Overcome With Travis White

Losing a Son to Addiction, Grief, and Learning to Keep Living | Katie Rizzo

• Travis White • Episode 80

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What happens when the person you love is struggling with addiction, and the life you thought you understood changes forever?

Katie Rizzo joins Travis White to share the story of her son Nicholas, his battle with addiction, and the traumatic grief that followed his accidental overdose. This conversation is honest, tender, and deeply human. It is about the way addiction affects an entire family, the shame so many families carry in silence, and the difficult work of learning how to live with grief instead of trying to escape it.

In this episode of Overcome with Travis White, Katie talks about Nicholas beyond his addiction: his love for soccer, his close friendships, his anxiety, his humor, his love for his brothers, and the beautiful life that grief could never erase. She also shares what Al-Anon taught her, why addiction is not solved by willpower alone, and why families need community, grace, and support when they are trying to keep someone they love alive.

Katie also opens up about losing Nicholas, the support groups, therapy, EMDR, journaling, exercise, and community that helped her and her husband survive the earliest waves of grief, and the framework behind her book The Trimesters of Grief. She describes grief as something that changed her body, her identity, and her way of seeing the world, while also teaching her how to be brave, present, and connected to Nicholas in a new way.

If you have lost someone to addiction, love someone who is struggling, or are carrying grief that other people do not understand, this episode is a reminder that you are not alone, your love still matters, and healing does not mean getting over the person you lost.

What We Discussed

  • Katie Rizzo's life before addiction changed her family
  • How Nicholas became addicted to prescription painkillers after sports injuries
  • The anxiety, injuries, college transition, and pain that shaped Nicholas's story
  • Why addiction affects the entire family, not just the person using
  • What Al-Anon taught Katie about the three Cs: you did not cause it, you cannot cure it, and you cannot control it
  • The shame and isolation families often feel around substance abuse
  • Why people struggling with addiction are not defined by their addiction
  • The limits of willpower, tough love, rehab, and one-size-fits-all advice
  • How Katie and her husband tried to keep Nicholas alive while navigating impossible choices
  • The day Katie lost Nicholas to an accidental overdose
  • Why grieving parents may need to talk about the hardest parts of their loss
  • How support groups, therapy, EMDR, journaling, exercise, and community helped Katie survive traumatic grief
  • The idea behind Katie's memoir, The Trimesters of Grief
  • How grief can mirror pregnancy, change over time, and become something you learn to carry differently
  • The stigma around addiction and what it means to say, "my son is an addict and I love him"
  • Favorite memories of Nicholas, including soccer, his humor, his recklessness, and his love for his brothers
  • What Nicholas continues to teach Katie about bravery, presence, music, love, and being a loving witness
  • What Katie wishes people understood about talking to grieving parents

Chapter Markers

  • 00:00 - Intro: addiction, grief, and Katie Rizzo's story
  • 00:44 - Katie's family, Nicholas's injuries, addiction, and journaling through grief
  • 06:55 - Remembering Nicholas beyond addiction
  • 10:17 - What people misunderstand about substance abuse
  • 16:14 - Advice for families loving someone with addiction
  • 22:50 - The day Katie lost Nicholas
  • 28:56 - Support groups, therapy, EMDR, exercise, and community
  • 34:01 - The Trimesters of Grief and learning to live with loss
  • 39:46 - Breaking addiction stigma and speaking honestly about grief
  • 42:35 - Favorite memories, what Nicholas still teaches, and being a loving witness

Learn More About Katie Rizzo

Call To Action

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Addiction doesn't just affect the person struggling. It changes an entire family. Today I'm joined by Katie Rizzo, who shares the story of losing her son, Nicholas, to an accidental overdose and the journey of learning to live with grief instead of trying to escape it. We talk about addiction, shame, mental health, and why healing isn't about getting over it. This conversation is incredibly honest, and I'm grateful Katie trusted us with her story. Here's my conversation with Katie Rizzo. Welcome to Overcome. With Travis White. And please take a few seconds and leave us a five-star review on whatever podcast platform you may be listening on. It really helps us out. Right, Katie, why don't you start us off by telling us about your journey? Thanks for having me on. Well,~ so my name's Katie Rizzo and I the reason that I'm on this on Overcome is because I had what I thought was a really perfect life. Like we had three kids. ~ I had a great job here teaching in the public school. I taught AP bio and honors anatomy.