Before I Let You Go by Kelly Rimmer

Before I Let You Go by Kelly Rimmer

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


I felt this was a very realistic portrayal of substance abuse and addiction. This was also a very accurate portayal IMHO of being the family member or a loved on of someone who uses and/or is addicted to a substance. How we immediately are judgemental if we do not know all of the facts and think of and acknowledge the abuse as an addiction and disease.

"And just like that, I'm judging her again. From admiration to condemnation in two simple thoughts. It never really goes away"

Lexie's character was super relatable to me. Her relationship with her fiance Sam was also realistically written. I felt so bad for her fiance Sam just as I did at the beginning of my relationship with my own husband (sometimes to this day) for becoming engaged to someone who always had her guard up when it came to her family, always took care of her family since being forced to become the "mom" of her sister from a young age, and the impact this can and does often have on relationships. From the codependency and the wishes to be able to make everything better for the person who is sick, to the need to take care of them and sometimes accidentally this behavior becoming enabling behavior if you are not careful.

"You know what codependency is, right? You and your sister are a textbook case."

This book absolutely broke my heart and brought tears to my eyes. It unfortunately hits the nail on the head with how our system treats people with addiction. The entire story challenged even my view on addiction and I'm studying to become a substance abuse counselor! I understand that it's a disease and yet sometimes the anger would still come to mind when thinking about a pregnant woman still using while pregnant. But it's not her choice! It's a symptom of an illness! This book made me think about my own perspective on addiction while pregnant. I wasn't aware of a lot of the laws talked about in the book that are "for" fetus' to be preotected from their pregnant and drug using mothers. I look forward to the research I'm going to do to learn more about it.



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