Maggie Jean Wortman, a 27-year old Eureka woman plead guilty to voluntary manslaughter, yes, voluntary, for killing her five-week old infant with methamphetamine tainted breast milk. The Times-Standard reports that the infant, whose name was Michael, had an autopsy performed and that test results came back with “methamphetamine toxicity” as the cause of death.
A parent’s addiction is the greatest destroyer of a child. Whether parents are alcoholics or drug addicts, if there are children in the home, there are sure to be many sad moments and many tears in the life of that child. Parents who are addicts lose all sense of full responsibility toward their children when intoxicated and behave toward children in a way that does not only harm them, but also breeds anger and behavior for the child to become an addict.
According to Mother Nature Network, "6.7% of people seeking treatment for meth addiction are pregnant women." The most horrible and reprehensible stories I have heard about drug and alcohol abuse however, are those of parents who are meth addicts. They exhibit the kind of anger, rage and homicidal behavior towards their children that is extremely troubling. I have heard of a meth-addicted mother dropping her baby on the floor, deliberately on its head, twice, and being upset about the fact that the baby did not die. I have heard of sodomy of a baby until it’s death by a meth-addicted father and I have heard stories beyond that.
Meth will make a monster out of anyone, some more than others, perhaps. The question is; how much of a monster does it take for us to get people to understand that meth is the end of all things sane, compassionate and normal? Meth devastates everything it touches and If I had to describe the effects of meth, I would call it “schizophrenia in a bottle.”
