METH'S GRIP FIGHTING FOR FAMILY

Jasmine and Rocky Briggs saw their children hijacked by addiction. Now
the parents who ached as their kids were lost to meth are trying to keep
other families from having to fight the same battle.

Jasmine Briggs talks to an attorney about an upcoming court date for
her 25-year-old son, Nathan, a recovering methamphetamine addict.
Briggs has become a tireless advocate for better treatment programs
since her children's slide into addiction. A shelf behind her displays
her kids' pictures and athletic trophies.

By Iliana Limon (mailto:ILIMON@ABQTRIB.COM)
Tribune Reporter

Jasmine Briggs sat outside run-down apartments in the city's bleakest
neighborhoods, searching for a trio of lost souls.

Gang members and drug dealers banged on her car windows, but the
mother wouldn't budge. She was on a mission to find her three adult
children consumed by methamphetamine addiction.

"I couldn't sleep when I wasn't even sure my kids were alive," she
said, her eyes filling with tears.

Briggs drove away from her two-story Foothills home toward dilapidated
neighborhoods in the Southeast Heights praying she would return with
her wayward children.

"I mostly just sat in my car and cried all night," she said. "My kids
had been out of my house for about a year, so I didn't even know what
I would say if I found them. I just needed to see them."

Thousands of tears later, two of Rocky and Jasmine Briggs' children
are home.

The husband and wife, who are both 47, won two battles against
methamphetamines, an addictive form of speed, easily made from
household products.

Authorities consider the rampant meth use an epidemic in New
Mexico.

Today, Lt. Gov. Diane Denish will unveil her plan to fight meth
addiction and the soaring number of neighborhood labs.

Jasmine Briggs met with Denish on Wednesday, sharing her experiences
with a drug that nearly stole her children's lives.

Nathan, the Briggs' oldest child at 25, is in his sixth month of
recovery.

Amanda Briggs, their youngest child at 20, will reach her fifth month
of sobriety on Jan. 23.

They still pray for Lashonda Briggs, who is 23 and has a 17-month-old
son. She remains on the streets and denies she is addicted to meth.

"I finally had to take her Christmas gifts out of the trunk of the car
and accept that we weren't going to find her this holiday," Jasmine
Briggs said earlier this week. "She's still lost, but I haven't given
up hope. The others came home, and one day she might come home, too."

The perilous road to recovery for Nathan and Amanda was paved with
gut-wrenching arguments. Their parents took a demanding, tough-love
approach, refusing to feed their children's addiction by giving them
money or a place to live while they were still using drugs.

"I felt like I was literally watching my children die in front of me,"
Jasmine Briggs said.

When Nathan and Amanda finally agreed to seek help, the Briggs family
faced another round of nightmares trying to check them into a drug
treatment program.

Only 64 in-patient beds are available in New Mexico for substance
abusers.

The sparse public and private centers all had long waiting
lists.

Jasmine and Rocky Briggs always thought their health insurance was
their safety net, but it did not open any doors.

"I couldn't believe that my kids finally reached a moment of clarity,
and we couldn't get them into treatment," Jasmine Briggs said. "It was
a horrible slap in the face after all we had been through."

Persistence finally paid off for the family when Amanda and Nathan
were accepted into a 30 day program at the Turquoise Lodge. But the
Briggses still question why they faced so much adversity.

Craig Fritz (mailto:cfritz@abqtrib.com)/Tribune

Jasmine Briggs (left) compares notes on methamphetamine rehabilitation
with state Sen. Michael Sanchez, a Belen Democrat, before meeting with
Lt. Gov. Diane Denish. "I want to help other parents who are just as
lost as I was when all of this started," Briggs says. "And I want
addicts to be able to check themselves into treatment centers when
they are ready to leave the drug behind. This was a huge problem for
our family, but the truth is that it's an even bigger problem for our
community."

It wasn't supposed to be this way for the close-knit, middle-class
family.

The soccer, basketball and baseball trophies in the Briggs' living
room should have led to better things.

The teens with innocent grins captured in team photos had big dreams
and bigger potential.

"If you told me four years ago that all my kids would be addicted to
meth, I never would have believed it," Jasmine Briggs said.

Lashonda vaulted to the varsity soccer team during her freshman year
at Manzano High School.

Nathan also wore several Monarchs uniforms, playing baseball,
basketball and football.

