Customer Reviews

Stay Close: A Mother's Story of Her Son's Addiction

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Hearing about a family torn apart by drug abuse is not unusual, but what is unusual is how this family's story is told. This is a candid revalation of a family in crisis told from the perspective of the mother, her addicted son, and his other sibling. Each has a dinstinct perspective and tone of voice. This is a heroic story of how courage and persistence in love and support can slowly bring a family to healing. The struggle is not short, and the mistakes are admitted freely on all sides. This is a story for anyone who feels helpless in their struggle and wants to know what their loved one in need is feeling.
For me this story is more personal. I was one of the students at the school where Dr Libby Cataldi served as the head for 21 years. I knew her as a supportive advocate for all of us both in our education and our professional careers. I was one of the ones she was taking care of and who needed her. But my classmates and I had no idea of the personal struggle that was going on underneath all her smiles of encouragement. This book made me weep for her and for her family. I knew both boys as the extraordinary students and gentlemen they were as children. I remember thinking of the wonderful futures that I thought lay ahead for them with the benefit of their mother's support and love. How lucky I thought they were to have her. What I didn't know was how really lucky they would all be to have each other.
Read this book and think about how you can Stay Close in crisis, how you can manage through the fog of mistakes, and see through to a clear understanding of what makes family family.

Stay Close. More than a title. This books cuts to the meaning of Love. Addiction is a mystery and it comes in many forms. "Stay Close" takes the reader through an addicts life through the eyes of his Mother. This book is candid, provoking and filled with reality. Libby brings addiction out of the closet of shame and guilt, and into the forefront of understanding and even love. It is difficult to love an addict, and more difficult for an addict to love themselves. This book is guiding light not only for families effected by addiction but anyone with children. The phrase, "Love them through it." is only the beginning...

I'd like to thank Libby Cataldi for honoring and putting into words the deep love a Mother has for her children. It is not a weakness but a strength.

I would recommend this book to adults and teens; an invaluable lesson is written between every line.

Stay Close is a brave and touching story of a mother's fight and painful journey to save her son from drug addiction. Libby Cataldi's voice as a mother and educator is beautifully sincere, shining a light on what many families today face and are often too ashamed to speak about.

Early in the book Cataldi describes her two beloved sons through memories of a childhood filled with playful laughter, leaving a powerful and moving snapshot of the visceral love that they have for one another. As a reader, this image is painfully shattered as Jeff, the eldest son, falls to drugs throughout the course of his adolescence and into adulthood.

When speaking about addiction, I've often heard people say "I don't get it. Why can't they just stop?" People often don't stop to think that addicts are in just as much pain as those that love them. The self loathing they must feel because they can't stop, no matter how much they try, is unbearable, I'm sure. I didn't fully understand this before reading Stay Close. Between the heart-wrenching stories retold by his mother and brother, you will find that even in the midst of a terrible drug addiction, the love for his family and essence of Jeff was always there. Maybe he was clouded at times, but the Jeff that Cataldi describes early on always remained. Jeff's personal account, inserted periodically throughout the book, also provides insight to a life of friendships, music, trouble and drugs. His reflections are like finding the missing pieces of a puzzle and that's what makes this book so unique and captivating.

Because the mother-child bond is unlike any other, mothers will be touched by this story on a different and deeper level. Cataldi touches on relationships, the struggles of being a professional, working mother and all that that entails, and the importance of working closely with loved ones to support and discipline your children - as a team and under a united front. However, there is something in this story for everyone, whether you're a spouse, sibling, friend, or addict.

Stay Close will leave you with a greater understanding of addicts and respect for the entire recovery process. Addiction is extremely hard on those that love them, but also on the addicts themselves. The idea of "stagli vicino" or "stay close," that powerful Italian phrase that forever changed the life of this family, is different from what we hear and are told to do when dealing with addiction. We've all heard about "tough love" and the importance of cutting addicts off - not only financially, but emotionally as well. This story speaks of another way. It speaks of love and emotional support, even when it is toughest to give.

Stay Close is not only about a mother's painful experience with her son's addiction. It's a story about the redemptive power of a family's love for one another and the importance of never giving up hope.

I loved the book! I am the mother of a recovering addict and could identify with many of the feelings and responses that Libby had. Her writing style is professional and she has a suberb way of describing events. I found myself on the edge of my seat wondering what would happen next!
This book will be meaningful to all parents and family members of addicts and recovering addicts. A parent with a child in the early stages of addiction will glean information that could help them seek rehabilitation much sooner. Addicts themselves would benefit from understanding how their illness affects others. "Stay Close" could easily be a lifesaving book. Thanks Libby for your bravery and faith!

