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PAST ISSUES

Young woman forced to grow up fast because of suicidal mother

by Patricia Donahue
Exchange Writer

     "Wake Up!" Ashley Rodriguez screams at her mother, who's slumped over in the chair.  Ashley pushes her mother's limp body, and shakes her head back and forth with her hands. "You can't do this to me right now," she screams again with tears rolling down her face.  Ashley is pulled away from her mother by an EMT who has just arrived.  As Ashley is escorted up the stairs by her grandfather, the only thing that is running through her mind is that she wished that this would be the last time.

     Ashley Rodriguez was seventeen years old at the time of her mother's attempted overdose of pain killers.  A time in her life that certainly has impacted her greatly.  "No one should have to see their parent(s) like that," she said.  As I ask Ashley to talk about the incident with her mother that night, she seems hesitant as she lowers her head and takes a deep breath.  However, she agrees to go along with it and starts from the very beginning. 

     Ashley goes on to explain the night she was awakened from the sirens and lights flashing through the blinds in her bedroom.  "I just figured there was an accident down the road or something and didn't pay much attention."  That was, until Ashley realized that those sirens were growing closer and those lights were shining into her window. 

     As Ashley tried to open her eyes she looked at the clock and noticed it was two a.m.  She drew open the blinds and saw an ambulance making its way into her driveway and was a little confused as to what was going on.  Ashley got up and walked out of her room to hear screaming coming from downstairs.  She threw her mother's old tattered blue sweatshirt on and followed where the screaming was coming from.  "I'm not even clear what was going through my mind."  

     As Ashley rounded the corner down the stairs she recalls the very picture that stays in her head everyday of her mother in that big orange swivel chair. The chair that still remains downstairs in the computer room.  Ashley's mother who was clearly unconscious, was sitting in the chair as her grandparents were screaming at her to wake up.  Ashley pushed through her grandparents and ran to her mother's side.  "After screaming and pushing her I came to realize that my mom was not waking up."     

     Ashley peered out of her bedroom window as her mother was being rolled away on a stretcher into the ambulance.  Her piercing screams brought her grandparents into her room where she was pounding on the window.  "The next morning when I woke up I had almost forgotten what had happened the night before --- just like it was a dream."  Going to school that day was hard --- all Ashley wanted to do was cry.  Every period she would call home and see if there was any news with her mother.

     Every time, someone at her house picked up on the other end, and Ashley would say, "any news? Where is she? When can I see her?"  The same answers kept getting old as her grandparents would tell Ashley her mother was still in the hospital and she wouldn't be able to see her for a couple of days.  There wasn't a lot Ashley could do until the school day was over. 

     She remembers going home and running through the door to find her grandparents sitting in the living room silent.  "What's wrong with her? Where is she?" Ashley yelled.  "Your mother has done it again.  She just doesn't care about the consequences," said Ashley's grandfather. 

     She knew exactly why this didn't surprise them.  This wasn't the first time that Ashley's mother had gotten herself into a situation like this.  Throughout Ashley's seventeen years she can recall more than five occasions where she had to act like the adult while her mom was abusing drugs or drinking heavily.  "I never found it fair.  I felt like no one was going through the same shit I was," Ashley said.  For a seventeen-year-old that was about to graduate, Ashley Rodriguez felt obligated to stand by her mother.  "I know now that my mom never saw what she was doing to me," said Ashley.  Once out of the hospital Ashley's mother was put in rehab for another two weeks, prohibiting Ashley to see her.

     Someone's first impressions of Ashley would be that she is a caring, outgoing and very loving individual.  No one would have guessed that she has had to grow up so fast.  Ashley says that she has learned a lot over the years watching her mother.  "I find myself being hesitant when drinking or being around drugs, even though I'm in college, because I'm so afraid that I will end up like her." 

     Today, Ashley remains in college with a 3.0 GPA and has never touched any type of drugs.  "I won't do it to my family; I don't think they could handle much more of that type of behavior." 

     Tears started to fall, Ashley crossed her arms and slipped her hand into her jeans pocket.  She pulled out a round-shaped token and started to smile.  "This right here is what motivates me to get up every morning," she said.  The round token is a token of five years being sober.  Ashley twirls it around through her fingers, and holds it tightly.  "My mom gave this to me on my 19^th birthday, and I always keep it with me."  All that she can hope for now is that that night would be the last time she would ever have to see her mother like that.