a psychedelic – it messes with your brain. The synthetic form of LSD that is more readily available on the street and online is killing kids by its physical effects and its cause of behaviors as well. I’ve asked many questions of a few men my age who have done acid. They have stories of seeing bad trips or having them themselves. People huddled in corners thinking something is coming for them, seeing things that weren’t there, not knowing any kind of reality.

Now what? Now I have more questions. And I will keep asking til there aren’t any more to ask. This drive to know has caused me to look at ME. I have been asked, “What does it matter?” “Why do you need to know?” I reply “I just do.” I want to know everything I can know about that night and early morning. I want to know as much as I can until I can’t know. It won’t bring him back for me to know. Riley is gone. I want to understand as much as I can and maybe that reflects on me in some ways. I want to know.

If you are considering trying LSD, take a look at this video. If you have questions about LSD, this video might help answer them. Feel free to email me or comment on my blogs.

I Love You, Riley.

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My Name: Riley Reed Peterson

September 5, 2014 / djuanadreed / Leave a comment

I found this treasure in a box of pictures. It is a sort of handmade puzzle Riley made. I think he was a first grader. It is hand cut in different shapes with a question in each piece. Each question has Riley’s handwritten answer. It is a sort of who is Riley type of project. His answers are candid and true to who Riley was at age 6. What a great age! I see the twinkle in his eyes when I think of Riley at age 6.

My Name: Riley Reed Peterson. (I love that he wrote his whole name.) My Birthday: May 3rd. (Yep, the day he was born……. and died.) My favorite animal: a prona and a shark (He loved the water.) My favorite food: An ice cream sunday (Of course!) Where I was born: Scottsdale, AZ (He was 7 lbs 7 oz, 21″ long and born during a Phoenix Suns playoff game.) My favorite book: Wackey Wednesday and Capt. Underpants (Copies of those books are still on his bookshelf in his room.) What I like most about our school: the cafeteria and the playground. (For sure those are the best parts of school.) What I do well: Beat my grama at checkers. (I can see the pride on his face now.) My wish: That I was rich and I had a dirt bike and a million dirt bike stadiums. (He had big plans starting at a young age!)

I think Riley Reed Peterson who was born on May 3rd, who loved the water and to swim had outgrown his interest in sharks and piranha’s. (Note how much of a little boy that is to like dangerous water animals!) He favored elephants as a teen. He wasn’t a big fan of ice cream anymore though he never wavered from his love of pizza. In that hospital in Scottsdale, Riley took his time arriving into this world. Braden had come so quickly. When my water broke, Braden was delivered in minutes. I was prepared for Riley to be a replay of my quick delivery of his big brother. It was not at all. It took medication and waiting for Riley to arrive thus Greg had time to watch the Suns playoff game while we waited. He did eventually arrive in due time- Riley timing. Riley enjoyed reading Captain Underpants books at that age. Me too! At 17, he enjoyed books that made him go “Hmm” and contemplate deep questions that have no answers. I think Riley still thought the world was his playground. He traded playing checkers with Grandma for playing chess at Coffee Rush with whomever was up for the challenge. He often beat his opponents at chess too. Riley gave up his love for dirt bikes for an interest in cars, guitars, vinyl, and computers among many other things. I imagine that he is pretty ticked that he didn’t get to the rich part. I fully expected Riley to reach his goals he had set for himself. He dreamed big. I loved that about him. I don’t think anyone should put limits on their dreams- they happen.

Forever May 3rd will be a painful day for us. What once was a day to celebrate his life now will remind us of the end of his life. A curious 3 year old that drew on the back of my leather couch with an ink pen. A curious 7 yr old who almost was successful in peeing off the balcony of a top floor hotel room. A curious 12 year old that spent hours learning the ins and outs of computers. A curious 14 year old started the process of teaching himself how to play guitar. A curious 17 year old tried a drug labeled as acid that had promises of a psychedelic spiritual experience. That last bout of curiosity killed him. Curious isn’t bad. We learn from our curiosity and mistakes made. This is a lesson of curiosity that was a mistake. A fatal one. That is a puzzle piece of Riley’s life that has been written that I will never be able to fully accept.

I Love You, Riley Reed Peterson.