Parents who lost 'part of themselves' to daughter's heroin death give back with Bri's Hope
Kaitlin Greenockle
Rich and Shelia Craumer did everything they could think of to try and save their daughter.
At first the signs were not so clear. "It's just the teenage years," people would say.
Then their lives changed and they were scraping for as much information as they could find about rehabs, treatments and court mandated programs instead of preparing for their daughter's freshman year of college.
One incident is seared into Rich's mind. He recalled tackling his daughter in their front yard to get drug paraphernalia away from her.
But in the end, the power of addiction claimed her life.
Briana Craumer was 18 years old when she died of a heroin overdose.
"... ultimately what we really have is this disease of addiction, and yes it kills," Briana stated in a letter Rich said she wrote when she was in rehab.
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Rich and Shelia met in high school and had their first daughter, Ashley, in 1987. About six months later, Ashley died of sudden infant death syndrome.
About a year later, they had a second daughter, Alicia, who also died of sudden infant death syndrome at about 3 months old.
Ten years later, they had Briana and "she was like the angel we never had," Rich said.
She was a beautiful, blonde little girl, always happy, good in school and grew up in a loving family.
Briana was raised in Spring Grove and graduated in 2017 from Spring Grove High School, although she was not given the option to walk alongside her classmates.
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When Briana was about 14 years old, her personality started to change. She started to pull away, was always in her room and didn't want the hugs and kisses anymore.
"I think looking back now, that was part of her starting with her addiction," Rich said.
Once Briana was in 10th grade, Rich and Shelia began to see even more changes in their daughter.
She would be angry one minute and then the next minute she would be happy. She would be herself and then the smallest thing would trigger her.
Her parents thought it was normal teenage behavior.
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Read:'He chose to do heroin, but he didn't choose to die'
As she got older and began hanging out with her friends on her own, it became harder for Rich and Sheila to protect her.
They thought some of the kids she hung out with weren't good influences, but they also knew they couldn't force her to choose other friends.
"They can say they're at somebody's house, and you think that's OK because that's a good kid, but how do you know they're there?" Shelia said.
Briana was more of a follower and one of the girls she would hang around had more of an aggressive personality, Rich said. "I think that intimidated Briana."
It was Briana who chose to start doing heroin, but her parents believe that she might have been persuaded and pushed.
Even with her personality changes, Briana still kept good grades. That was until 11th grade, "when things started happening," Rich said.
"On the outside I play the role, the happy, cute, fun-loving, happy girl. On the inside I'm dead, there is nothing but a black, rotting pit inside me quenching for the thirst of the next high," Briana wrote.
She started skipping school, her grades were going down and she always had some type of an excuse, Shelia said.
"It's hard as a parent because I think sometimes you know things, but they can really be good at lying and manipulating," she said.
Briana's drug use was discovered her senior year. She got caught at school with drug paraphernalia, Rich and Sheila also found a wine cooler and spoon in her room. She was put on probation.
Briana finished her senior year at River Rock Academy, Spring Grove, and received a diploma, but was not allowed to participate in graduation.
"It was upsetting," Shelia said. "She was on her way to college ... she was supposed to be going to Millersville (University) August of last year."
Instead of college, where Briana planned on majoring in early education pre-K through 4th grade, she ended up in rehab.
"My head is killing me, getting high consumes my mind, my life, it takes me over, every hour, minute and second I am thinking, dreaming and fantasizing about being high," Briana wrote.
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In between graduating high school and going into rehab, Briana stole Rich's truck and when she came back home she said, "Hey, Dad, how's it going?" like nothing happened.
That's when Rich saw the paraphernalia on her, he tackled her in the yard and took it from her. Rich called Christina Martinez from Open Arms Recovery Center in Hanover. They started treating Briana right away.
"I'm evil, I'm manipulative, but most of all I am sick," Briana wrote.
She was put on Suboxone, started her counseling and even got a Pomeranian named Chloe to help her.
She was doing well with this treatment, until Briana stopped taking the medication and hid it in her room. Soon after, she relapsed.