"I always thought he was a little small to play football, but I
should've know he had a heart that made him more explosive on the
field than dynamite," Rocky Briggs said, beaming even eight years
later about his son's success.

Amanda, the last Briggs to take the field, seemed to shine the
brightest.

The forward's footwork earned her a spot on the 2001 Tribune All-Metro
Soccer Team. Recruiters from small colleges throughout the Southwest
courted her, but she wanted a break from the rigors of competitive
sports.

New Mexico Highlands University kept calling Amanda, asking her to
come play soccer on scholarship, as she began her sharp dissent into a
world of meth and mayhem.

"I should have done it," she said. "At the time, I guess I just wanted
a break from everything."

Nathan and Amanda said they always followed their parents' rules in
high school, maybe sipping some alcohol but never touching drugs.
Their parents commonly showed up in movie theater parking lots,
checking up to make sure their teens were telling the truth.

"Once I graduated and moved into my own apartment, I had so much
freedom," Amanda said. "No more soccer, no more rules. It was really a
whole new world for me."

Nathan and Amanda said they were both curious about drugs, keys to a
mind-warping world they had never visited. They accepted free meth
from a new set of friends, who were nothing like the people they knew
in high school.

"The first time I tried it, it was kind of like, `Whoa, I've never had
this much energy,'" Amanda said. "I felt like I could jump outside of
myself. It was weird and different, but I knew I liked it.

"I kept doing it, and within a few weeks, I was hooked. I lost
complete touch with reality and was just numb all the time."

Nathan passed out after his first meth experience, the night of his
high school graduation, but he also quickly grew addicted to the drug.

"It made me feel like all my worries were gone, and I really liked
it," he said. "I thought it made my life so much easier."

Outside of the speed-induced cloud, Jasmine and Rocky Briggs were
stunned by the dramatic changes in their children.

Nathan and Amanda eventually dropped out of Albuquerque's Technical
Vocational Institute and lost their jobs.

They bounced from apartment to apartment, ignoring their parents for
more than a year.

When the couple did see their children, they were withdrawn and prone
to mood swings.

"The hardest was Mother's Day two years ago when none of my children
were around," Jasmine Briggs said. "We were so close, and it was
unbelievable that I had lost them all in such a short period of time."

Jasmine and Rocky Briggs cried and begged their children to seek
treatment. But only Nathan and Amanda could decide when to sever
meth's grip on their lives.

Amanda's turning point came in the Lovelace Hospital emergency room,
as she battled frightening symptoms of an overdose.

Nathan had his change of heart after spending more than 100 days
behind bars. His parents refused to bail him out until he agreed to
seek drug treatment.

"It was this perfect moment we were waiting for, but then we couldn't
get them into any intense recovery programs," Jasmine Briggs said. "I
had to call legislators and beg and fight just to get them the help
they needed."

The Briggs children attacked treatment like the hard-nosed athletes
they were before they met the drug called meth.

Displaying passion and clarity rare among young addicts, Nathan and
Amanda are sticking to a strict regimen of work, exercise and
Narcotics Anonymous meetings.

"It can be really depressing some days, but I know that my life was
only going to get worse if I kept using meth," Amanda said.

The brother and sister have simple goals: owning cars, moving into
apartments and leading sober, independent lives.

The two are fighting a series of legal problems they racked up while
trying to pay for their drug addiction, but remain optimistic about
the future.

"You learn in recovery not to set too many long-term goals or it's
much easier to fail and go back to drugs," Nathan said.

Their mother, who grew up in the Barelas neighborhood and still
preaches her father's values of hard work and determination, is
committed to fighting meth addiction in New Mexico.

She knows legislators by first name, wearing them down with her
unwavering passion to provide more treatment options for meth addicts.

"I want to help other parents who are just as lost as I was when all
of this started," she said. "And I want addicts to be able to check
themselves into treatment centers when they are ready to leave the
drug behind. This was a huge problem for our family, but the truth is
that it's an even bigger problem for our community."

Rocky Briggs knows his son and daughter will always fight this
addiction, but the tough Clovis native melts every night he comes home
from work and finds them waiting for him.

"I'm so proud of how much they accomplished," he said. "These drugs
normally tear people apart. Some people don't survive battles like
this, but my kids are fighters. I know they're going be OK."