How I Dealt With Drug Hitmen and What I Learned From It

“Your brother owes us money. If you don’t pay us, we’ll kill him.”

“We know where you live. We’ll set your house on fire with your parents and your sister in it.”

No. It’s not an excerpt from a movie. It’s a message sent to my brother’s phone, about 10 years ago.

My brother started using drugs by the age of 13. He’s now 33. Go figure. He’s been admitted to roughly 12 rehab centers in at least three countries over these 20 years. None of them made any difference. But I must admit, while he’s in rehab — or in jail — we breathe again. We know exactly where he is. We know he won’t be phoning at 3 am saying he has no place to go. We know the police won’t be calling us. We know the drug hitmen won’t come after him — or after us.

This is the first time in 20 years I dare to write about my brother’s addiction. One that has wrecked our lives. One that has aged my parents precisely 20 years.

Each rehab treatment used to bring new hope for us. Not anymore. We’re now longtime veterans in this infinite loop of drug addiction. But after a torturous journey, we finally said it. “That’s it. You’re all by yourself now.” Not sure how long it’ll last, though.

Addiction is an ongoing cycle of highs and lows. During the highs, my brother gets a job and leads a “normal” life for about a week or two. Then the lows come, and he starts skipping work, or being late, or asking for money. Or the three of them. By that time, we’re already waiting for the disaster to happen, while secretly hoping this time is different — though we know deep inside it won’t be. And it isn’t. Just like it happened a thousand times before, he finally falls off the radar. His cell phone is no longer responsive. His whereabouts, unknown. We fear the worst — yet, we beg for it to end soon. After a week or two, he resurfaces from the ashes, almost naked, barefoot, dirty, and broken. He’ll ask us to drive him once again to a rehab center, but we found out this is mostly a strategy he uses to escape from drug hitmen. They don’t harass addicts while they’re in jail or in rehab.

Each time he gets out of rehab — or jail/mental hospital — we tremble with fear. It’s showtime. Anything can happen. Like that afternoon, back in 2010, when we saw that message on his phone.

“We know where you live. We’ll set your house on fire with your parents and your sister in it.”

“I’ll kill all your family if you don’t pay us.”

These messages were clearly trying to instill fear. And they had succeeded big time. But we went on with our lives — though not for long. Our bell rang a few days later.

A tall, bearded man was at the door.

“Yes, how can I help you?” — I asked.

“You’re Nicholas’s sister, aren’t you? We’ve contacted your brother to let him know we would be here. He owes us $1,300.”

“What? Who are you? How much?” — I asked in awe.

“$1,300”

My dad came to the door and asked me if everything was fine. I explained the situation to him. My dad approached the man. He — naively — told him not to sell drugs to my brother anymore. The man looked at my dad and said, in a very polite demeanor,

“Sorry Sir, this is how it works.”

My father went inside to fetch the money. But he had misunderstood the amount, so he gave the man $1,600 instead. The man gave $300 back to him and said,

“Sir, it’s $1,300. We’re 100% transparent.”

I must admit, such decency is not commonplace these days.

My brother’s drug debt was canceled, and we tried to forget about this episode just like if it had been a bad dream.

The addiction cycle went on as usual, but for quite a reasonable time we didn’t receive such noteworthy visits. And it’s not like we missed them.

They had left us alone. No more messages. Sigh of relief.

They’re gone for good…or are they?

A few years and several rehab treatments later, my brother was finishing a program at one of the various local centers. It was 2017. Eventually, he got out. After a few days, he got himself a job and was “apparently” doing fine — which isn’t unusual when he’s in his highs.

About two weeks later, he started asking me to borrow some money. First red flag. He said he had left his wallet at home. Yes, he’s never been too creative when it comes to lying, but he can be pervasively manipulative. Anyway, I rarely replied to his messages. But he’s a compulsive stalker when he’s after something. So he bombarded me. He knows no boundaries.

A few minutes later, my phone abruptly ceased to vibrate. And that was it. His phone had died. As usual, he probably had to hand it over — along with his sneakers, his watch, and his jacket — to cancel his drug debt.

Then I received a phone call from an unknown number while at work.

“Hi, are you Maria? Nicholas’s brother?”

“I suspect you already know that, so why are you asking? What do you want?” — I replied. My intuition at its finest.

“Yes, you’re right. We know. Listen, your brother owes us money. If you don’t pay us, we’ll kill him.”

“Do as you please.” — I said.

“Oh wait! There’s no need to be so drastic, I’m sure we can come to an arrangement.”

“Yes, do so with my brother. I don’t want to be involved.”- I told him.

“How about discussing this with your parents?”

… Silence

… More silence

“You need not involve my parents. They’re old and retired. We’re not responsible for my brother’s debts. He’s a grownup. We won’t finance his addiction.” — I said.

“Well yes, but someone has to pay me. If nobody cancels his debt, he’ll be in deep trouble.”

“He already is.” — I said.

“Fine” — he replied. Then he hung up.

I cried.

A lot.

A soul burning anxiety took over me. I tried hard to keep this intense feeling of guilt at bay. Would I be responsible for my brother’s murder? What would I say should someone find his body? That I was as shocked as everyone else? Or that I was to blame? What a self-inflicted torture I had got into. But I just couldn’t keep on dying bit by bit, each day, to try to save a brother who had never asked me to save him. I wanted to have a life. Apparently, my brother didn’t. Yet, it wasn’t easy for us to understand that he wasn’t our responsibility. We would never save him from himself. After all these years, he’s never showed signs of improvement or a trace of will, so why should we be willing to sink along with him. He was pulling us to a deep darkness I felt we might never come back from. It was much harder for my parents. I admired, yet dreaded, their evergreen hope.

