The National Addiction Memorial honors the loved ones we’ve lost.

Since Earl was a teen, he experimented with many drugs and along the way he developed alcoholism and an addiction to crack cocaine. For many years, he struggled with these demons and very sadly, he became ill as a result and passed away from complications with this liver and throat.

Shamus did not intend to give his life to addiction. The disease took his mind and personality. Addiction took his ambition, pride, creativity, sense of humor, his smile, and the light from his eyes. Addiction lied to him and told him he was in control. He tried to appear functional as addiction destroyed him bit by bit. Because of addition I will never see his beautiful smile again. Because of addiction I will stand at his grave on Mother's Day and his birthday. Because of addiction his children will never see their father at their graduation, wedding, or birth of their children. Shamus fought so hard but was so tired.

"We found out Trevor was smoking weed when he was 16. We talked to him about it and thought it would stop. When he was 17, we were noticing changes in his behavior. He was moody and argumentative. We hoped it was just teenage rebellion, but we found out he was using prescription pain pills. We never got a straight answer on how or when it started. When we found out he had tried heroin, he was already 18. Flash forward six and a half years. Six and a half years of losing jobs, lying, stealing, manipulating, dope sickness and bill collectors. Countless attempts at trying to get him to get help, either a rehab facility or at least counseling were met with “I can do it myself”. And he did, several times, but it would last awhile and then all the issues would start again, and you knew he was using. He had about 18 months of success with Suboxone, but he didn’t like the way it made him feel and decided to stop taking it. Things got worse, and we finally had to ask him to leave the house. He then decided he would go to detox on October 22, 2011. After detoxing and going through about three weeks of rehab, he was sent to a recovery house in York, PA. He was doing well at the recovery house. We had the first really good Thanksgiving and Christmas in a long time. He had gotten a new job, and had become head of house where he was living. He seemed to be doing well. We had agreed to get him a used car to get back and forth to work. He was working a night shift and the bus schedule wasn’t working out. He came home to pick up the car on Wednesday night. I told him to call me when he got back to the recovery house. He didn’t call. I couldn’t reach him the next day, so I called the recovery house. They said he was sleeping and they would have him call me when he got up. When the phone rang around 7:00 that night, it wasn't Trevor, it was the gentleman who ran the recovery house telling me our son had died of a heroin overdose. "

Bryan did not always understand the laws of the land, people, and perhaps tried to re-arrange his world hoping it would make better sense,. His reality and perspective changed, unfortunately by delving into an area that would only perpetuate misunderstanding and create more confusion and pain. No, Bryan was right in some respects, life can be unfair and there is pain where there could be pleasure. Bryan lost his battle with Addiction after many attempts to heal, find understanding and Acceptance. Bryan said, "maybe I should pray more, my spirit is broken". Bryan is among the angels who are so dearly missed. Bryan came to me for a reason. He got the opportunity to have a mother and I, an opportunity to be one, and have a child.

She became addicted to marijuana submerged in butane also known as waxing. Then started using just butane which finally took her life.

Josh started experimenting with alcohol and drugs at a young age 13 or so. He really started using different substances at 15 and struggled through high school. He got his diploma and worked for three years for a plumber until his addiction caused him to lose work and he was fired. He got bad after that and when he was 23 he got arrested several times. He detoxed in jail for the first time, and spent time in 5 detoxes after that. His last stay was 6 months at a sober house. He stayed clean for 8 months. We thought he was ok but, an addict is never really ok. He was found in his bed. He had been dead for several hours. There was no saving him.

Her struggle with drugs was so intense, she did have a very strong longing to be clean and sober.

Jocelyn started out by smoking weed at her early teen years and escalated all the way to heroin by the time she was 20. She was in and out of 4 different rehabs and as a family myself, my dad, my mom, and two brothers tried to rehab her ourselves. We all wanted Jocelyn to be free of this disease and we know Jocelyn wanted to be free as well. The heroin addiction led Jocelyn to the streets of Kensington Philadelphia where she was eventually murdered.

Richard had a long love story with drugs and alcohol and mental illness. He had no social skills.

His addiction to heroin only last one and a half years. He tried desperately to fight this demon and never wanted or thought this would happen to him.

He was always in and out of rehab, he got clean for bit, then went back to heroin. He ended up in the hospital because the drug was making him hallucinate, he saw people there and he thought they were trying to harm him. He also had nightmares and night terrors. t\The addiction got so bad, that he became a stranger to everyone who knew him.

