Jessica Didia (left) sits in her mom Laurie Steves’s car as she smokes a mixture of crack and fentanyl together on Wednesday, June 9, 2021 in San Francisco, California. Laurie said she wanted to “smack the pipe out of her hands” but was trying to be welcoming to her daughter in the hopes that by creating a space that was non-judgmental she might be able to reach her better.
Love in the Shadows: A Mother's Fight, a Daughter's Struggle, and a Newborn
To save her daughter’s life, Laurie Steves gave up her own. She left a suburb of Seattle with one goal: reaching San Francisco to save Jessica DiDia, the 34-year-old daughter she hadn’t seen in nearly a decade.
Jessica Didia looks at her needle as she shoots crystal meth with friend Rasool (right) on Turk Street on Tuesday, Aug. 24, 2021 in San Francisco, California.
Laurie Steves embraces her daughter Jessica Didia (left) as they meet for the first time in nearly 10 years for lunch at Denny’s on Mission Street on Saturday, June 5, 2021 in San Francisco, California. After many days of looking for Jessica in the Tenderloin neighborhood with no luck, Laurie parked at an intersection where drug dealers are prevalent in the hopes that her daughter would show up to buy drugs. After 20-minutes, Laurie spotted her and jumped out of the car. They talked for the first time in nearly ten years and had lunch together.
Laurie Steves cries out of frustration after several unsuccessful attempts to find her homeless daughter Jessica Didia (not pictured) in the Tenderloin on Monday, May 24, 2021 in San Francisco, California. Laurie’s son Zachary died last December of a drug overdose and her daughter Jessica has been homeless and addicted to drugs in San Francisco for a decade. The death of her son propelled her to try and save her daughter. Laurie packed up her apartment in Port Orchard, Washington and moved to San Francisco with the idea that she would stay there for “as long as it takes” to help Jessica.
Jessica Didia, 34, who is homeless and addicted to fentanyl, sits on her suitcase on Turk Street after smoking crack on Tuesday, Nov. 2, 2021 in San Francisco, California. Her mother Laurie Steves moved to San Francisco for three months to try to help her but ultimately failed.
Laurie Steves puts her head to her hand as she watches an episode of Private Practice where a character on the show has a drug overdose on Monday, Aug. 9, 2021, in San Francisco, California. A photograph of her deceased son Zachary Grelle (left) sits on her bedside table.
Jessica Didia watches as an EMT responds to David Larson who overdosed on drugs at the corner of Eddy and Larkin Streets as people look on on Monday, Feb. 28, 2022 in San Francisco, California. David survived the overdose.
Laurie Steves wheels daughter Jessica Didia into Saint Francis hospital on Wednesday, Aug. 11, 2021 in San Francisco, California. Jessica was hit by a car and hurt her knee but never made it beyond the waiting room due to a fight she got into with her mother.
Jessica Didia (left) smokes a cigarette with mom Laurie Steves as they stand on Ellis Street in the Tenderloin on Wednesday, June 9, 2021 in San Francisco, California. This was the second time they had seen one another in nearly 10 years. Their encounters were often tense as Laurie didn’t want to push her daughter away but was also eager to get her off drugs.
Laurie Steves packs up her belongings after deciding to move back to the Seattle area on Monday, Aug. 30, 2021 in San Francisco, California.
Laurie Steves embraces her daughter Jessica Didia (right) before leaving for the Seattle area on Tuesday, Aug. 31, 2021 in San Francisco, California. Laurie had been looking for Jessica for several days to say goodbye and had the good luck of finding her just before departing. Laurie said that she “tried her best” to help her daughter get clean while Jessica felt she was there only to help assuage her own guilt.
Jessica Didia, 34, (center) who is homeless and addicted to fentanyl, smokes crack on Eddy Street on Tuesday, Nov. 2, 2021 in San Francisco, California. Her mother Laurie Steves moved to San Francisco for three months to try to help her but ultimately failed.