~ Just life was good. My eldest son took both of the classes that I taught in high school. ~ my other two that came through the high school,~ they weren't as excited to have their mom as a teacher. Things were really going well. And ~ our older son, Nicholas, he played soccer and he had a lot of injuries. He ended up getting a lot of painkillers for those injuries. And ~ he became addicted to pills. He went on to go to college ~ and he played D2 soccer. There he had more injuries and he had a lot of anxiety. He ended up coming home, graduating, and ~ he had a pretty raging addiction to pills. We struggled with it for a little while. My husband and I both joined Al Anon, which is a support group for people who love somebody with addiction, which you probably already know. It's a great group. and it may have saved our lives, but it didn't save Nicholas's. And ~ two years ago he accidentally ~ overdosed. And ~ that kind of led me into like a pretty big traumatic grief. and Unbeknownst to me, journaling really is good. I'd never journaled before, and the day that it happened, I just started writing things down just because I I couldn't believe this was our reality. ~ I kept thinking, like, maybe if I write something down, I'll be able to understand. But ~ but journaling journaling actually saved my life a little bit. And ~ around nine months in, I started like trying to look at the framework of like wha what's been going on. and I realized that a a lot of what I was dealing with was it felt like almost pregnancy and it felt almost poetic that this love that I had for my son for twenty five years, ~ that he and I had created this new thing called grief and I had carried it for for nine months.~ and up around that time I ~ listened to this artist, his name's Nick Cave. He lost two sons to suicide.~ and he talked about asking grief to leave his body. And so I did that. And since then I've kind of had this grief orangutan who I have to take care of now.~ and I ended up writing a book about kind of my experience. It's my memoir about kind of what I went through and how I'm surviving. That's kind of how I got here. Well, I first of all I'm sorry to hear about your son. Second of all, I love that you've written a book because I have always felt that it's important for everybody to share their stories.'Cause it's honestly it just takes that one person to read it and say, you know what, you changed my life because of what you went through. And I can I I it it a lot of times I feel like people can understand themselves better because of somebody like you going out and writing a book. Hope that is one of my hopes. And the other one is that there was so much shame around the addiction.~ and that shame kind of went kept going through~ the grief too. And right after Nicholas passed away, I started on the internet searching like, how do people live through this, right? Like, ~ or is there a crack in the code, like is there a way to visit somebody who's dead? And I f I stumbled upon a bunch of grief groups and I started my husband and I started going to them just because this was life or death for us and for our other two kids, right? Like how do you well I didn't know anybody who had lost a kid to addiction. And the year Nicholas died, ~ eighty thousand kids in the US ~ overdosed. Which is equal to one commercial jet l airliner going down every day.~ so I've met a lot of people who are kinda hiding in the shadows, who have a lot of guilt, who feel like they're not ready yet or able maybe to talk about it. I've met some people who are able and who really have changed my life and being able to hear mom say,~ people who are addicted come from families that love them. Like that was just so wonderful to hear. Mm-hmm. And watching other people who have survived this ~ has really kind of saved my life and and made me want to kind of Reach my hand out to other people who have gone through this. Yeah, that's and that's how it seems to be'cause it's like it while you're going through these trials or challenges in life, I feel like there's often times you feel so alone. Yeah, yeah. But I do have a question before we get into some of the stuff about, you know, like loss and ~ mental health stuff, I'd love for you to tell us about your son. Who was he beyond his addiction? Hmm. Well, Nicholas had blonde hair and it was really straight and I can just picture him running on the soccer field. He just looked like a dandelion because it was just always crazy. And he was a kid who was really comfortable on the soccer field. He loved his friends. If he scored and his friends would like circle around him, you could just see his face would just light up.~ for a long time he was very socially like had a lot of anxiety. W in high school he got prom king and he came home and was like, This is the worst day of my life. This was a joke. Like, I'm so embarrassed, right? And you're like, No, kid, like people love you. ~ I don't know what it was about him, but he just he couldn't believe that he was worth l love and belonging in his classes and I don't know. I he's somebody who really needed somebody to shake him and say, no, this is real. You you are appreciated.~ he when he went to college, I drove him to s ~ Colorado Mesa University in Grand Junction. And when we were driving, he was like, I don't think I can do this. I don't think I can leave home. I don't think I can be with new people. I and I wasn't sure he had the skills either. And I I kept saying, he know, let's just give it one day.~ we drove there from Arizona, so it was about a t a ten hour drive, and the whole time he was just almost sick to his stomach. And I almost I kept thinking, should I just tell him you're right, forget it? But I mean he had a team. I kept thinking, like, you know, he can do this. And we pulled into his dorm.