My name is Trisha Grose. I attended Concordia University in Wisconsin and worked full time as I obtained my bachelors degree. I am a business woman – in fact I am the owner of Chateaux Realty, a successful boutique real estate firm in the Denver Metro Area. I am a type A person that runs my household, leads meetings, sells homes, employs more than 20 people.
I have been happily married to my husband Scott for more than 10 years. We joined our families and each had two children. So I am the biological mother to two children and step-mother to two children.
I am “that mom” – you know, the mother that volunteered at school, attended every school event, went on field-trips, had all of the children in sports, and put my children and family in front of my career – even though I always tried to balance everything my family and children always came first.
Our home has always been open to all of our children’s friends. We have had swimming pools, home theaters, horses, pot belly pigs, sheep, goats, and everything the kids could ever want to make their childhoods magical. We had a vacation home in the mountains where the kids had four wheelers and snowmobiles. Our household was filled with family time, laughter and love.
As a mother I watched my children like a hawk. I had all of their passwords for their phones, video games, and computers. I checked their Facebook pages, Instagram accounts, and phones on a regular basis – and they knew it. That was one of the rules of having the privilege of electronics – mom was able to check everything whenever she felt like it.
I thought I was doing it all right.
I am the mother of Brendan McCurdy – who is the most amazing soul in the universe. He was an excellent student, happy child, amazing hockey player, great baseball player, wonderful brother, and fabulous son. He was also a Heroin Addict.
Brendan died on September 5, 2015 from a drug overdose. Ironically it was not Heroin but a mix of other drugs I can only assume he thought were less dangerous than Heroin. October 28, 2015 would have marked his one year anniversary of what he referred to as his “clean” date. October 12, 2015 would have been his 17th birthday. But his disease took over and he could not make it one more night.
On September 4th, 2015 Brendan came home from his job at Sonic, told Scott and I about his day, said he loved us 5 different times, spent 1/2 hour telling us all about how proud he was of his sobriety and the strength we had given him over the past year – and then he went downstairs and overdosed. His little 12 year old sister found him unresponsive the next morning – just 7 hours after we had told him goodnight and said our “I love you’s” he was gone.
My husband, a retired police officer, worked on reviving him for 1/2 hour until the paramedics and flight for life showed up and took over. About an hour later they pronounced him dead. Right in his bedroom on the floor – my wonderful son was gone and no one could bring him back. He was dead and even though no one could find any sign of drugs on him, near him or in his car we all knew it had to have been an overdose. The autopsy and toxicology would later prove our suspicions were correct – Brendan had combined a lethal group of drugs and given his life for his addiction.
If it can happen in our family – to our son that we were so very close to – our son that had access to bi-weekly NA meetings, expensive hockey involvement, therapy, psychiatrists and medications – then it can happen to anyone. His grades at the time of his death were a 3.8 GPA – he had not skipped one minute of school his Junior year at Columbine High School, he was on the varsity hockey team, and he had a part time job. He was the son every family dreamed of – and he died from an addiction that started in 7th grade with some marijuana at a local park, progressed to an addiction to opiates after an accident where he was prescribed pain killers, and eventually ended with a Heroin addiction that took his life.
Authors of the book “Beauty From His Ashes, A Mother’s Journey Through The Loss of Her Son To Heroin” :
Trisha Grose, author and real estate agent at Chateaux Realty. Ms. Grose is currently completing this book with Richard Farrell. This book is about being a parent of a teen addicted to Heroin, the struggles associated with Brendan’s recovery, the holes in our system for caring for these children, and the grief of losing God’s most precious gift – a child. She lives in Colorado with her husband Scott and daughter Haley. Other articles by Trisha:
I Wore This Dress to Bury My Son
Richard Farrell is an author, filmmaker, teacher, and journalist. His documentary, High on Crack Street, was aired on HBO and received Columbia University’s duPont Award. The Fighter, a feature film based on High on Crack Street, was released in 2011 starring Mark Whalberg, Christian Bale, and Farrell playing himself. He is the author of What’s Left of Us and co-author of A Criminal and an Irishman: The Inside Story of the Mob-IRA Connection. He lives in New Hampshire with his wife Melissa and son Aiden. To learn more about Richard visit www.myheroinlife.com
Contact Trisha: BeautyFromHisAshes@gmail.com
To learn more about Brendan’s story or to contribute to his memorial fund please go to his Go Fund Me page.
Heroin. Stop the Silence. Speak the Truth. 
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