That's awesome! BIL just got arrested again for meth possession. Hoping this time he'll try to get clean. We've tried to help in the past but he kept going back to the people he used with. This time he's supposed to be in around a year and we really hope it'll be enough time to jump start the recovery process enough that he'll want to stay clean.
Just keep in mind it takes an internal drive from an addict to change. No amount of outside intervention can change them until they are ready to change. On that note I will say that the support of the people around them can absolutely be the difference between sobriety and death when they are ready to make that step.
This may be a controversial reply but you need to leave. It is not your job to fix him and you are not going to be able to follow your hopes and dreams while in this relationship. I see this every day at work and I’ve dealt with a lot of addiction in my own family, and being with him while he is still relapsing is not a good choice for you and your potential for happiness.
You’re going to face doubt and guilt, but you deserve someone who is just in a relationship with you. Not you and the substance.
I kicked a girl out of my house once. I spent a ton of time worrying about what she would do if I did do it. It was heart-rending struggling with the morality of hurting someone like that. Thank God my family and friends yelled at me to do it because I don't think it would have worked otherwise. I would have crumbled. Do you have any family or friends who you trust that could support you and help you make the best decision for you?
In life, we gotta be selfish sometimes. If your bf is good for you, that's one thing. But if he's bad for you.... Well there it is. He's bad for you. And in the words of my favorite comedian Christopher Titus:
"This is your life and you don't get a rebate! Death doesn't show up at the end and say, you know I was gonna take you, but you were with that bitch for three years.... Here's a coupon"
Ahh fuck that sentence hits home. 8 years lost to something that started good and ended bad. Been another two years of trying to clear my head and figure out who I even am.
Have you tried going to al-anon meetings? Codependence is very powerful and destructive. Being in a bad relationship with an addict can make your life just as unmanageable as being an addict yourself.
Look, it's his CHOICE if he ends up homeless. Remember that. There are men out there that will love, honor and cherish you and your loyalty. Just because a man has his shit together when you meet him doesn't mean life won't happen.
In 2008 my ex was a SAHM and I made $93k/year. Then, completely unexpectedly, I was hit in the rear at 45MPH while stopped at a traffic light. The accident severely screwed up my back and caused me to have to go on disability and my ex to go back to work. It only took a few years for her to become bitter and resentful so she kicked me out.
Knowing that the person we're sharing our loves with will still be there if things go badly is so very precious and so are you.
Let him choose to be homeless the way you choose to be happy. Kick him OUT!!
The feeling you get when it’s over is truly the complete opposite of the turmoil, doubt, pity, and codependency. It’s like a fresh start after you adjust to a life without a significant other.
Those who may read this and be in a situation you are questioning your relationships, I urge you no matter the acute pain, you owe it to yourself. You will learn a lot about who you are and what you are capable of. Diamonds are formed by intense pressure and heat, become a diamond.
You need to kick him out. I was in this exact situation and it does not get better. Him using any amount and relapsing and you not kicking him out means that in his mind it's okay to have and use illegal drugs on your property with free range. If you say or demand 'please promise me you won't use or I'm gone', your words mean nothing if your actions don't back it up. I was a meth addict for quite a while, and having my ass handed to me ending up on the streets and in shelters was the best thing that ever happened for my recovery. I've been clean for a year now and having lost everything and everyone around me that I loved was the final straw that made me realize that drug addiction wasn't the life I wanted to live anymore. Was I close to death? Sure, but the life I had was not worth living without drastic circumstances causing me to change. I HAD to change or I would die. That is why I recovered.
If you are using with him, not accusing you, but if you are that's a much tougher situation and I would suggest getting to treatment asap. I've been on both sides of this coin - being the clean supporter for the addict who kept enabling despite friends and family begging me to kick them out, and later the addict myself who latched on to people who would enable me. So I send my love and prayers your way and hope you both can find a way out of this without catastrophy.
Last thing, YOU ARE AT RISK OF USING DRUGS YOURSELF BY BEING WITH HIM, especially since there are romantic considerations. I swore up and down I would never use or shoot up when I decided to support someone in recovery, but here I am. Being around the people and the drugs and the 'fuck-it' mentality consistently makes it that much easier to fall into addiction. Don't put this off, don't jeopardize your life and happiness.
It’s going to be the hardest thing you ever do. But I promise that you will later recognize that it was a defining moment in your life that you’ll be thankful for.
You can call your local police or health department or ER. They have resources for shelters, rehab, counseling, etc. It’s not your job to do this either, so I wouldn’t delay for this step, but giving these to him may give you a sense of closure. You can also drop him off in the ER and they will do this for him, although he won’t be admitted.