~ and for some reason at Colorado Mesa they had all these ~ football players that were helping and they'd bring all your stuff up to your room and Nicholas was just like looked at me like, my God, this is the worst day of my life. Ha ha ha. And they, you know, brought his stuff in and brought him into this room and there was a a boy there. His name is Jacob. And Jacob was on Nicholas's soccer team. And Nicholas looked at Jacob and Jacob looked at Nicholas and I swear like they have known each other from a past life if there was such a thing. Like the two of them were like I yeah, I am gonna be okay. And that night, you know, we went out to dinner with Jacob and Nicholas said, I feel like I've been here forever. Like I know I I I am gonna be fine and he was. so he's somebody who really needed close friends,~ and he saw himself through other people's eyes, I think. It's really cool. And it and I I love that he found his thing in life because Yeah. I feel like some of that t sometimes that doesn't come until later. You don't always find it at a young age. Yeah. Yeah. No, that is true. It's really beautiful. Yeah. What do you wish people let me rephrase this in my it sounded better in my head, but then it started coming out. Yeah. I was like, No. What do you what do you wish people understood about ~ substance abuse and the people who struggle with it? Gosh, so much. How much time do we have? We'll be here for days. ~ I feel like there is a contingent of society that He's like people who have addiction are almost dirty or disgusting. Like sometimes people will say to me,~ your son didn't die of of street drugs, so ~ you know, he he's not one of them or he became addicted because a doctor prescribed them. So he's not like, you know, those other people or Somebody was really surprised that Nicholas didn't didn't die of fentanyl. And they're like, ~ well, he wasn't one of those people. I it just this this underlying tone that that people who are addicted to something are ~ less than other people. And number one, that's wrong. Like Nicholas was a beautiful soul. And number two It's just so ignorant. Like the reason that I think people reach out to drugs and alcohol is because they're uncomfortable in their body and that drug gives them this magical feeling that th they pretty much never find again, but they're always searching for it. I watched my son, who loved his family and who loved the opinions of other people, become a person who was very unlikable to his family and to other people. I mean, he stole and he got into accidents, and there was just chaos all around him. The the drug wasn't him, and and it made him do things that were n not aligned with his values. And also I think people think that people who are addicted can just one day get up and just use willpower. And I watched Nicholas, and if willpower were enough, he would have been sober. He wanted it really bad. He went through a lot of times telling us like this is the the last time like I'm gonna come clean. Please don't, you know, please don't give up on me. He he just really wanted to to have a different kind of life than he had. Yeah, and his as his as he was going through this addiction, could you see the relationship with him and yourself like changing?~ sure. ~ Alan has three C's. You didn't cause it, you can't cure it, and you can't control it. For a long time I thought I could do all those those things. So a lot of times I would try to give him suggestions. I mean, my husband and I, we both went to Yale. We both have graduate degrees. We both were like, we are gonna logic our way through this. I don't know that I don't I don't know that. that words are gonna would are gonna help an a person who's addicted. I feel like the one thing that could have helped Nicholas is if he would have had a group of people his age who were sober, who had invested them in him and had taken him under their wings. And I I saying that I don't know that that would even even have helped Yeah, it's it's hard. I've seen friends of mine go through addiction problems and I actually there's this kid I went to high school with and not till I think it was only about a year and a half ago, maybe, and I heard of an accident o overdose. His were ~ they weren't ~ prescription pills, Yeah. I don't think, but still it doesn't it doesn't matter. Does that make no yeah. Yeah. It's still it's still like substance abuse and it's it just like I remember hearing that and it just broke me and I was like I and this he wasn't necessarily a friend, he's more of an acquaintance. I knew him in high school, hung out with some of the f same groups of friends, but it still hurts to hear when somebody you know passes away that like that way. Yeah, and I don't know I don't know that there's a one way to treat people who are ~ struggling with addiction. Like we n my husband and I tried, you know, tough love, we tried having him live with us, we tried, you know, drug testing them all the time.~ we took him to inpatient rehabs, we took him to outpatient rehabs. I'm not saying it's not solvable, but I don't know. There is an element of a community that we we I think we would have we would have benefited from.~ I don't know. I I think a l people like to pretend that it's like, it's a family problem, let them take care of it. And I think it leads to a lot of isolation and I think a lot of I th I just think a lot of people are struggling behind closed doors. I I agree with that and I like what you said about~ it's it's not a one size fits all. It's I I believe addiction and mental health are so closely related that Yeah. way 'cause different things work for different people. Yeah. Okay, for you a hundred percent. Yep. So someone listening right now,~ who may have a loved one that's struggling with substance abuse, what words of advice or what would you tell them? Well, I would tell them to to Al and I'm that ~ you know, you didn't cause it, you can't cure it, you can't control it. I would remind them that alcoholism is a family disease or addiction is a family disease and that people tend to in in families that are struggling, they tend to isolate. We tend to try to solve things on our own.