Mandy was strong and clean for the last 9 months of her life. She was starting to work on her GED, had her first job, and had hope in her eyes. The summer of 2012 was the first time Mandy, our younger sister Vanessa, and our mom were together in years. It would also be our last summer with her. Before that summer, the last time I saw Mandy was so heartbreaking. She was strungout and had no idea who I was. Mandy faced jail and prison sentences for her drug abuse. At one point of her being out, she lived in a basement ""apartment"" of a ""fourplex"" in Ogden. I include the quotations because this house had no real separate apartments. The four kitchens and four bathrooms made it seem like a fourplex, but all four sections were accessible to each other with no real privacy. Mandy lived in the worst of the four sections. I know this because my boss, a real estate agent, has been in charge of the now bank-owned house. I've walked through the house, taking inspections every other week, and came to view it as her addiction manifested as a building. A couple weeks ago I begged my boss to do the inspections on this house for me. It was too much and took hours to recover from the anger that house brought out. My fantastic and understanding boss asked no questions and took on the burden for me. It doesn't matter that this is not where Mandy ended up, just knowing she was in such a horrid place The last night Mandy was alive, she got in a fight with her boyfriend. They were both drinking heavily, and Mandy left the house at about 1 am. She walked to her dad's house where Nessa was staying. Nessa had been struggling with heroin herself for years and was facing a similar path. Mandy begged Nessa to talk with her, but Ness asked her to come back tomorrow when she was sober. This haunts Ness, because the next person Mandy went to was a cousin who sold drugs, which he offered to Mandy. The meth combined with the alcohol was enough to kill her."

Aaron found marijuana and used it for almost 8 years to self medicate. In the spring of 2012 he was introduced to heroin. He found it unmanageable and went to treatment in the fall. Unfortunately he suffered from PTSD and could not stop his paranoia. We were trying to get him some help. The medical world doesn't always understand and he decided to get high "one more time".

Andy started with prescription drugs (Oxycontin) and moved to heroin. He died of an overdose after 6 wonderful months clean.

Jim's journey into the disease of addiction began when he was 13. In an early treatment program, we were told he wouldn't live to be 16. That spurred Jim and I to prove "the experts" wrong. He lived to be 35 with many wonderful years, many friends and great experiences. From pot, prescription pills through cocaine and alcohol, Jim fought and conquered each. His life was on track despite setbacks when heroin was introduced to his group of friends. This proved to be the final dual for life. Ultimately Jim died from an overdose of heroin and alcohol. The true cause of death was the toll taken by the long term effects of the disease of addiction. He never gave up fighting for his life. He remains my hero.

At 15, a 31 year old man introduced her to heroin. She spent the next 24 years of her life struggling to stay clean. She was diagnosed bi-polar in her 20's. When things were good in her mind, she managed to live clean- marry, have three beautiful children, make a life for them and herself. But then she would fall.

Stephen struggled with anxiety, bipolar disorder, and depression from his early teens. He turned to drugs as early as 15. Like most kids, he started out smoking pot, which eventually turned into pills and harder drugs. Stephen's drug of choice was Xanax or anything similar. Like any good parents, Stephen's mom and dad took him to doctors they trusted to try to find help but it was just more and more pills they would wind up putting him on. Once his addiction got out of control, over doses, suicide attempts, and rehabs weren't far behind. Stephen's life became a cycle of getting clean and slipping up. He could not hold a job for very long and was very unhappy with his life. Stephen hated his addiction as much as everyone around him. His last time in rehab was different. He seemed better. The happiest we had seen him in maybe years. "Back to his old self" we said more than once. Which is why it was so shocking when on August 17, 2012, Stephen's father found him dead in his apartment after overdosing on a mixture of Heroin and Xanax. He was 28 and had been clean for months.

Denial preceded her fall. Even after hospitalization after heart failure in the emergency room she was in denial. Telling her friends she had a stomach virus. She never admitted to having a problem. And those around her were ignorant of as well as addicted themselves. Denial, then Shame and embarrassment, and more denial escorted her to the end.

He comes from a long line of addicts, even five generations that I know of. One of his great grandfathers was know as the drunk of Bountiful Utah. So by the time he was 14 he gravitated to kids who were consuming alcohol and by the time he reached 16 we had placed him in a treatment program for drug and alcohol addiction. We got him sober by 17 and he graduated from High School. Soon afterward me and his mother divorced and he married another addict. Their sobriety ended about three years into their marriage. From then on his life was filled with being successful when he was sober and tumbling when he acted out. He was in and out of jail along with his wife. Getting jobs and loosing them for not passing drug tests. At the age of 23 his friends started dying form their addictions, but this did not stop him or keep him sober. In 2005 he got into prescription drugs and found doctors who would prescribe them in abundance. So instead of working he sold these drugs on the street. Into 2010 I called an ambulance because I thought he had overdosed when the police arrived and checked his prescriptions he had 7 of the most highly controlled drugs and not just 30 pills but each prescription had over 300 pills. He was on Medicare for a bad back and depression so he got most of his prescriptions for less than 10 dollars, but often sold them on the street for over $1,000 of dollars. After selling them he would buy cocaine and had overdosed 3 times before his overdose death. I struggled with him and tried very hard not to be a codependent parent. I held him accountable for most of his acting out, but like most parents I wanted to believe him when he told me he was sober, but each time it was just a lie. The last month of his life he again said he was sober we had been going to movies and had plans for the summer. I took to a pawn shop to sell his movies he said it was to by food, but 5 days later he died of drug overdose. His last words to me was I love you, Dad.

Once pain meds were taken from him, he struggled to function so he started experimenting with heroin in 2010. I thought we had beat it and was shocked when his autopsy came backand it said heroin overdose, it wasn't even on my radar, total shock.