Kelly Gordon

Hello, my name is Kelly. Junuh is my son. I now live in Woodstock with our dog Stella and a new addition to my household, Saylor, a black cat. I work in an office that supplies home oxygen and sleep machines. But enough about me. Let me tell you my story of the journey I was lucky enough to have with my son.

Junuh’s story was cut short for him. Junuh was a healthy boy born in Vancouver on Jan 11, 2003. He looked like a little old man, his hairline bald on top and long around the sides and back. His big blue eyes windows into his soul.

Junuh did not have his dad in his life – his dad chose another lifestyle. I would say, “Just you and me buddy against the whole world.” And he would respond with a smile and say “I love you mom.” I haven’t heard those words in 4 long years. I wake up everyday and say good morning to him. I still look at my phone, waiting for a text, or a phone call from him, hoping that the life I am living without him is just a bad dream. But clearly it’s not as he had an overdose on February 13, 2021. His life was over on February 17th, 2021 and on that day my life ended too. Junuh was 18 years old. 

Junuh was a complex character. He was funny, he played soccer and even went to Portugal to represent Canada for the U13 Boys. Junuh loved skate boarding and doing his hair (he was a good looking kid). Junuh only had me for family. He had close friends when he was playing soccer, but he had lost a soccer friend and this I believe was a turning point for him.

As a parent, we take our kids to appointments, feed them, hug them, teach them values and protect them. I did try. I did all these things and I still lost my son to a world I never imagined was not actually a movie.

When Junuh asked me to drop down and play soccer for a different league, I hesitated. He was doing so well at the level he was at. His position was goalie. We moved to Woodstock. He changed schools. He wasn’t meeting the right types of people. He found the wrong crowd. 

My son started doing meth because an adult man gave it to him. I can’t believe a grown man would give a child drugs. As the weeks passed and Junuh continued using meth, he would leave the house and stay out later and later. Day and night for about a year, I would chase Junuh around town, trying to get him to come home. I took it upon myself to go into places called “Flophouses”. These places were not pretty, people high, recovering from their last hit, laying on a dirty floors.

Calling the police was not helpful at the beginning. Our city had a local curfew for children to be home that was set at 11 pm. After 11p.m., you had to call the missing person’s line. I would call everyday and was pretty much known on a first name basis.

After enough times calling the police to go look for Junuh, I got the attention of two detectives. They were also on the same trail of this adult man who was giving youth drugs. We worked together to catch him and bring Junuh home. They discovered that the adult was using Junuh and two other boys of the same age (they were 14) to go steal things for him and break into cars for small items that could be used for quick money. This young man would let them sleep at his nasty place, give them drugs and got them addicted.

We were eventually able to get the dealer sent to jail.  He spent a short time in jail and on probation, he was no longer able to be with children under the age of 16 – a small price to pay for a life time of traumas for these boys. 

My son moved home and I thought, “Finally he’s home!”. We moved on from that traumatic year.  During that summer, Junuh was on to high school. I moved him again to a fresh city as I thought getting him away from Woodstock would be the answer.  We were living on a horse farm.  Junuh always loved animals. I still relive a memory of him wanting to always lead the biggest ones out to the paddock. So, now with Junuh being home and having moved to a new city, I had gotten my son back. I had him for 6 months. Then, he met new friends at school – however, they were not the best crowd either.

Junuh went from being a sweet, kind, loving son to a seemingly moody teenager…well that’s what I thought it was. Nope, I was completely wrong. This time, the downward spiral was out of control. Now he was not playing soccer at all. He was becoming more and more rude, not following rules, becoming hot-tempered, never going to school. 

His Grade 9 year was finally over. Summer came and Junuh was a mess. I tried to take him to counseling. I tried all sorts of reasoning with him to get him back on track but nothing helped. 

Now we were at a brand new school year, Grade 10, and he hated school at this point. When he would leave the house to go to school, “Great!” I thought, believing that he had gone to school. Nope, he would actually go to a friend’s house, after the friend’s mom had left, and they would stay there daily instead of going to school. He started once more not coming home at curfew. The signs of him using a substance again were becoming more and more clear.

Nope, he would actually go to a friend’s house, after the friend’s mom had left, and they would stay there daily instead of going to school. He started once more not coming home at curfew. The signs of him using a substance again were becoming more and more clear.

His Grade 10 year continued and his 16th birthday came and went. One night, a couple weeks after he had turned 16, Junuh was removed from the house. It all started because he had lost his keys. He found me at a local restaurant and I gave him my house key, telling him to leave the door unlocked so I could get in. I did not notice that he was high or drunk. He left and later that night, before I went home, I bought a pizza for him. When I arrived home, he was asleep in his bed. I put my hand on his shoulder and that’s when he hit me, leaving me with a fat lip, broken glasses and two black eyes. I had to call 911. I didn’t know what else to do. The police came and arrested him. 