~ it becomes a really lonely, chaotic place. I mean, there was a time where Nicholas was stealing from us and ~ his car was in the shop and my husband and I were just like bickering with one another incessantly because ~ you know it it's it it feels like an you're up against a dragon and and there's just not enough help out there. So I would tell that person, keep fighting, try Al Anon. I think one of my friends set talks about her son and says that she just kept trying to keep him alive, whatever that meant, like maybe not giving him money, but making sure he had food. ~ there's just such a weird belief we have that people have to hit their bottom and the bottom is so different from everybody. And what if their bottom is death? So there's so much judgment on people. Mm-hmm. So I would try to tell them to give yourself some grace. Don't feel like don't feel like there's one answer and to go with your gut. And as long as you're doing the best you can for you and to try to keep your your person alive, I think that's the best you can do. And you you mentioned a lot that your or a little bit in there that your friend~ felt like they had to keep their son alive. Did you ever get to that point where you you were thinking that in the back definitely. of your mind? Definitely. Like ~ we were doing like we were bartering with Nicholas for money for go for going to rehab. Like we'd say we'll pay for your rent if you do rehab and I at one point was paying for his groceries and I was worried that he was spending the money on drugs instead. So I'd make him like send me a picture of of him at the grocery store with his ~ with his receipt and then I would send the money. I we we would pay for him to have gas to go to to work and I'd say, you know, I want to see a copy of the receipt. so yeah, I think people who are dealing with addiction, I mean it's it addiction is a life or death disease and everybody around them you know, trying to keep their their kid alive and I I've I met this family who the dad was trying tough love and I hope it worked.~ his son was in a halfway house and he had been robbed and he called and said, You know, I have no money and we all have to leave the halfway house because if I guess there's too much drama or whatever and he's like, I've been living on the streets, you know, and he said, Could I have some money for bus fare? And the dad was like, I couldn't trust that the money was going to bus fare. So I said, No. And it just like, Really? That's the poor guy, like no matter It feels like it's a lose lose situation somewhere. Yeah. You just reminded me of a a personal story of of mine that so I was really close to this person. I was really good friends with him in like middle school in the first maybe year of high school. And we just got into different crowds. But long story short, I've been out of high school for years and probably it's Mm-hmm. it was probably about five to six years ago, I think. I had reached out to this person, I found him on Facebook or somewhere on social media, and I said, Hey, how are you doing? Just wanted to catch up. And all of a sudden and I knew he had an addiction And all of a sudden he started asking me for money. I was like, Whoa, like I haven't talked to you for like ten years. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I have a family to feed, and he said, Well, I'm stuck in this place. And I said, Well, I'm sorry. Like, I can't do it. And it's like Even in in that time it's like, do I feel guilty for this? But I I I still can't tell an answer to that, but it's like I don't know you well enough and I'm sorry for whatever you're going through. It's just a hard situation. Completely. And w what if our rehabs worked, we could say like, no, this these are the steps to getting somebody sober, right? ~ for the pills that Nicholas were was on for the for the opioids there and the benzodiazepines, there's a 70 to 80 percent or 70 to 90 percent relapse rate. And I don't to me, you know, we've spent all this money, sixty thousand dollars at a time, for, you know, ~ at maybe a ten to thirty percent chance of him getting better. There isn't one path that's gonna be like this is how you do it, you know, kids who are are treated with tough love dye, too, kids who are giving way too much dye. It almost feels like ~ we just don't know what we're doing with addiction yet and what the right answers are. Yeah, for sure. And I I think that's and I don't I don't know where it goes from there because what what do you do? I I feel like I don't know, that's I could we could go off on a whole other thing on that. But this this question is probably gonna be one of the hardest I've Yeah. asked on here. So just bear with me.~ can you take us back to the day you lost your son? Okay. Like did it just feel like a normal day or What do you remember about it?~ well the day that we lost him,~ he was gonna come over for dinner. He had called and the last thing we'd talked about is it was Sunday and he was gonna come over for dinner. we'd my husband and I had just come back from vacation and we weren't We really questioned whether or not we should go on vacation, but there was so much turmoil always with the addiction and with he had been an inpatient and outpatient that we decided, you know, if we're gonna wait to go on vacation until things are gonna be good, we're always gonna wait to go on vacation. So we had we'd just gotten home from vacation and he had called and ~ he had Yeah, I'd like to come over for dinner and I was like, Yeah you know, we'd love to have you. I had a little ~ hesitation because I wanted to say, but don't come over high, but I didn't say that. And I I hope you didn't hear the hesitation in my voice.