Jessica DiDia, 35, who is homeless and a drug user, gets frustrated as she sits in an alley in SOMA in San Francisco, California on Tuesday, May 10, 2022. She was beaten by several people as she tried to visit her boyfriend’s memorial. Her boyfriend died of a fentanyl overdose. Dula, who was a former MLB baseball player died of a fentanyl overdose and people on the street began to say that she murdered him. They argued that he was only a crack user and that it was Jessica who was the fentanyl user so she must have spiked his drugs. The toxicology report found that he had crack, meth and fentanyl in his system and it is likely that the crack he was using was unknowingly laced with fentanyl. The loss has been tremendous for Jessica and she is still trying to come to grips with her new reality.
Jessica DiDia, 35 (right) sleeps next to a friend (declined name) on the sidewalk on Myrtle Street in San Francisco, California on Wednesday, April 20, 2022. Since her boyfriend died Jessica has no where to sleep. Sometimes she wakes up in a heap of trash or curled up in a dog bed on the street.
After falling due to a seizure and breaking her orbital socket Jessica DiDia, 36, sits in her hospital bed and watches The Devil Wears Prada movie on the television in San Francisco, Calif., on Sunday, April 9, 2023. Jessica has been a drug user for over twenty years and has fallen deeper in to her addiction to fentanyl.
Jessica DiDia, 35, smokes fentanyl on 9th Street in San Francisco on Monday, Feb. 27, 2023. Jessica has been a drug user for over twenty years and has fallen deeper in to her addiction to fentanyl.
Jessica DiDia, 36, (center) sits on 7th and Mission Streets minutes after being released from the hospital for a grand mal seizure in San Francisco on Friday, May 19, 2023. In that moment, Jessica had been clean from fentanyl for a week. She tried to stay clean on her own but it did not stick.
Laurie Steves (right) visits with her daughter Jessica DiDia, 36, after Jessica suffered from a grand mal seizure that the doctors had difficulty controlling at San Francisco General hospital in San Francisco on Tuesday, May 16, 2023. Laurie flew from the Seattle area to be with her daughter after hearing of Jessica’s injury. The doctors were initially concerned for her brain function but her brain was not visibly affected. Jessica is a drug user and was able to stay off of drugs while at the hospital. They gave her methadone and other medications to keep her comfortable.
Jessica DiDia, 36, (center) holds her stash of fentanyl in Julia Street alley next to the medical respite she was supposed to be staying in after getting released from the hospital in San Francisco on Wednesday, April 19, 2023. Jessica checked into the medical respite and never went back. Jessica has been a drug user for over twenty years and has fallen deeper in to her addiction to fentanyl.
Jessica DiDia, 36, bends her back as she falls into a daze while high on fentanyl in the tent she shares with her boyfriend on 7th Street in San Francisco on Friday, June 16, 2023.
Jessica DiDia, 36, is seen intubated after suffering from a grand mal seizure that the doctors had difficulty controlling at San Francisco General hospital in San Francisco on Saturday, May 13, 2023. The doctors were initially concerned for her brain function but her brain was not visibly affected. Jessica is a drug user and was able to stay off of drugs while at the hospital. They gave her methadone and other medications to keep her comfortable.
Jessica DiDia, 37, gets her hair treated for lice after being in the hospital following a drug overdose.
Jessica DiDia, 36, sleeps on the corner of 7th and Mission Streets in San Francisco, Thursday, June 8, 2023. Jessica is a drug user who has fallen deeply into her fentanyl addiction.
