My husband and I would like to express

Dear All,

My husband and I would like to express our gratitude toward your organization and the group of selfless individuals who run it day in and day out. Our son Frank was a good person all of his life up until his early teenage years. Even through his remaining teen years he was a good kid but we could tell that things were changing and not for the better.

Slowly but surely as Frank grew older he started to attract the wrong crowd of people and he became less and less the person we always knew he was. He started to seclude himself and of course wound up using drugs and alcohol to excess. It started on a smaller scale in the beginning but progressively grew to a stage where he needed help. At first we thought it was just recreational and that he'll grow out of this stage and move forward in life. Unfortunately, that was not the case. We knew over the years that he had dabbled with drugs and alcohol but did not for a second see what was coming.

One day he came to us upset and crying and asking for help. We found out that he had an addiction to pain medication that he was buying for "partying" purposes and just having fun. Of course we as parents did what we felt was right and helped him find an outpatient program. He attended this for a while and we figured that the problem was handled. Again, we didn't know the magnitude of what he was involving himself into. Frank eventually did a few inpatient programs for short stints of time because his addiction then became heroin and he still hadn't handled anything that got him into this situation. It was a gradual downfall for him that wound up getting him hooked and dangerously to this potentially lethal drug that he was buying from horrible people on the streets.

Our son had fallen apart. Nothing worked. My husband and I supported and assisted him in anything we thought would help him and of course got swindled into believing anything he told us. Meanwhile nothing was changing for the better. It got worse. He wound up in jail at least a couple of times that we knew of and still that didn't wake him up. Our son had become some kind of mechanical being that seemed to have no true feelings and no remorse for the pain that he instilled into anybody who loved him or showed concern or care for his well being. He simply didn't care.

His wife desperately struggled to keep him from harm's way but he was on some type of destructive mission and wouldn't be stopped. Some of the horror stories that his wife would tell us of the manipulation methods he pulled on her were simply astounding. How could someone so intelligent use all ingenuity to slowly kill himself? And furthermore how could he not even care about himself enough to stop when all things that kept happening were without a shadow of a doubt killing those around him?

Finally we had received a phone call from a friend of Frank's who had gone through a program in California to get her life straightened out.

It had worked for her. She was living the good life that her family deserved and that she deserved for herself. She gave us the name and number and we called Narconon California in Newport Beach. We had never heard of this place and for that matter we had never really had a need to know of any place of this nature. It took a hell of a lot of effort to get Frank to drop everything and agree to go but we did it. We didn't take no for an answer. The truth is, whatever he had left at that point was about to be lost regardless and that included his wife and our support. It was simply tearing us into pieces and our lives were not our own anymore. It wasn't easy but he finally got onto the plane and made it to California. I flew with him to make sure he wouldn't run off. It was that bad. We were met by Narconon California staff at the airport and they took him to their facility to start his program.

Frank spent about 3 1/2 months in California to do this program and this was back in 2000. Frank is still clean today and hasn't turned back at all. He took on the opportunity to stay out there and work for the organization. My husband and I missed him greatly but felt a great sense of relief that he was out there and not back here killing himself anymore.

My son today has a beautiful 2 year old daughter coming from his wife who stuck with him through all of this. Our son is happy, his family is well and happy, we are happy and our son lives every day to help other people. He stayed with Narconon California. We have been out there to visit many times and every time we do, we are more and more proud of our son. He is truly showing his colors that we knew were always there. It still took a while to trust our son as there was so much damage prior to him leaving, yet we have found that trust again in him. To a parent, that means the world.

I can count on my son! I know that what he tells me is true and that he'll back that up anytime. We know that the indescribable and hideous past that we all shared with Frank through his drug addiction is over and has been for quite some time now.

Sending Frank to Narconon california was worth every dime that it took to do so. We really thought that our son was going to die. We really started to prepare for that. We didn't have hope anymore. Then we were contacted by one of the Staff named Dave who mentored him through his program and then some. Dave wasn't alone. Frank raved about the staff there and showed a true caring for people that we haven't seen or heard from him in years. It seemed like his inner self had returned. Slowly but surely he became more and more responsible and I believe that he is a better person than he's ever been.

Narconon California truly gave us our son back!

Catherine A. R.

Proud parent of a Narconon California graduate