~ and we both hung up saying, I love you, love you. ~ I wish I would have said I love you like seven thousand times instead of just once. and he didn't show up.~ A day past two days we are calling, we called the rehab. ~ he was an outpatient then, and the rehab couldn't tell us whether or not he was going to the rehab. And ~ they said because of HIPAA, which whatever. ~ and finally ~ I called the police and asked for a well person check. And ~ the officer called from Nicholas's apartment and said, Don't worry, there's nothing smelly under the door. and then they'd broken in, and they found him. I ~ They didn't call me back. So after a few hours of me calling and them not calling me back, ~ my husband went and~ he found them all standing around him. So that's how we found out. Whoa, that's tough to hear. Yeah. You might want to cut it out. I wouldn't I wasn't there. Yeah. Mm. I well I just I thank you for answering that 'cause I was like hope What's weird though is like people who have lost their kids, like that's something like we sometimes we really want to talk about it. One of my friends in one of my support groups, this really you should cut this out too. She texted me and said, Hey, I just s was looking at a picture of my son in the morgue and she's like, I want you to see I am. And it's like which of course I was like, okay, but it's like It almost n you n you want to to show other people like this really happened. Like it's almost like it's not it's not it's impossible. And so sometimes talking about it is almost helpful because you're like, Yeah, that like it's it's gonna anchor you in reality rather than living pretending something else happened. Yeah, and and to be honest, your story and what you just said, I love the rawness of it. I absolutely love It's not great. The honesty. I No, I'm not saying it's great. Like I I love like the how open and honest you are about it because I think th I think this is reality. I think this is where we live. Like and there's a lot of times where and that's and that's that is yeah. Yeah. the only reason why I asked that question. It's So I appreciate you being open and raw and honest, even though it's not the easiest thing. Well it's not yeah, and it's not what you see in Instagram, right? And that's what and that was part of what was keeping Yeah, no. us not being honest about Nicholas's addiction with the world was the like wanting to have this perfect facade of like, we have three kids and they're all athletic and they all are going to college and everything is great and When in reality, you know, we had one kid who was really struggling and it was tearing us all apart. And maybe things would have been a little bit better if we could have told the world, like, no, things are not good.~ and that just goes back to I've talked about this a little bit on the show, is you never know what people next to you are going through. Like ever, ever. And I I've I've had to learn to that it's it's caused me to be less judgmental towards people. Yeah, that's true. So only with your permission, I'd still love to keep that piece in there because I I like I like that you're being No, you can. It's yeah, I didn't open and real. Like it's it takes a lot to be that vulnerable. and do you find you said like people who've lost somebody, you know, like to talk about it. Do you find it gets easier as time goes, or is it still always kind of Hard to talk about. Honestly, the minute this happened, I was like, Okay, we've gotta figure out how to not get eaten up by this. Cause I mean, it could eat you up. And we've been in support groups with people who haven't told anybody that their kid passed away and it's been a few years because they're like not in denial, but they just are so ashamed. ~ So Nick and I, that's my husband's name. We joined a ton of support groups. We've read a ton of grief books.~ we made a commitment to do everything the grief books suggested.~ one of the grief books, ~ Colin Campbell's Finding the Words, it's a great book. He talks about saying yes and that you need community. And so Nick and I, you know, when anybody came over and was like, Do you want to? We always said yes, even though Our first instinct was, no, I absolutely do not want to go do that.~ because community is really important and it's the one thing that's really~ kept us afloat. ~ the other thing was exercise. Like people said ~ on the books, like you gotta exercise. And so the two of us have been exercising every day. That's not negotiable. ~ in our grief group, Lit, they talk about~ one of the grief counselor talks about you need to metabolize grief and so exercising helps with that and it's a hundred percent true. my journaling ~ helped a lot and I I feel like we got to a place where it just it was like so bad that we knew that we had to take control of it. So your question was about like, does it get better? I think it depends on you. And for the two of us, I think it's gotten not better, but we live within the realm of this new thing called grief. And a lot of it's because we really focus on it. Also, I got a therapist and I have to say she's the best. And ~ EMDR, do you know what that is?~ Yeah. Yeah. Is the the eye movement yeah, Trauma. Yeah. It's been extremely helpful to me. yeah.~ I don't know. I think I I it would be a basket case, I think, if I didn't have her and that.