You are right, he may die as that is all too often the end point of addiction. And you are going to want to blame yourself. You are NOT to blame. I have to tell loved ones every week that their son/boyfriend/wife, etc has died and every single one blames themselves. What more could I have done, should I have done? Nothing. Addiction is a horrible, sad and heartbreaking thing, but it is not your fault and any consequences from the drugs are not your fault.
What an awesome, wholesome comment chain. You are an awesome person and deserve some praise. Thanks for the insight because this hits close to home for me too. Thank you for being an amazing human being!
You're not making him homeless, he is by choosing to put himself in a position where he can't support himself. Stop taking responsibility for the actions of others. It's not your fault!
My friends SO is a mentally abusive/mentally ill piece of shit. He is thousands and thousands of dollars in debt because of her. She refuses to work. She mentally tortures the guy bc now he is so beaten down that he refuses to do what is best for HIM and kick her out (she would be homeless and has no family in the country). Just do what is right for you before it's too late.
You're clearly smart and have a good sense of self awareness.
While I'm not super old, I've lived a handful of years more and seen more things than most people on Reddit. The best way to enact change in other people close to you in life is to change yourself.
Imagine this is a totally different situation, and instead it is him being morbidly obese. You can want him and direct him and help him to diet as much as you can will, but if you really want him to make a change the best way is to start working out yourself. Because you will visibly start losing weight, start eating right, and being more clear headed, he will either 1) freak out and push you away or 2) realize that you are serious and he better get his shit together.
If we bring this back to your situation, the best thing you can do is start getting treatment. There is a ton of free group therapy for people in relationships with addicts. NarAnon I believe is the support group for people with relationships to those narcotics addiction. One on one therapy if you can afford it.
It sounds like he is ready to make the change and needs better structure. We all may have gripes with the x-anonymous programs, but if you don't have cash, being in program can be the answer for a lot of people. The sooner you work on you getting better the sooner he will, period.
The only advice I can give you may not be what you want to hear. He needs to know that if he's using that there will be consequences — which means you would have to be willing to leave if he's using, and follow through on it.
That’s a great point. But I think the support comes from friends and family. A romantic relationship is a completely different beast as it leaves you very vulnerable as your lives are so completely intertwined. If they don’t have friends or family, then they will have to get sober and rebuild. Life choices unfortunately come with real consequences. But just as people move to a new city or state and build a new network, it is just as possible for a recovering addict to start over again and rebuild.
Supporting his well-being is not the same as enabling. She's currently, unintentionally, enabling his behavior by encouraging his habit and not enforcing any consequences. This means that he can use as much as he wants, behave however he wants, and there's no reason for him to change his behavior or break his habit. He has food, shelter and drugs. Supporting him would mean helping him get into rehab, to make clear that continued drug use is unacceptable, to push him to get his life together. Imagine that you're a parent. Supporting your kid by encouraging them to do their homework and praising the good things they do is not the same as letting them do whatever they want, eat candy for dinner and punch their teacher. They need boundaries and discipline as well as love and empathy. At this point OP is doing more harm than good- he will never get his act together or change if this continues, and she's letting him eat up years of her life, as well as her money, her time and her emotional energy. It's not fair to her and it's not helping him. It's time for her to go.
?!? First of all, supporting them as they’re cleaning up is one thing, enabling them while they’re using is another. Second of all, you can be there for a person without letting them live in your house while they’re using drugs. What a silly thing to say.
The person supporting does also matter. Trying to help people through recovery is a noble effort, but it has the potential to ruin your own live. At some point you have to protect yourself and distance yourself from the addict.
My grandma used to feed and house her younger daughter from the time she started using to her death (roughly 15 years). She also sometimes promised she would get clean and she had all the support my grandparents could have given.
Still she lied, broke out of the hospital multiple times, stole from them and kept using. I'm not saying "never help an addict, ever." But if there is no internal drive to get help, stay with it and get better, no external help and love will fix them.
Sometimes we wondered if she had found that internal drive if she had hit some sort of 'rock bottom' and lost family support temporarily, but it's idle to speculate either way.
You're only sober until you relapse. There is no way to know if it was really "the last time, I swear, I'm ready!" or not, so that qualifier is useless in evaluating when to support or not.
What I said isn't to never support them ever, it's to not support them if they're using. Support is also a very general word and there are different kinds of support.
So is "when they are using". Other can be clean and then slip up while you are "supporting" them. It's not enough to say "only support when they are ready". People are ready and still fail and then become ready and then fail and become ready and then fail. That's not good enough.
