Learning to Breathe

Learning to Breathe explores a mother's journey through years of attempting to navigate the guilt, confusion, and loss that comes with being the parent of an addict. It includes poems of grief and sorrow, as well as poems of endurance, strength, and praise. Through poetry as a form of prayer, the speaker realizes she has control only over herself. If she is to survive and be of help to her child and to those she loves, she must find how to be resilient. This is a parent's story, and the poems are an offering of hope to the many others in similar relationships: despite almost unbearable sorrow, we can learn to breathe again.