A heartfelt day in court

I have to catch up on blogging.

Yesterday was an interesting and emotional day for me. We go to church and became friends with a woman and her 2 daughters. She was a nice lady, did not come every week, but came a lot. Eventually she got a boy friend and he was looking for work so we hired him to do some work for us around our farm. Now I have to tell you he is not your typical guy- but I will save this for another blog.

Anyway- I will call this lady Jean. So we never got to know Jean very well, but it seems she had some mutual friends so we knew a lot about her- her husband had committed suicide with a shot gun in their kitchen about a year earlier while everyone was in the house. I began to reach out to her, I knew she was struggling through her first Valentine's day without him. Her oldest daughter was just coming out at 14, so we took interest.

Well Jean is a recovering Meth addict- she was sober during the time I knew her- but word got out that she had been arrested for drugs. I was disappointed, but honestly not surprised she relapsed with the things she was dealing with.

So Jean asked me to go to court with her- to be her support. This was embarrassing for her, and she was not able to do it on her own. So over the last 6 months I have gone to all of Jean's court hearings with her. I have sat for hours next to her and learned a lot from my time in court. Yesterday was the worst.

Jean was sentenced to 4 years in prison. Now many of you might say she deserves this, and I am not saying she does not. I am just telling you that it was very difficult to be there and see this happen. Jean brought both of her daughters to court, and Mother in Law of her deceased husband, and to watch the pain that those little girls went through to know that their Mom will be gone for so long was heart breaking.

I know we have all heard this before- but drugs destroy lives. Jean will most certainly not be the same person when she gets out of prison and her girls will be raised in separate homes with family, but they will be forever changed because of this. There is no one like your parents when things get rough and these girls have lost both. I know Jean was being selfish when she used again, but who would have know that a decision she made 6 months ago would change the course of so many lives? I know I will hold my children a little tighter because I could not imagine 4 years without them.

I will never get out of my mind the look of shear terror and panic when the judge remanded her to the custody of the Sheriff's department for the next 4 years. I will never forget the lost and hurting look in her daughters' eyes when they figured out what was happening, I will never forget how my heart broke for Jean as a Mother- because we all have flaws and I believe that most of the time she was a good Mom- but regardless she is these girls' Mom and that is/was all they had to hold onto.

I am thankful that I have never been tempted with drugs and or alcohol. My Mother was an alcoholic, so I have made a lifelong decision to refrain from alcohol because it destroyed my childhood. I do not understand, in my non addict brain, why Jean could not say no and walk away from the drugs, but she was not strong enough and now she will pay the price. Unfortunately so will her children.