Hers is a pain more and more parents are feeling every day -- the loss of a child to a medication that was supposed to help him heal.
"Nature is out of order when a child dies," said Lisa Janicki. "It leaves a huge hole in your heart."
Lisa's son, Patrick, broke his back after falling from a pole he was climbing at a county fair. His doctor prescribed opiates, and before long he was hooked.
"I never thought to question a family physician," she said. "I wish I had."
Patrick battled his addiction for a decade and finally succumbed to a drug-related cardiac arrest at just 30 years old.
Lisa, can't bear to think of another family enduring that heartache.
"I can't do anything about Patrick. I couldn't save him, but I will save somebody else's child," she said.
To that end, Lisa is pushing for new legislation to make doctors take more responsibility for the drugs they're prescribing.
House Bill 2272 would limit, to seven, the number of opiates a first-time patient can get before requesting a refill. Doctors would also have to disclose the risk of addiction. Cancer patients and those seeking end-of-life treatment would be exempt.
A separate bill would require doctors to consult an existing state database to review a patient's drug history. The move is designed to keep addicts from acquiring stashes of pills from multiple doctors.
"We have to stop the pipeline that's bringing these drugs to our counties and our families," said Lisa.
Opponents argue the restrictions would take up even more time in a doctor's already busy day. Others worry about the inconvenience to patients who would need to drive to their practitioner every week to get another prescription. Some say doctors concerned with patient pain would simply prescribe stronger pills.
But to Lisa Janicki, who is also a Skagit County commissioner, it's common sense legislation that would keep more families from suffering the same anguish hers has.
"If Patrick's death can't make other people wake people and see this problem and feel empowered to address it, then it was a waste of as very good life," she said.
Both bills are moving toward committee discussions in Olympia.
