Warning: This Drug May Kill You Page #3

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I mean, there was nothing.

I mean, I never saw anything.

She was driven,

and fun to be around,

and it felt right.

We had a couple of kids,

she was a great mom.

We were going on vacations.

We were visiting with family.

We had friends over all the time.

We'd have dinner parties.

She was raised really well.

She was, like, a track star,

cross-country, the cheerleader,

everyone loved her.

I just always looked up

to her when I was little,

and being like, "That is the most

beautiful woman, like, ever."

And I'd wear all of her clothes,

all of her jewelery,

I would do makeup with her

ever since I was...

I could walk, I feel like.

Doyle:

Christmas morning of 2000,

about five or six months

after the baby was born,

I woke her up, and it

had been a couple of days

since she'd been up,

and, uh, I got

the kids out of bed,

and, you know, she didn't even

realize it was Christmas.

I asked her if

she would consider

going to a treatment facility,

and I had already talked to Betty

Ford Clinic down in Palm Springs.

She stayed for three days

and then went missing.

I went down

and tried to find her.

She'd checked

into a motel, and...

she was passed out.

I had just no idea

what was going on.

She went to a second

rehab facility,

and I figured, since I could

afford it at the time,

maybe this place would be better

'cause it was three times as expensive.

When she checked out

28 days later,

she had a whole

bunch of new pills...

and it happened all over again.

She would go around

to different doctors,

telling them

that she had pain.

You know, she'd do

something to injure herself.

I watched her slam her hand

in the car door one time

just so that she could go

to the emergency room,

and the doctors would

always give her something,

Vicodin or Oxy

or something.

She shattered

both her wrists,

and she had...

um, this... I don't

know how to...

she had like a cast

on both of 'em,

and as soon as they

were all healed up again,

she did something

that shattered it again.

Repeatedly, like, the cycle

was over, and over,

where she'd hurt herself,

and then get medication,

and then she'd go off, and leave.

My dad always told me

it was "cooking school."

Once we got older,

we started to realize that, like,

she is going to rehab

right now, but...

It's not... ...it's not gonna...

it's not gonna work.

It got to the point

where it was so common,

I was like, "Maybe

she was really like that."

But then I could tell

when she was clean,

how healthy and just

amazing she looked,

but when she was high,

it was like...

it was like

she was sleepwalking,

like, she wasn't

herself whatsoever.

Just, like, her eyes

were different,

her speech was different,

the way she walked,

everything about her was just really off.

Preston:
When she was clean,

she was an awesome human being,

and just the best mother,

and I'd trust her with

my life when she was sober,

but I had to do things that

most kids wouldn't have to.

It almost felt like

I was the parent.

It's like the roles switched,

where I'd be searching

her room for... for drugs.

Whenever I'd open drawers,

there would be pills hidden.

There would be pills

in the bathroom counters.

You know, in her coat pockets,

or in her shoes,

in her sock drawer,

I mean, in the back of the food pantry,

or wherever.

They were everywhere.

Her family was ashamed.

Every Christmas

was a disaster.

All of a sudden,

we're losing friends,

people didn't want

to be around us.

Doyle:
I think at this point,

the kids...

they were just starting

to understand it.

The reason why I would keep them

out in the evenings, you know,

and always filled their days

with things, you know.

I mean, at one point,

I had all three of 'em in Little League,

which was a disaster for me,

because I'm driving

all over the place.

Two practices and a game

for each one of 'em every week.

You know, we'd have

dinner out all the time,

and movies,

and you know.

It was exhausting.

I'm trying to keep them away

from wanting to go upstairs

and see their mom in bed.

We knew there was a problem,

but there was nothing that

we could say or do

that was gonna change it,

so it just became

part of our life.

Doyle:
In 2008,

like seven years into it,

a rehab facility in Malibu

called and said,

"Are you not coming for family week?"

And I said, "No, I've had it.

"You know, I'm not coming

to anymore family weeks.

I've been to too many already."

And they said, um...

"Well, it sounds to me

like you're done."

And I said, "I don't even

know what that means."

He said...

"Well, if you're thinking

about a divorce,

"we... we really ought to think

about that while she's here,

"so that she doesn't

come home to that

and not have a support group."

I mean, it was the first time

anybody had ever said...

that I actually...

you know,

could get out, so...

um, I...

I filed...

and moved the kids out.

When we divorced,

Wynne got half custody,

and started living

in San Francisco.

The kids would visit her.

They're getting older.

They're starting

to really develop

a relationship with their mom

that's separate from me.

Harry:

The last house that we lived at with her

was in the South Market,

and the Embarcadero.

And I used to skate

on the Embarcadero at 10:30,

'cause she would allow me

to, like, leave the house,

like, she gave us

that much freedom.

It was just like my favorite

feeling in the world.

This was her house, you see,

with all these candles.

Man:

Oh, that's cool, yeah.

Doyle:

When the kids were with her,

I was always on edge.

Then it really just

became about safety.

I became this hyper-vigilant

sort of guy,

and she was fine,

but I knew it

wasn't gonna last.

It just slowly

deteriorated again.

I heard from the kids that she

was going into the hospital

because she had a kidney stone

that they had to remove.

She had been taking

a lot of opiates,

and once she got

to the hospital,

they were giving her

what a normal person

would be getting as a dose

when you have pain,

but it wasn't near the amount

she'd been taking on her own.

So, there she is

in a confined spot,

for four days going

through withdrawals,

and it was just getting worse.

So, she left the hospital,

and they gave her a bunch

of opiates on the way out.

Preston and Harry

were staying with their mom.

Harry:
Like, she had all these

pills on the side of her bed.

"The hospital told me to take these,"

and I was just like,

just... please

don't overdo this.

Like, there's a lot

of pills here.

Eight bottles

filled to the top,

and I was like,

"Who gave you all of these?"

And she said,

"Oh, my doctor did."

Like, "I'm still in a lot

of pain from the kidneys."

And then, in the morning,

she was just laying there

with her arms spread out,

and her eyes were kind of open.

We said goodbye,

and got no response,

and we thought that was odd.

Preston, like, pulled out

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