Last fall, Megyn shared the news that her older sister, Suzanne Crossley, died suddenly of a heart attack. She was 58. At the time, Megyn said “life was not easy” for her sister, who “got swept up in the opioid crisis thanks to a doctor who told her a minor pain killer was not addictive.” Suzanne got “sober, rebuilt her life,” and was planning on sharing her story with Megyn’s audience one day, but they “never got around to it,” she said.
On Monday’s show, Megyn was joined by Nicholas Kardaras, PhD, a psychologist and recovering addict, who, as she noted, has been “devoting his life ever since to trying to help those to whom it’s happened and also to help people prevent it from happening to them.” During their conversation, she opened up a bit more about Suzanne’s addiction and recovery and the impact it had on their family.
Megyn Shares Her Story
In October, my sister Suzanne will have been gone for a year. She was a recovering addict. She got addicted during the opioid crisis to a drug called Ultram, which she was told by her doctor was not addictive. It was one of these opioids that, when this was happening in the mid-1990s, a lot of people even on oxycontin – if you watch Dopesick – were told it’s not addictive, don’t worry.
Before she knew it, she was addicted and she really spent the rest of her life battling that addiction and the massive fallout that follows for a good chunk of your life. So much sets you back. It’s very hard to get back even to just stasis, never mind to then excel and make something out of your life.
I think about it when I listen to that song by Oliver Anthony where he talks about just how dejected he feels about “rich men north of Richmond” and how the country sort of keeps a man down. Some of the pushback to it was, ‘Oh no, in this country you can do anything.’ Well, you know what? Try factoring in an addiction in your life and see how things go because that gets held against you forevermore.
Suzanne was on Suboxone, which was helping her get off of the actual drug. But that too shows up in blood tests. If you want to be in any sort of a caregiving role, forget about it. It just haunts you.
I was thinking about all of this because we had a mass said for her at our church over the weekend. I was praying for her and thinking about her. I was just thinking how things would have gone if that hadn’t come in and just taken over her life, her children’s lives, our life and relationship.
Anyone who’s had an active addict in the family knows what I am talking about. It’s like having a nuclear bomb go off in your family.
You can check out Megyn’s full interview with Kardaras by tuning in to episode 611 on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you like to listen. And don’t forget that you can catch The Megyn Kelly Show live on SiriusXM’s Triumph (channel 111) weekdays from 12pm to 2pm ET.