~ so I don't know if it gets if it gets better, but I think you have to really we've had to really work at at making things kind of fall into place. And that makes sense. And I feel like what you're explaining is you at some point you realize that in order to surv survive your loss you had to basically change your way of thinking. Everything. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's See. I tried to f go ahead. I don't have you have you heard Billy Bob Thornton lost his brother and he said at any one point in time he's gonna be fifty percent sad and fifty percent happy. And I think that was really freeing for Nick and I. It it was for me, because I kept trying to get back to like how we were before, but you're never gonna get back to that, Yeah. right? And I also kept trying to find like how is it that I'm gonna be happy again? And maybe the answer is you're not ever gonna be that happy again. You're gonna live with this new reality. And that new reality is that this kid that you loved and who for twenty-five years was a really big deal in your world is gone. And so why would you expect it to be anything but kind of terrible for a long time and you're gonna have to make joy where you can find Mm-hmm. Yeah, and I'm I'm actually really happy that you've been able to find some things to help you out along this road. Yeah. Ca'cause I I feel like that's not even always easy to do. Yeah. Journaling helped a lot. I started when I was journaling, I still am journaling every day, but I started feeling more connected to to Nicholas and ~ Nick Cabe, who I re I brought up before, he talks about that you kind of need to have a continual connection to somebody who's gone. And I've been journaling and then those journaling turned into writing poems,~ which really is just journaling. So yeah. Yeah. You you mentioned ~ at the very beginning, this is goes back to your writing, I believe. Well maybe it wasn't your writing. Maybe it is. I can't remember. My brain is off, but nope, And my dog's coming in. Okay. you're good. ~ I believe you mentioned your memoir centers around the idea that grief mirrors pregnancy. Where did that realisation come from? Well, that was for my journal. When I started writing, I started feeling like describing what my body felt like. I felt like I was pregnant again. I the first trimester where you're nauseous, you can't eat. ~ you know, everybody says like, you have the glow of pregnancy. Well, the first trimester I I was green. And I when we experienced when I started off with grief, I was green with grief and I started feeling like I was growing this thing called grief. And grief is half me and half Nicholas, just like the placenta was. And there was a period of time, then the second trimester where I everybody else was moving on and going on with their lives. And I just felt like the grief was growing within me and I couldn't move on. And I just like would lay in bed and and journal and feel pretty sorry for myself. ~ and then there was a period where I realized I wanted everyone to know, and that was like my showing. And I told everyone, ~ I still do.~ it's funny if somebody would say to us like, how many kids do you have? My husband always like steps back. He's like, I'll let you handle this. And Because I'll tell you, I want people to know that there is a big, beautiful life that isn't here anymore and people should know about him.~ and then I told I said, you know, I read that thing about from Nick Cave about asking grief to leave your body. And I did and it it actually is pretty effective to not have it just sit inside of you and but to think of it as a its own entity, right? And my griefs I think of him as like a little orangutan. And some days he's very peaceful and other days he's a terror and ~ I it it I think having a framework to kind of think about this thing called grief is been really helpful to me because our society is really grief illiterate.~ I can't tell you how many people, even my own family who means very well, have said, like, when are you gonna get over this? Or when when are you gonna get back to doing, you know, how you used to be? Or my dad said, It seems like you're never gonna be happy again and Like you're right. This when Nicholas comes back things are gonna get better, but and barring that, like we're gonna have to live in what what's real in the here and now. Yeah, yeah, and I I feel like that's that I I feel like that would be the me like five years ago as being that person. But doing this is like no, you don't just get over stuff. You have to the I guess the way I'm gonna relate it back to me for a second. Yeah. Nothing. No, leave me. I'm not trying to make this about me. I just wanna relate it back to so when I first started therapy, I was going for depression and and anxiety. And when I went in, I thought, okay, well, just tell me what I have to do to get over this, to get through this. And my therapist sat me down, he's like, looks me in the face and in the eyes, and he's like, Travis, you do not do not get over this. You learn techniques to get you through this. And that was a big realization for me, because I was like, Well, okay, well, what does that look like? He's like, That looks like you're gonna be this is gonna be with you for the rest of your life. