Moms Tell Sad Addiction Sagas at Drug Seminar

CREST HAVEN – Drug addiction, specifically to heroin and opiates, in Cape May County is gripping victims, some as young as 12-13 years old. Drug overdoses are claiming young adults’ lives who once believed they were immune to addiction—they thought they could turn away anytime they desired. Testimonials at the Sept. 5 Cape May County-sponsored “Putting Faces on Addiction” seminar included heart-wrenching sagas of mothers who lost adult sons to drugs; and that of a 25-year-old recovering man, sober since Aug. 15, 2012, who follows Alcoholics Anonymous’ 12 Steps to Sobriety. He wants to help others addicted to alcohol and drugs.
The event, hosted by Freeholder Kristine Gabor, was the beginning of a dialog to address the addiction problem within the county. An in-county treatment center was cited by many as necessary to assist those whose lives are affected by drugs.
According to Jim Mahoney, a 42-year county resident who works in the addiction field in North Jersey, where many are sent for treatment, “This is the first time there has been a countywide meeting (on drug addiction) in all 21 counties. I can’t applaud you enough.” The room erupted in applause.
Kreni DiAntonio, a Wildwood Crest resident, lost her 32-year-old son, Gregory “Greg” DiAntonio Dec. 30, 2012. She passed through the room a photo of him and his brother Jeffrey, younger by four years.
“This is my face of addiction,” she began. “To sum up, his short life was cut way too short by an ugly demon,” she said. Her family was “well established,” she noted. “When he was little he was a perfect child. We did everything together. We did all the kiddie stuff. We went to the beach and boardwalk, we looked like a parade going down the street,” she said.
DiAntonio had “a very close knit group of friends” while in school, she continued. Jeffrey, who is “mentally challenged,” she added, “Admired his brother more than anyone else in his entire life.”
Then, at age 13, “he started to change.” There was use of marijuana in their Poconos vacation home, “which we did not condone. We sent him to counselors, but he knew how to talk to them,” she said.
As with any parent of an adolescent would acknowledge, “As parents we can’t be with our child 24-7. Sixty percent of their waking hours are spent with their peers.”
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We did take action. We tried to be more observant. We watched for things,” DiAntonio said.
Then around age 16, “his behavior started to change.” A stellar athlete, DiAntonio won awards, but “became very nasty to me,” she said. “He always wanted to live with someone else.” That attitude his mother chalked up to adolescent behavior.
Widely scouted in soccer and tennis, DiAntonio wanted to attend LaSalle University. After two weeks, he walked off the team and “went with his buddies.” Written up three times for alcohol use there, he left LaSalle for Cabrini.
While his girlfriend graduated, DiAntonio chose to depart college near age 20. “The problem was growing and growing,” said his mother.
DiAntonio returned home after a month in a Maryland rehabilitation center. Little had changed. “It was a joke,” his mother said. “After a month you’re barely clear headed,” she continued. From there it was back and forth to a facility in Florida.
During a family week at one center, she learned, “When an addict is not using, this demon lays dormant and continues to grow. As soon as the addict goes back, they almost always start out where they left off.”
Later came marriage, and DiAntonio’s life seemed to brighten, but was never entirely free of drugs. He went to another rehabilitation center over the Christmas holidays. There, said his mother, there was “not that much supervision and someone brought in Xanax. He was thrown out of that facility and “two days later he was dead. These addicts get clean, and the next thing they are back using the same amount, but they don’t realize. He went to sleep and he never woke up,” said DiAntonio.
Greg’s final text message to his mother was, “Have some damn faith Mom. I will be fine.”
Kass Foster of National Park recounted a similar account of how her 27-year-old son Christian died in 1997. A hard-working son, employed at a refinery not far from home, he had been on a waiting list for treatment. Repeated calls for a bed in Integrity House in Newark met with the same reply, none today.
After he passed on, she called and told them, “Take Christian off the waiting list. He died.”
A popular, sports-loving boy as he grew up, Foster said of her son, “He was an average student who played football and baseball. He grew into a tall, 6’-2” very handsome man. He had a nickname she learned after his death, “Babe.” His friends told her, “all the babes did love Christian. He was like a celebrity in town, young and old loved him.”
Foster said she was in denial that her son had died. “I said the hospital maybe made a mistake, the hospital was wrong, maybe Christian didn’t die,” she said. She put a picture of him in their kitchen; her husband would turn it over.
At one point, Foster’s husband “came to me and said, ‘We are not going to blame one another for this happening.’” She noted, “A death can destroy a marriage.”
Not long after, she read a story, very similar to Christian’s in the Courier Post. She asked the reporter to give her contact information to the subject of that story. It was the beginning of an eight-year journey that took four grieving mothers to Trenton, to meet governors and other officials. Finally, it resulted in a facility in Pittsgrove to treat drug addicts. Three trees were planted on the lawn were in memory of three of those who had died, Foster said.