After Junuh’s arrest, he went to a youth shelter in Kitchener. At this point, I begged him to get into rehab, counseling, or any other group that would put this family back together again. We had some heart to heart talks. He had never stolen from me nor was I afraid of him until after that night. I asked him to come home but he said he refused. He was upset with me because I had called the police and he did not remember that night. He did not know that he had punched me.  He told me he thought I called the police on him for losing the house key.

Junuh spent 18 months living on the streets and at shelters and friend’s houses. During this nightmarish period, I was back to looking for him constinuously, walking the streets, checking shelters and parks, not hearing from him for days. Here and there I would get a call from him saying “Hi mom. I love you. I am ready to come home”. We would make arrangements each time, like new curfews, register him to go to school again and apply for him to get into detox and rehab programs. But he never came home and the cycle would go on and on. 

The longer he wasn’t at home, he would lose weight, his skin becoming pale grey and his eyes looking more tired and sadder. All of this time I was trying to get him into rehab programs. But he would be turned away for one reason or another. The most popular reason was that the program was already full and there was not room for him. 

While Junuh was not at home, he did reach out to some of the community services that offered things like food, clean socks and toothbrushes. But he just needed to come home.

Junuh died at a centre that was considered a transitional home for adults. He was 17 years old at this time, again waiting for a bed at a rehab centre, but his bed wasn’t ready for him as there a was a two week waiting list. At this transitional home where Junuh stayed, there were trained staff and naloxone kits were right on site – but he still died. 

The afternoon that I got the call from the hospital, He was with two “friends” at the home, in the community area where the computers were located. Staff were present. Apparently before staff called 911, Junuh had been showing signs of being on a substance. The two “friends” noticed he was sitting slumped over at a computer where he had been messaging me for money for a phone at 6:00 a.m. They checked his pockets for drugs and ran out the door. The two “friends” that checked Junuhs pockets did not help him.  They did not tell staff that Junuh was overdosing. They ran out the door and left him to die. By the time EMS showed up, 25 minutes had gone by.

They got him to the emergency department at Grand River Hospital. I got a call from them at around 2:00 p.m. It was February 13, 2021. My heart stopped. I was told it was a bad overdose and to not drive to the hospital on my own but have someone take me there. I arrived at the hospital and went to my son. My first sight of my beautiful baby boy was of him being worked on, tubes everywhere, surrounded by doctors, nurses, police and EMS. My Junuh was unconscious and didn’t look like he was in any pain. I remember hearing in my head while looking at the mess of people, machines and tubes, “Mommy I need a bandaid”. It pained me that I couldn’t give him a band aid and make him feel better.

The health care team tried to explain to me in great, big medical terms, what was going on with his brain. They were trying to make arrangements to take him to Hamilton hospital to have a decompression on his brain. When the results came back from his head scan the brain was too swollen and they were unable to treat him, he stayed at Grand River Hospital. 

When he was finally in the ICU, I got to hold his hand, touch his hair, his beautiful eyelashes looking like they had tears on them. I kissed him, crying. And to this day, I cry. The nurse on night duty let me stay as long as she could.  During Junuh’s stay in ICU, i wasn’t allowed to be at the hospital all day, everyday because of covid.  During the times that I had to be away from my son, I was allowed to see him through video chat. I could talk to him, listening to the life support machine helping him breathe. I would lay in my bed listening.

On visiting days, for the few short hours, I was allowed to bring one of my dearest friends, known to Junuh as Auntie, to be with me.  However, she had to stay outside of the room and watch.

Sadly, in the end there was nothing they could do to save him. He stayed in the ICU for four days and I was the one who had the make the final decision to take him off life support – the last second of his life and his last breath. I held him, squeezed his hands, tickled his feet, hoping he would jump up and say, “Hi mom! I am ok, let’s go home”. He passed away.

After his time of death was declared, I was a parent without a living child. I walked out of the ICU alone. Friends and family were with me but it did not help. My son was dead due to a fentanyl overdose. I stared out the car window blankly as I drove home. 

I saw bunnys, they seemed to be everywhere, guiding me home. As I pulled into the driveway, I saw one rabbit standing up on his hind legs, front feet tucked in, ears held high, watching me. I believe that was Junuh telling me he was ok. Now bunny’s are everywhere in my home, my friend’s home, all for Junuh. 