Read:Son's overdose death motivates mom to open recovery house in Hanover area
That's when she went into Bowling Green rehab. The plan was to have her there for at least 30 to 60 days. On Day 13, Rich got a call from the insurance company informing him that they would not cover any more costs and that Briana would be home the next day.
Knowing that Briana was not ready to come home after only two weeks in rehab, they called Christina, who got Briana into Safe Home in York.
While at Safe Home, Briana relapsed again and was kicked out, without Rich or Sheila's knowledge. Briana had just turned 18.
She was out on the street for two days in York. To this day Rich and Sheila have no idea what happened to their daughter in those two days.
"I don't know myself, I am fully engulfed in my addiction. (It) controls everything I think and do," Briana wrote.
Once Briana was allowed to go back to Safe Home, her probation officer was there, and they tested her for drugs. She tested positive for five of the six drugs they test for.
That's when she was taken to the York County Youth Detention Center where she stayed for a month, until she was placed in Abraxas, a state run facility in Marienville.
After being in Abraxas for four months, she had her next court date where it was decided that she could join the Jump Program.
"It is an awesome program," Shelia said. "We had meetings every Monday, she had to go to court every other Wednesday, she had a therapist, a probation officer ... and was drug tested sporadically."
Briana was doing great. She was home, she was back to her old self and even doing chores around the house that she never used to do.
After four weeks at home and doing well with the program, she was allowed to have her GPS ankle bracelet taken off. That was in December 2017.
Things were going well. Briana was happy and, as a family, they were taking baby steps to help Briana fight her addiction.
Christmas was coming up, and the three of them planned to spend the holiday up in the mountains at their cabin.
Thursday December 21, 2017, Sheila was getting ready for the trip, and Rich was at work. Briana was in her room sleeping, so Sheila thought.
When Shelia went to wake her up, she found just pillows and blankets puffed up. Briana was gone.
Frantically, Shelia was trying to reach her daughter, but she wasn't answering her phone. She called the therapist to tell him what happened and he came right over to wait with Sheila until Rich got home.
"We just assumed, well she's going to come beebopping in sometime, we just didn't know when," Shelia said.
They filed a missing person's report with police and if Briana wasn't home by the next morning a warrant would be issued for her arrest since she was breaking her probation.
Read:Heroin epidemic the subject of Hanover town hall
At about 9 p.m., Shelia and Rich decided to go to bed, still with no idea where Briana was. Rich slept on the couch so that he could be right there when she came home to hug her and tell her how much he loves her.
"Not soon after I went to bed is when the cop and coroner came knocking on the door, they put two and two together and they found her at this individual's house," Shelia said.
Briana had someone pick her up in the middle of the night and went back to his house where he lived with his parents in Seven Valleys.
She did heroin that night, laced with Fentanyl, and overdosed.
In the morning after Briana did the heroin, she had been snoring loudly, which made the individual and his parents think that she was just sleeping.
However, loud snoring could be a preliminary sign of an overdose, according to York County Coroner Pam Gay.
The snoring is the early stages of obstructing their airway, Gay said.
It wasn't until later that afternoon someone called for an ambulance, but it was already too late.
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"I've lost a part of me, Shelia lost a part of her, and I don't want anyone else to go through the pain that I have every day of my life," Rich said.
That's why Rich and Shelia started Bri's Hope. A support group for those who are battling addiction, have loved one's battling addiction or have lost a loved one to addiction.
They meet every third Thursday of the month at Open Arms Recovery Center at 6:30 p.m.
It's a time where people can share their stories or just listen. Rich and Shelia wanted to provide a place where people can know they are not alone.
"When I was going through this, I just wanted somebody to talk to who may know what I'm talking about," Rich said.
People don't understand unless they are in it, Shelia said. She still has a hard time understanding.
She continues to ask herself every day "Why?" She doesn't know where or how it all went wrong.
"(Briana) was trying to make it work," Rich said. "I remember her sitting right here and we had our family meeting and she said, 'You know what today is?' and I said, 'Yeah,' and she goes 'I'm five months clean, and I can't wait to get to six.'"
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