She cited the South Jersey Initiative which may fund treatment for those ages 24 and under who have addiction problems.
Gabor introduced Chris Coombs who grasped the podium and declared, “I’m here to speak on my experience. I’m not a licensed counselor; I don’t claim to know anything. I pretty much want to share the way it was for me, what happened.”
In AA, Coombs said he had been sober since Aug. 15, 2012 when he met his sponsor and began the 12 Steps to Sobriety.
“I had a spiritual awakening,” said Coombs, as the room quieted. “I know that sounds kind of crazy, but 13 months ago there was madness going on in my life.”
Raised in “an awesome, great family, with a mom and dad in the house, there was no divorce, and my sister is here. I always had everything I wanted; it was so far from any broken home. We were always happy and had what we wanted. I was raised with morals and values.”
School went well, and he got good grades. His parents wanted him to succeed. Then in high school came his introduction to alcohol. By 17 he “knew I drank too much, I knew alcohol was my mental obsession.”
Coombs said AA is for those who are alcohol or drug addicted. “Seventy five percent of those in my network would shoot dope; they were not just beer drinkers.”
It was that “spiritual change” that Coombs said helped change his “thought process.”
“I don’t think the way I thought 13 months ago. I don’t have the same perception on things. These (12) steps pretty much work on yourself,” he said.
“I love this stuff. It (AA) saved my life,” he continued. Anxious to assist another like himself, Coombs looked out into the crowd, and acknowledged County Prosecutor Robert Taylor. “I know the prosecutor,” joked Coombs.
“I’m only 25 years old. Down this way it’s hard for me to find people in my age group living sober, living by the 12 steps. I know there is a purpose for me to pass on what I have been through. It’s a hell no human deserves to go through. It tears families apart. Thanks for letting me share,” said Coombs.
The crowd accorded him a standing ovation.
Then a woman stood with her daughter by her side, and declared the young woman sober for 27 days, “No thanks to anyone in this room. Thanks to my love,” she said.
She said the 20-year-old, a mother of two children, 2 and 3 years old, was an addict since age 18, had called Cape Counseling, and was told “seven days later they could see her in October. My love was supposed to get her through until October. She is being punished for being an addict.”
While those at Addiction Recovery Services in Burleigh were “very helpful” she said the $90 a week for medication was out of her price range. “I don’t have $90 a week, and she has no ID. I can’t get a bed in a rehab; she has no insurance, because she can’t get an ID. She can’t make the six points of proof for a driver’s license. The information they ask for is not obtainable. I have hit the wall after all. Love is not enough to get her through to October.”
She stated a rehabilitation center’s advice to her daughter, “Get high, then we can get her a bed.”
Another treatment center was contacted, but lacking insurance, “no bed ever became available. It’s just horrible to go through this. I am keeping her locked up in the house,” she said.
Realizing her daughter needs parenting skills, she called the Department of Children and Families, only to be told parenting classes could only be taken under a court order. “A judge has got to tell her. Why can’t she decide on her own?” asked the mother.
“These are lessons that should be taught in schools,” she said.
Patricia Campbell of Families Matter, which uses Vivitrol in six shots to help addicts, replied that, as of Oct. 1, help would be available through the South Jersey Initiative for anyone to 24 years old. The Vivitrol shots, $1,100 each, are used along with counseling at the Villas facility.
Gabor stated facts about the county’s addiction problem:
• Based on a year-round average population of 76,794 adults, the need for treatment is 19.3 percent of the population. This is the third highest in the state behind Atlantic (20.7) and Monmouth (19.9).
• Of those seeking treatment in 2012, 45 percent listed heroin or opiates as their primary drug of choice.
• In Cape May County, the percentage of 18-24 year olds seeking treatment for heroin increased 154.56 percent from 2009-2011. Only Monmouth (169.53) and Ocean (161.71) were higher.
Other presenters at the seminar included:
Kim Mounce, director of Community Initiatives, Cape Assist, Wildwood. She spoke on the new Good Samaritan Law and NARCAN. That law, in general, protects from prosecution persons who call for medical assistance to aid another with a drug overdose.
Patricia Campbell, Families Matter, Villas, regarding use of Vivitrol and their counseling services.
Chris Burns, director of nursing, Addiction Recovery Services regarding services offered.
Lynne Krukosky, executive director, Cape Assist, Wildwood spoke on the services offered.
Nancy Crafts, counselor, whose firm bears her name, about the services provided.
Kathryn Gibson, Cape Counseling Services, on the younger drug users she is meeting and their drugs of choice and the services offered by the organization.
Tonia Ahearn, Parent to Parent, a group that reaches to assist those whose children are using or have used drugs to the point of addiction.