I think that the symbol of the bunny for Junuh was that, at home I used to sleep with a large stuffed bunny on my bed. I gave him one while he was in the youth shelter so he would feel safe. I bought myself another exactly the same. Junuh had kept this bunny I gave him, I found it at the last place he was at.

After his time of death was declared, I was a parent without a living child. I walked out of the ICU alone. Friends and family were with me but it did not help. My son was dead due to a fentanyl overdose. I stared out the car window blankly as I drove home. 

I saw bunnies. They seemed to be everywhere, guiding me home. As I pulled into the driveway, I saw one rabbit standing up on his hind legs, front feet tucked in, ears held high, watching me. I believe that was Junuh telling me he was ok. Now bunny’s are everywhere in my home and my friend’s home, all for Junuh. 

Bunnies are signficant to my memory of Junuh.  I used to sleep with a large stuffed bunny on my bed. I also gave him one while he was in the youth shelter so he would feel safe and later bought the exact stuffed bunny myself.  Junuh had kept this bunny I gave him – I found it at the last place he was at before he died.

That was Junuh’s story. But I just want to mention a few other things. 

Junuh’s mental health struggles were never diagnosed. He was at the age where he had the right to make his own choices and he did not want to participate in a formal diagnosis process. However, signs that made me realize he was struggling were his attitude change, being grumpy all the time and not eating as much as he used to. 

I believe that the shelter system for youth failed Junuh. They are run on expectations that most youth have a hard time meeting. These expectations included kids needing to go to school and being the shelter for 5:00 p.m. Otherwise, they would not get a bed. They did give Junuh several chances to follow the rules and made some exceptions for him.

They also had a policy where the older kids got less chances than the younger ones.  Since Junuh was 16 years of age, if he was late, he was likely not to get a bed. I believe that if Junuh had been able to follow such guidelines at home, he probably would have been less likely to have run into friends that were out drinking and using drugs.  So the policies at the shelter were not practical.

Canada’s government failed my son and many others.  The number of youth living on the streets, resorting to crime for survival or being trafficked, is too large for the limited trained staff and facilities provided by the government to support them. We need more medical teams that can help deal with the physical and mental health concerns of youth on the street – perhaps volunteers, trained staff walking the streets and making contact with youth who can’t make it into a shelter so they are safe.  The youth also need to have 24-hour access to shelters and more shelters need to be built.  

 As a mother who has lost a child to a deadly substance that has infiltrated the illicit drug supply, grieving is not a process for me, it’s now a lifestyle. It has only been after 4 years of Junuh being dead that I can actually say I have been ready to learn what to do with my grief. I have a wonderful support group through Moms Stop the Harm. I have met other moms who have also had to experience the pain of losing a child to the toxic drug crisis. We have formed a small force we call #Momsquad. We have made a messenger group chat where we stay in contact and support each other. Some of the moms speak in public to raise awareness about substance use and overdoses. We come from all walks of life and careers.

The love of a mother for her precious child never dies. When you love a child, that love runs wildly through your whole body. It never goes away. It seems to burn like a fire, taking over every emotion.

Premier Doug Ford has passed Bill 223 which will result in the closure of 10 safe consumptions sites in Ontario. These sites have been saving the lives of thousands of people who use drugs by reversing overdoses when they happen. I have this to say to Doug Ford: You are a monster. You deciding to close SCSs is mass murder. SCSs help people. Isn’t that your job?

 Harm reduction is important for everyone. Until you experience the loss of a loved one to drug overdose or witness the struggles of someone living with addiction, it’s hard to understand the benefits of harm reduction. Believe me, I am one of those people that turned my head away and judged people with homelessness and drug use until my son was involved. People do not wake up and say they want to become addicted to a drug. If we close these safe consumption sites, everyone will be affected, the healthcare that is already short staff, overworked, will be even more overwhelmed.  We will lose thousands of people due to overdose.

We need to END the stigma towards people who use drugs.  We can all educate ourselves on addiction and show everyone respect and love equally. We can all help by volunteer at community services or shelters and by donating our clothes, shoes, blankets and winter coats.  You can share your experience if you have a story of someone in your life that is or has experienced addiction. Sometimes even just saying hello to someone who uses drug and showing them compassion can make a difference. 

I want to wrap this story by saying Junuh is my whole world. I have dedicated my life to him by getting out there and telling his story. I have spoke briefly at Drug Overdose Awareness Day events.   On March 6th, I put up a black balloon to honour those we have lost to overdose.

I have a bunny figurine next to a window in my kitchen that lights up when the sun goes down in the evenings.  That is my daily reminder that Junuh is still with me.  However, nothing can ever replace him or the completely take away the hurt that carry around daily without him here.