A part-time Indio resident has launched a grief support group to help people who have lost friends and family members to drug overdoses.

Denise Cullen tried every way she could to help her son, Jeff Cullen, who died from a Xanax and morphine overdose when he was 27.

After his death, Cullen attended a bereavement group, but didn't feel a connection. No one could relate to the years leading up to the death, of helping a family member battle substance abuse.

That's why she has started a local chapter of GRASP — Grief Recovery After a Substance Passing — specifically for people who have lost loved ones due to substance abuse.

The first meeting was held last month at the Sun City Shadow Hills clubhouse in Indio. More are planned.

Cullen's son was an avid surfer who grew up in an affluent part of Orange County and was in and out of rehab nine times beginning when he was 15.

And always at his side during those tumultuous years was his mother.

It's been 14 months since his death, and dealing with the loss remains a challenge — especially because of the circumstances, Cullen said.

“All mothers and sons have a special bond,” she said. “We were very close. I'd always try to help him through his addiction.”

GRASP founder Pat Wittberger of South Carolina knows of no other such group in California. She's happy to know Cullen is filling a need in the Coachella Valley.

“It started with a couple of the mothers sitting around our kitchen table sharing with one another,” Wittberger said of the group's beginnings.

Her daughter Jenny died of a heroin overdose 15 years ago at age 20, and she was in the same position as Cullen is today.

“We tried to find a bereavement group, but they weren't answering our needs,” she said.

The group started small, but grew as word of mouth spread.

Pamela Gabbay, program director at the Palm Desert-based The Mourning Star Center of the VNAIC, a counseling center for children and their parents, said she doesn't know much about this particular group but can see the benefit.

“Everyone is coming for the same reason,” she said. “It's not only specific to grief but specific to substance abuse passing. Everyone in there already has a certain understanding.”

Denise Cullen often wonders what went wrong with Jeff.

She has stacks of books on addiction and a box full of research from attending conferences in an attempt to understand her son's dependence on drugs.

“We were good, good parents. We read to him every night (as a child). We told him we loved him. He wasn't a latch-key kid,” she said.

Jeff Cullen had been diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder, and his mother believes he may have used the drugs to self-medicate.

“He was trying to feel normal but he became addicted, and once he became addicted, it changed his brain,” she said.

After that, it wasn't a matter of just snapping out of it.

The local GRASP chapter is intended to also provide education on addiction.

According to a national survey last year, an estimated 22.2 million people 12 or older were classified as having a substance dependence.

“I want to help others, too,” Denise Cullen said.

On the day he died, Cullen dropped Jeff off at a Stater Bros. near the beach in Orange County so he could meet a friend.

She gave him $20 and told him to call and check in with her.

She didn't get a call until 3:30 a.m. It was Jeff's friend telling her of his death.

“He struggled and suffered so much,” she said.

He was found lying on the ground, near the curb in a residential neighborhood, his body full of Xanax and morphine.

“People walked over him for hours. It looked like he was asleep,” she said.

Cullen said she became a wreck after that.

She quit her job as a social worker and spent the first three months in her darkened bedroom.

“I needed something desperately, and there was nothing out there,” she said.

This group will help others and help her heal.

“What I need, what I get the most comfort from, is talking to others who have experienced this very loss and all that goes with it,” Cullen said.

“There was nothing there for me, so I created it,” she said.