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Ahead of Mother’s Day, grieving moms who lost their children to drug overdose are warning that the wave of punitive anti-drug legislation sweeping the country would not have prevented the deaths of their loved ones. In fact, they say, adopting harsh new laws like these only makes the spiraling public health crisis worse by further criminalizing people living with substance abuse disorders.

While families across the country celebrate Mother’s Day, far too many of us will have an empty chair at our table. I lost my son, Mark, to a preventable overdose. For over 100 years this country has attempted to eliminate illicit drug use by arrests and imprisonment. And for over 100 years this punitive policy has failed. This failure is evidenced by over 110,000 lives lost to overdose in 2023.

PEORIA, Ill. (WMBD) — Mothers who have lost their children to drug overdoses say one way to cut down on the death toll could be to decriminalize all drugs. But this small group of mothers, led by JOLT Foundation’s Tamara Olt, said making such drugs as heroin, morphine and others legal could reduce the stigma surrounding their use and allow people to get help before it’s too late.

The language used to describe substance use and addiction must convey respect for individuals, an accurate understanding of the full spectrum of substance use (from non-problematic use to chaotic use and addiction), and effective treatment. Avoid perpetuating negative stereotypes by first recognizing, addressing, and combatting misunderstandings and stigma.

The poisoning narrative emphasizes the “innocence” of people who died from consuming fentanyl unknowingly. In doing so, it contrasts them with others: the people who sold the drugs (guilty of murder); and people who knowingly used fentanyl (guilty of the choice that led to their overdose).

Today, more than 400 hundred families from across the United States who have lost loved ones to overdose re-released an open letter urging lawmakers to stand firm against attempts to double down on the punitive policies of criminalization and prosecution as a response to the overdose crisis. In collaboration with Broken No More and the Drug Policy Alliance, these families are speaking out and calling on all lawmakers to oppose these failed drug war policies and instead embrace life-affirming, evidence-based health responses proven to save lives and prevent other families from experiencing the devastating loss of the one they love.

Naming DRDs [Drug-Related Deaths] as ‘special deaths’ also stems from the high levels of disenfranchised and complex grief. Disenfranchised grief is grief that is not acknowledged by the social network of the bereaved, or by wider society; this is usually applied on people that “didn’t deserve to be grieved over”. Such grief can be seriously detrimental: those experiencing complex grief struggle to find meaning in their loss, and can remain confused by their feelings, particularly feeling that they don’t have the right to grieve.

WTFentanyl.com is a comprehensive resource dedicated to raising awareness about the devastating impact of fentanyl and advocating for effective solutions to the overdose crisis. Their site provides critical information on the dangers of fentanyl, shares personal stories from those affected, and offers actionable steps for prevention and advocacy.

Because these parent-formed organizations, with their narrative of dealers poisoning their children, have become the face of the fentanyl-involved overdose crisis, it is to the benefit of law enforcement, prosecutors, politicians, and the DEA to support them and increase their power. And as they become more powerful, voices for humane drug policies and harm reduction are drowned out by emotive drug-war rhetoric.

A growing number of parents see the war on drugs as an abject failure that harmed their kids. Over one million Americans have died of drug overdoses since 1999, with around 110,000 deaths alone in the 12-month period ending in May 2022. Every single person that overdosed had parents. They were someone’s child at some point.