Grandpa Addicted Strength

 My grandpa is one of my heroes.  He is such a good man, and I miss him dearly since he passed away.  My dad came to visit yesterday and shared a story I had never heard before.

I know that my grandpa grew up in a home with a father that was very gruff and angry...perhaps even a bit abusive.  (I don't think anyone has ever used the word abusive...I think they have said mean and angry...so I don't really have details as to how severe things were.)  So I have always been so impressed that my grandpa was such a kind and gentle man.  He never seemed to get angry, he was incredibly loving and patient with us as children as well as with his children and with my grandma.  I've always admired that he didn't carry unhealthy patterns from his childhood home into his adult home.  That takes a great strength of character.  

Yesterday my dad told me a story about my grandpa's time in World War II.  I knew he served and was an officer.  I knew he was shot in the knee as it bothered him for years to come.  Apparently my grandpa was in military hospitals for 18 months after being shot.  For some reason, my dad said, they could either send him back to combat (and he wasn't healed enough for that) or he could be in the hospital. So he spent time at a couple of different hospitals.  Morphine was relatively new at that point and they began administering morphine for the pain.  At one point, a new doctor came and saw that he was on morphine.  The doctor asked the nurses how long he had been on morphine.  They weren't sure...longer than they had been at that hospital.  The doctor knew that they had found that people could become addicted to morphine.  And so the doctor ordered that my grandpa not be given any more morphine.  They didn't wean him off of it slowly, just cut him off cold turkey.  He experienced withdrawal symptoms but he got over his addiction and never used/abused any kind of drug in the future (only taking necessary prescriptions and an occasional aspirin/Ibuprofen).  It must have been awful...the pain from his knee coupled with the withdrawal symptoms.  It must have required intense strength to overcome that addiction but I'm so grateful for that doctor who knew he couldn't continue to receive morphine and for my grandfather's physical, mental and spiritual strength to overcome such a difficult challenge.