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So it makes me have way more empathy ~ for people and whatever they're going through because it's not just a phase. Yeah. You don't just snap your fingers and Yeah, I agree. And I'm sorry that you have anxiety because I think I I watched my own son struggle with that and it ~ it it it was it's not logical, so it was hard to watch. No. Yeah, it's it definitely is not logical at all. And it's there's moments where you in your brain you know it's not logical, but you still can't push those thoughts away. And going back to grief though, was there like a certain point where you realized, well, I need to stop fighting this and learn how to walk alongside of it? I feel like that happened at the beginning, just the first day, because I I kept like thinking like, okay, we can have a normal life if Nicholas is here. Like there was no no scenario where he wasn't there where normal life came back. So I think I feel like that happened really early on. That's that's good. What would you say, ~ Never mind. I in my head it was a different question, but you've already answered it. Okay. I can answer things twice too. see here our but it was stigma that's where I was going. I feel like alongside of mental health there's also stigma with addiction. How did that play out ~ both when Nicholas was alive and after his death? Mm-hmm. Well, you know Can I start I can I start with that w after Steph? Like when after Nicholas was gone, Yeah. I felt like I felt like people were driving by my house or my former students were talking to one another and everybody was Can you believe, you know, sh that lady Such a bad mom that y her son had a pill size hole in his heart. And there's a saying in Al Anon, which is, How free do you want to be? And my answer is, I really want to be free. So I felt like I I got to a place where I was like, is that really what I want to believe about the world? And the answer is no, because it would be a terrible way to live. And so I started trying to figure out how to find some grace for myself so that I didn't feel like I was. the addict's mom or that Nicholas was the addict.~ in Ellen, you have sponsors and I have one and she's just lovely, but she used to tease before Nicholas passed that I was so embarrassed by his addiction. And she used to say,~ I think I'm gonna make you go onto the street corner and hold a sign saying my son's an addict and I love him. And since he passed away, I feel like that's what I do now. I go on my all my socials and I wrote this book and I'm saying, my son is an addict and I love him. So that stigma's been really hard for me to beat down. And then when he was alive, I think we all played into it. I, you know, we really wanted we wanted him to get better. And I think we thought like the more hopeful we were, like, this is just a phase, he's gonna, you know, he's gonna hit his bottom.~ So I f I we while he was alive, I think we all were really trapped in that. Yeah. Now I'd I'd love to bring up some of the good things. Looking back, what are some of your favorite memories of Nicholas that you want people to remember?~ well he wasn't perfect. I think that's ~ something that, you know, when people pass away, you try to only remember. But he really loved soccer. And I remember he used to, especially in junior high and his freshman year, he he his freshman year he got on the varsity team right away. he just loved it. But ~ our next door neighbors,~ the mom went to she was a teacher with me, and ~ the Mom told somebody and somebody came back and told me and they were like, Yeah, Nicholas practices soccer with cones all by himself all the time. And I was really surprised people were talking about it. But it is true. Like that he was like driven. It was a passion for of his. And I there's something beautiful about that. Just, you know, a kid who n loves something and wants to do ~ wants to just be the the best that they can at it.~ and the other thing about him, another funny story about our backyard, is so we are dog people and we have dogs and Nicholas's job was to pick up the dog poop and which makes sense because he was the one usually using the grass. So in any case, ~ he did a phenomenal job and we were always like, he's really good at picking up the dog poop. And then one time my husband looked over the wall at our neighbors and Nicholas was picking up the dog poop and flinging it over the rope. yeah. So he was he was somebody who ~ who liked to push his limits, obviously.~ and he was reckless. He I remember the first time he he wanted to do gymnastics, so he was taking a gymnastics class and he was he was maybe seven. And I took him there and before it started they had all the boys and I think there it was only boys, but they were like, yeah, see how far you can go up on that rope and it was a huge building and, you know, they're go a little ways, but Nicholas w like he climbed all the way to the top of the rope and and it might have been two stories, maybe three stories up. And then he just let go like a crazy person and just fell all the way down. And everybody was looking at me and we were running and like, you know, he the he had the wind knocked out of him. And I was like, Nicholas, why did you let go? He's like, I didn't know what to do once I was up there. Yeah. He was like, they told me to climb. And I was he so he's exactly exactly so reckless, Yeah. Yeah, they didn't tell him how to get down, they just told him to climb. reckless and determined and a scoot.~ one other thing is that he he loved his family. He loved his brothers and there was a time he was coming off the benzodiazepines and he was in ICU for six days with a swelling of the brain and he didn't know who he was, he didn't know his name. ~ and I said, you know, who are you? And he said, I'm the big brother. And I think if that's Like it when everything was stripped away, like that's who he was. He he loved his brothers and he loved his family. I love that. So I just have like two or three more here. What has your son continued to teach you even after his passing? Okay.