"‘Congratulations! You’re pregnant,’ a doctor told Jessica DiDia, a 37-year-old woman struggling with severe fentanyl addiction and homelessness, as she lay in a hospital bed in San Francisco. Jessica replied, ‘Really? I had no idea.’ Not only was Jessica pregnant, but she was already in labor. Within an hour, she delivered a 5-pound, 6-ounce baby girl, nicknamed Sweetie, with a full head of dark hair and thick eyebrows. The newborn, arriving prematurely and showing signs of crack and fentanyl withdrawal, was immediately rushed to the hospital's neonatal intensive care unit. Laurie Steves, Jessica's mother, who had spent years trying to help her daughter overcome addiction, quickly flew in from the Seattle area to offer support. Though Jessica showed brief moments of maternal tenderness with her newborn, the powerful grip of addiction proved overwhelming. She soon left the hospital and returned to life on the streets, leaving her baby behind and relinquishing custody. As Laurie wrestled with the complexities of child protective services and the uncertain future of her granddaughter, what had seemed like a moment of potential transformation instead became another chapter in her daughter's ongoing struggle with addiction.
Days after giving birth, Jessica DiDia, 37, sleeps in a hospital bed after an ambulance rushed her to the ICU because she overdosed on fentanyl and was experiencing multiple seizures in San Francisco on Thursday, Oct. 31, 2024. DiDia, who is a fentanyl addict, gave birth in early October to a newborn baby girl nicknamed "Sweetie". In early October, when severe back pain led Jessica to ask police officers to call an ambulance for her, she didn’t think much of it. She thought she had sciatica and did not know she was pregnant until arriving at the hospital.
Laurie Steves touches the cheek of her newborn granddaughter nicknamed "Sweetie" as she recovers from fentanyl and crack withdrawals in the neonatal ICU at CPMC hospital in San Francisco on Oct. 7, 2024. Laurie's daughter Jessica DiDia, who is a fentanyl addict, delivered a 5-pound, 6-ounce baby girl with a full head of dark hair and thick eyebrows.
Jessica DiDia, 37, slaps her mother Laurie Steves' hand away as she tried to caress her daughters head just days after DiDia unexpectedly gave birth in San Francisco on Oct. 7, 2024. Laurie's daughter Jessica DiDia, who is a fentanyl addict did not know she was pregnant until arriving at the hospital.
Laurie Steves is overwhelmed with emotion as she embraces her newborn granddaughter nicknamed "Sweetie" for the first time in the neonatal ICU at CPMC hospital in San Francisco on Oct. 7, 2024. Laurie spent hours upon hours in the neonatal ICU singing and whispering to her newborn granddaughter, making sure to remind her that she would always protect her.
Jessica DiDia, 37, yells at her mother Laurie Steves (right) and throws a lit cigarette and gatorade bottle at her face as they argue about returning to the hospital to sort out custody of Jessica's newborn baby "Sweetie" in San Francisco, California on Oct. 20, 2024. Jessica did not want to go to the hospital without her boyfriend Moe and claimed she would go the following day but never went. Laurie has been left to deal with the courts to sort out custody.
Days after giving birth, Jessica DiDia, 37, cries out in frustration after using fentanyl and feeling upset because she never intended to get pregnant, on Russ Street in San Francisco, California on Oct. 17, 2024. Jessica was told in early adolescence by a doctor that she could not carry a baby to term, and a miscarriage she experienced several years ago solidified that belief. As a result, Jessica said, she never planned to have kids. Despite that she says, "Obviously, I want her to be happy.”
Laurie Steves puts her hand to her head as she sits in a courthouse, overwhelmed as she tries to understand child protective services and navigating custody around her newborn granddaughter in San Francisco on Oct. 21, 2024. Laurie has continued to try to understand the legal landscape of custody surrounding a newborn addicted to drugs without a lawyer or the means to travel regularly to San Francisco.
Three weeks after giving birth, Jessica DiDia, 37, smokes a cigarette as she spirals deeper into her addiction, using fentanyl as often as 20 times a day in San Francisco, California on Oct. 29, 2024. The unexpected arrival of her daughter deepened her despair, compounding the profound shame she carried as a drug user. She had long believed she couldn't bear children, a belief reinforced by a previous miscarriage. This unexpected motherhood amplified her existing anxieties and fueled her descent into deeper addiction.