Intervention: Jimbo is Addicted to Benzos, Opiates and Scaring People
By Thoughtis
This is a story about a man-boy named Jimbo—a one-legged opiate and benzodiazepine addict—who’s dangerously coddled by his father, Jimmy.
Jimbo is no ballet waif. There were no dreams of moving to New York City and becoming a black swan when he got older. On the contrary, he is big, extremely terrifying and works in his father’s steel shop when his drug schedule permits. His moods are terribly erratic. One minute he can be laughing and smiling and the next, a dark cloud can roll into his horizon and his demeanor will shift instantly. Everyone around him will start to twitch uncomfortably and ask him if he’s okay, but he’ll just ignore them and retrieve his pet knife. You see, whenever Jimbo gets upset, he carries around a giant knife and slides his finger over the sharp blade. It’s like his thing. His family will watch in suspense, silently backpedaling towards the exit while Jimbo watches them with a stone-cold gaze. It’s too real.
List of Jimbo’s accomplishments: He has been arrested twelve times, one of which was for firing a gun in public. He has wrecked something like eight cars in the past five years. Worst of all, he only has one leg because he passed out on the train tracks one night and a train ran him over. So now Jimbo just hobbles around. He’s like this weird one-legged potential serial killer drug addict. It’s not cute.
A lot of Jimbo’s anger stems from the dissolution of his relationship with his mother. When he was thirteen, his mother moved out of their house after admitting to having an affair and shortly thereafter, she was diagnosed with a terminal cancer and died. Jimmy never forgave her for her Hester Prynne behavior and even says that he’s glad she’s dead. The producer intervenes at this point and is like, “um, that’s harsh.”, but he just shrugs.
Jimbo has since channeled his anger towards his mother into this bizarre devotion to his father, Jimmy. He actually kind of has a weird Norman Bates-esque obsession with him minus the need for cross-dressing. Jimmy enables Jimbo’s drug abuse by supporting him financially and taking him to the pharmacy or as Jimbo likes to call it, “his drug dealer.”
Towards the end of this episode, the fourth wall has to come down because Jimbo e-mailed death threats to the documentary crew. Earlier in the day, Jimmy was going over to Jimbo’s house to discuss buying him his tenth car, but ultimately decided against it for fear that he was high as a kite. When Jimmy calls Jimbo and informs him that he won’t be coming over, Jimbo flips out and accuses the crew of telling his father that he’s been using drugs. God, addicts have such insane pretzel logic. Anyway, Jeff—the interventionist—tells Jimbo’s family about the death threats and cites this made up law that could put Jimbo behind bars if he didn’t accept treatment. So I guess we already know how this one’s going to end.
Getting Jimbo to attend his final interview AKA the intervention involved some serious coaxing on Jimmy’s part and one phone call to the police. When Jimbo finally does arrive, he adamantly refuses treatment and only acquiesces when he’s threatened with jail time.
Unsurprisingly, we find out in the status update that Jimbo had been kicked out of rehab for “disruptive behavior.” I’m guessing he tried to kill one of the nurses with his pet knife. His father, however, completed treatment at the Enabling Fathers Day Spa And Equestrian Summer Haven. According to Jimmy, he’s sober, but we suspect Jimbo was holding a gun to his head when he gave the progress report to the producers.