~ to be brave. Like I've been posting poems about him on the internet.~ to listen.~ his dad started taking ~ guitar lessons. So my husband, Nick, is he's a physicist. He's very, you know, left brain if that's a thing. But since Nicola's past he's been, you know, playing guitar, ~ and kind of like singing love love songs to him. So I guess he's taught me to to really get in touch with kind of being in the moment and being present and like appreciating music and kind of holding space and like maybe there's hope that that he kind of is here on some level. Mm, I love that. Meet him. And really love that. And I love that ~ your husband found something as well to pick up and do that. It is really cute. I think that's great. Yeah. Well, it was it started because he wanted to play a Willie Nelson song. I think it's Willie Nelson, Just Breathe.'Cause it reminded him of Nicholas. And then now he's just playing all sorts of kind of sweet songs. It's awesome. I'm j I'm a huge fan of music, so I'd I'd be that person to pick up something like that,~ but I can't play guitar for the life of me. I've tried and it just is not me. Well, Nick ~ didn't he takes lessons and there he has ~ performances every ~ f four times a year. So ~ and they're usually with seven and eight year olds. So ~ he's like this, you know, fifty four year old man amongst two these tiny little kids. So That's great. So what do you what do you wish ~ people would stop saying to grieving parents? think it's not stop saying because I even I feel like if you say something with good intentions, I think people I I I can speak for me, I'll take it. I mean, I've had people say really stupid stuff where you're just like, my God. But I know that their heart is ~ means well.~ I think what I would want them to do is just to talk to them because I feel like a lot of times people are worried about like, will it hurt her feelings? I don't know. Here's an example. My sister, her daughter who I love, is pregnant and she's having her next dot she's she already had a baby, so she's having her second. But my sister called and was like, This is gonna be a hard conversation because it's gonna be hard for you to And I'm sure that was really hard for my sister, you know? So it was beautiful that she like could hold both things, Yeah. like We all want her daughter to have a healthy, beautiful daughter. And at the same time, it can be sad that Nicholas isn't here to have kids on his own too. So, so maybe just to have those hard conversations and know that I it was so beautiful that she called and said it that way because, you know, of course I feel that way. I feel sad that Nicholas can't have kids and ~ It was just really I it was nice to find out from her and also to find out like with like such a loving connection. Yeah, and I I think the way you put that was fantastic is the the intention behind it. 'Cause I have to admit I'm often that person that says things with the right intention, but I don't always use the right words to people. And then I'll walk away and I'm like, I could have said that a lot better. I had a ~ one of my dad's friends who said,~ sorry about Nicholas, but it is what it is. And I was like You're yeah, that was a like for real? You really just said that type of thing? Yeah. But he's eighty two or some age. Like I'm sure it killed him to say like I'm sure and so I had to take it as like he's trying to re like he's trying. And the here this is the last ~ question that I had, but then there's a just a few follow up ones. If your son could hear this conversation, what would you want him to know? Come back. that we miss him and If there's anything that we did that could have stopped him, I'm sorry for I'm sorry for the mistakes I made. And I hope he knows how loved he is. How much we really love him. I love it. It's it's all just just really really good. I I love how open you've been th throughout this whole conversation. Where can people find you? Well, I live in Gilbert, Arizona, and you can find me at www.katierizzo.com. So that's my website. Or on Instagram, I'm Katie Rizzo double seven. My students gave me that name. I think it's super cute. Yeah. So there you can find my poetry.~ I have a book out called The Trimesters of Grief and it's ~ being sold anywhere books are sold. It comes out in October, but it's available for sale right now. Awesome. And I'll make sure to add the the links in the show notes for you. And last thing here is I feel like we've covered a lot of ground. Is there anything you'd want to bring up that we did not discuss? I think one thing I wish I would have added to the part where you said, what would you tell a family who's struggling with addiction?~ I would tell them that something I learned in Al Anon is to be a loving And that's really helped me, even with non people who are not addicted, that you're I feel like for a long time my I thought my role was to kind of guide my kids and help see like where their pitfalls and kind of make sure that they're safe. And now I feel like my job is just to be a loving witness. Love it. Well, Katie, thank you so much for coming on and spending an hour with I admire you for writing a book and sharing your story. I I know that it's not easy to be vulnerable, but I I admire your the work you're doing and you telling the story and I loved hearing about all about Nicholas. Mm. Well, I love talking about him. Great and thank you all that listened. If this ~ episode resonated with you, please share it and follow us. Thanks again until next time.