"Stay Close" is a MUST read. I couldn't put it down. Addiction isn't just personal. The journey of the addict is a journey taken, (willingly or not), by the entire family. Libby Cataldi was masterful in exposing the tentacles of addiction and their devastating effects upon family and friends alike. But beyond this, she exposed herself. Her hopes, her fears her torments and her joy are embedded upon the page. It was not until Libby had the courage to buck the "conventional" addiction advice, that glimmers of hope emerged. This book invoked tears of sadness and tears of joy. Don't miss out. Read this inspirational book.

"Powerful" - that's the first word many people use to describe Libby Cataldi's Stay Close: a mother's story of her son's addiction. I know because I have recommended this book to several family members and friends, and it is interesting how many people use the same word, "powerful," to describe this book. Beyond that, it is truthful, heart-breaking, hopeful, and beautifully written. The title sums it up brilliantly: "Stay Close" is an Italian aphorism which reminds us exactly what we need to do - no more, no less - when a loved one reaches out to us in time of need. This is "a mother's story," and there are elements of this story which resonate for every parent, regardless of the details of our circumstances. Honest writing inevitably is universal. It is a story of her "son's addiction," and the addiction is insidious and potentially deadly; it is a parent's nightmare. Even though Jeff's addiction seems far beyond the addictions that most of us see around us, we are all acquainted with addictions, whether they involve food, work, cigarettes, sex, alcohol, video games, or something else.
What makes this book a great read is its truthfulness and its hope. Like the rest of us, Libby, Jeff, Jeremy, and Tim are works in progress. Libby tells her story, with supporting passages from Jeff and Jeremy, in such a way that your heart breaks for her family and at the same time, you can imagine yourself standing in her shoes and wondering "what would I have done?" For whatever mistakes she might have made along the way, Libby "stayed close" and Jeff has endured. They are not quitters, and their story inspires me with hope for all of us.
P.S. I invited Libby Cataldi to visit the charter school in North Carolina where I serve as Principal. She spoke to our seniors, our faculty, and our parents. Her message touched the hearts of all three groups. Many people in America today are touched by addictions, especially drug addictions. Libby started a dialogue in our school which continues. We all must "stay close" and make wise decisions in these matters. It's not easy, but Libby reminds us that it is possible.

I am the mother of an addict also. Libby Cataldi was the head of the school I worked in very briefly and our lives touched one another very briefly. It was not until this summer when I got the invitation to go to the book signing at the school where Libby was Head Mistress that I knew of her pain of having a son with an addiction. I wrote Libby a e mail and shared with her my candid recall of my son's addiction from age 12 thru 17. My solace was in the Alanon/Naranon program - it was there for 11 years I found my home with other parents of addicted children. Libby and I have shared much over this summer of our experience with addiction. My son is now 36, married with children and owns his business. I no longer worry about his addiction nor worry if he will relapse, he knows where to go to get help if this happens. Once a long time ago, I thought of writing my own book of my experience with addiction, but it became too painful to live through the pain, hurt and craziness again, so I never did write about it. Libby's documentation of all she went through cut into me, so much so I had to put the book down several times because I could not stop crying. The sleepless nights, the thought that your son is out there and can die - there is no controlling it, no curing it - they must want it for themselves. Libby has done a wonderful job of detailing the emotions and roller coaster ride we go through with an addict. She and Jeff have enormous courage to tell their story and reveal their anonymity that we all have in the "rooms". Personally, I have no problem telling anyone I am the mother of an addict. The "rooms" teach us that in order to keep what we have, we must give it away....Thank you Libby and Jeff!

Claire

This is one of the most informative books I have ever read. If you know anyone with a drug related problem, this is the book I would recommed reading. The fact that Iwas able to relate to this problem, was very sad but also eye-opening. Best book I have ever read.

"Stay Close" is an addiction memoir, but it's not the stuff of so many addiction memoirs that precede it. It keeps the focus on the author, Libby Cataldi, who endured years of watching her son slip in and out of near-fatal addiction to heroin and an assortment of other deadly drugs. Where other books would lure the reader down the predictable road of addiction, Cataldi stays back and chooses to investigate the toll the disease takes on the addict's family. It's a well-written account from a former private school principal who includes diary entries and interviews with her two sons, Jeff, the addict, and his brother Jeremy, and her ex-husband. The book shows how helpless a parent can be fighting a mammoth disease that responds to tried-and-true recovery methods only some of the time and often only after the addict has hit absolute rock bottom (which tends to be the last place a parent wants to find his or her child). Cataldi's writing is frank, retrospective and honest. If you're looking for a book about addiction and how it can cut a family to its marrow I couldn't recommend a better book.

I couldn't put the book down until I finished. Dr. Caltadi's story illustrates, without equivocation, the impact of addiction on the entire family and the pain it visits on all. It is told with an openness and honesty that is believable and rare and at the same time impossible to imagine living through, never mind getting up and going to work. In addition it is magnificently written - a masterpiece. Great credit is due to Jeff, her son, who agreed to add his perspective and to let the story by told. The secret is in the title. Thank you. May this indeed be a help to others.