The day after I received the mysterious call, I visited my parents. While we were watching a movie, the bell rang.

“Who’s this?” — I answered.

“Hi, is this Nicholas’s family?”

“Shhhit” — I thought. “Is it you? I thought I told you not to reach to us again.” — I said.

“Yes, but I thought I told you somebody had to pay.”

“Not us.” — I said — “Get the hell out of here or I’ll call the police.”

“Ok, ok, there’s no need to get anxious. I’ll leave.”

And so he did. No one has harassed us ever since.

We located my brother a few days after the last hitman’s visit. He had just been released by the drug band that held him hostage. Police found him on the streets trying to steal a woman’s purse.

We took him to a local rehab center. “Here we go again” — I remember I thought to myself.

The perpetual circle. The dog chasing its tail.

After some back and forth, we finally sent my brother to Brazil, so we could distance and detox ourselves from him for a while. And it worked for about three years. But all good things must come to an end. My brother is returning to Uruguay next month. I can already feel anxiety building up. Even if this time he’ll be all by himself, we’ll still be in close proximity to each other — and that’s enough of a reason not to relax.

Tough situations put an emotional strain on us, but they are usually skilled teachers. If you pay close attention to life’s messages, especially through hardships, you’ll notice they always make their point in a very precise way.

Here’s what I learned after all these years and our brief — but intense — interaction with drug bands:

• You never know how much you can take until life tests you. Problems usually seem impossible to handle until you learn to do so. There’s no other way around it. When you don’t resist obstacles and accept the challenge instead, you’ll usually know how to proceed. The issue will still be there, whether you like it or not.
• You’re always stronger than you think.
• What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. This is one of life’s greatest truths, and I can’t stress it enough.
• Even when fear paralyzes you, it’s a brilliant move to exude confidence. To find your inner strength. The one you never run out of. A solid presence will often confuse others. You’ll already have time to break down when you’re safe, away from your menace.
• Nothing beats listening to your gut feeling.
• It’s wise to ask for help when you feel you can no longer handle a situation by yourself.
• You can’t put others first. No matter how selfish this sounds. You need to be healthy — both physically and emotionally — to be available for others.
• You learn to recognize what depends on you, and what doesn’t. I’m not religious, but the Serenity Prayer highlights a wise truth. “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.” — Reinhold Niebuhr. Living by this prayer makes a tremendous difference. We spend our lives wasting energy trying to change things that DON’T depend on us.
• Don’t insist on giving someone something they don’t want and never give more than you can give. Know your limits, or you’ll quickly try to surpass them. This will deplete your energy reservoir.
• Most of the time, you can only offer passive help — that is, listening and comforting. Not much else.
• Remember, you have the choice to help others, not the obligation. From the moment you feel obliged to help, a never-ending responsibility falls on you.

We have received no bizarre visits in the last two years, but we don’t want to celebrate yet. I believe we’ve been grotesquely lucky. And so has been my brother. In Uruguay, the country I live in, killings related to drug issues are always on the rise. I’ve read somewhere last year — though I can’t seem to find the link — that in Uruguay, one person might be murdered for drug-related debt every two days.

Last year, a young man was shot dead while he was waiting at the bus stop. They later found out he was the wrong guy. When asked about the motives, the executioners said, “Oh! He looked so similar, we just thought it had to be him.” These people don’t give it a second thought. So, yes, we’ve been lucky.

One thing we learned during one of my brother’s therapy sessions is that “an addict never ceases to be an addict, he/she might just cease drug consumption.” Recovery is for the rest of their lives. An addict can suck the life out of an entire family. It’s painful to watch them suffer so much. My brother once said, “I’ll never quit drugs. What would life have to offer me in exchange?”. So why bother?

“God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.” — Reinhold Niebuhr

Outsiders often find drug addiction issues difficult to relate to. And they usually think families are so selfish to leave the addicts to their fate. Believe me, I’ve been there when many of these people had to go through a similar situation. And then they understand. The guilt they feel for having judged us overwhelms them. They apologize. They tell us things like, “Oh, we’re so ashamed. Now we know the nightmare you’ve been through.” But deep sympathy is all we can feel for them, because we know the nightmare that still awaits them. And I hope that doesn’t include having to deal with the drug mafia.

We stood by my brother for 20 years. 20 years. Yet, we couldn’t save him. We never will. But we can still save ourselves. Help is a two-way street. Someone needs to offer it. Someone else needs to take it. There’s a sender and a recipient. Otherwise, help vanishes in the air. It doesn’t exist if no one will offer it, or when no one will take it. It took us 2 decades, 12 rehab treatments, 2 friendly visits — plus calls and messages — from drug hitmen, and several tours to mental hospitals to understand that.

The last day my dad saw my brother, he told him, “I hope I get to hug someone else next time I see you. Someone else… while still my son. And I hope I can see it happen before I die.” He’s still on time. But my parents are bordering 80 years.

Sometimes I feel the urge to compensate my parents for the immense pain my brother has caused them. But there’s something we all might have to learn from this. It’s the lesson of our lives, that’s for sure.

There’ll always be a plate of food and comforting words for my brother. That’s all we can offer him for now. Yet, we can’t give him what he chose not: freedom.