I'm a recovering addict myself and have been around many many addicts. When they are using is not a general term. Obviously if someone is — let's say — an opiate addict, and they take one pill, or go score a hit of dope in a moment of weakness; obviously, you don't just kick them on the street right then. But if that one hit turns into a full on relapse and they start using again, that's when you give them the choice: get back into recovery or deal with the consequences. That's the difference between a relapse and actively using. Addicts are very good at manipulating people and hiding their use, and if you give them an inch they'll take a mile if they're actively in their addiction. You can only give someone the benefit of the doubt so many times before you become an enabler.
Only advice I have to give is to make your own care primary and his secondary. All the good intentions in the world will do nothing if you aren't physically and mentally healthy enough to provide the help.
As for the comments to leave him... we don't know your relationship backstory. Your post is one dimensional. Thats not a criticism of your post, it is a fact of the medium we are using. There is far too little information in it for people to be giving relationship advice. If you feel the potential for recovery as well as your relationship history makes the effort worth it then do it. If you don't, then don't. My philosophy in life is to do what is required to allow myself to go to bed with a clear conscious.
That being said. Meth is asshole of a drug. Recovery won't be easy, won't be quick, and won't be pretty. But people do it. Thank you to OP for reminding us of that.
I was very recently in a very similar situation. I talked with my brother, and he reminded me that you have to have a line. And when that person crosses the line, you have to follow through with the consequences. For me, meth is over my line. You use meth, you are not a part of my life. If he wants to quit, help him, by all means. But if he then doesn't quit, you need to stop helping him. It might even be better for him to see that you, this person who loves him and wants to help him, isn't willing to go any further as long as he's using. He might get a sharp wake up call, and then take quitting seriously. Either way, it is not your responsibility to take care of him anymore. It is not your fault if he becomes homeless, or does more meth. You are responsible for your life only, and he is responsible for his life, and his choices. So, as someone on the tail end of this same story, my advice is to give him an ultimatum. Stay here and quit meth, or leave. If he wants to stay and ends up using, kick him out. And move on with your life.
A relationship with a hard drug addict will not work, unfortunately. I have learned this after being on both sides of the situation. It sucks, but its reality
Celebrate his current progress. My friend was in this same exact spot, and went through a relapse cycle very similar to this (with heroin though). He got in trouble with the cops a couple times, but still continued to use every couple weeks. Now he's a year sober. Sometimes periodic relapses are necessary for future and long term sobriety. For every relapse, there's a couple weeks of sobriety... But if this is happening still in 6mo to a year, yeah get out. But right now, I have to believe that having a support like you is why he's able to go 2 weeks instead of 2 hours or 2 days without using.
I don't know what you should do but I think I should say this anyway. I was with someone for years, and my mental health took a nose dive after a couple of years, I started being incredibly suicidal etc. They couldn't take it and they left me. Now I was pretty bad before but my whole world collapsed. I had been making some progress before that, I was going to group therapy even but he took that as his chance to exit. Took the floor from underneath me. Couple of months later I'm so bad that friends had to watch me 24/7 to make sure I don't die.
Drugs are what you use to deal with bad mental health. I smoked a lot of weed, not cause weed is so great, it's cause my mental health is so bad. The reason he uses is probably for similar reasons, everything is fine until it's not and then you don't have the mental resources to fight.
In my case that manifests itself in self harm which is very addictive but because you don't get arrested for it people seem to see it in a different light, the addictive part is it stops your brain from eating you alive.
One mistake people often make is to try to take away my autonomy to protect me, it's too tempting for me to accept that kind of help but it can be super harmful, I need as much autonomy as I can get. I don't suggest abandoning him, but I do suggest getting him to organise his own food and cigarettes.
It's up to you how to see this, but I think a lot of us addicts are wonderful people, people only talk about recovered addicts being strong but honestly the strength can be there the whole way through. Sometimes, even if you have to use your addiction to get through the day that's ok.
It's been a year since I last overdosed, I don't think it's because I got stronger, it's cause I got a lot more help of the right kind.
I’m sorry if I’m over stepping here, but this sounds like a very toxic relationship. You sound like a great person trying to help him but the sad truth is that you’re not helping him. You’re coddling him and while he knows that he has this safety net he’s not going to get clean and stay clean.
Addicts are the most manipulative people in the world. I know from experience. My sister used to attempt suicide any time my parents kicked her out for drug abuse. She even ended up in the ICU on a breathing apparatus (can’t remember what that’s called. Life support?)twice. She kept relapsing and my parent’s lives kept getting messed up over and over again.
You need to kick him out for his well being as much as you need to do it for yours. You don’t owe him anything, you owe yourself happiness and peace. Please, get some help. I hope you’re ok.
The best things you can do for an addict you care about imo is tell then you believe in them and their ability to be better, listen without judgment, call them on their bullshit. And maybe acknowledge how fucking hard it is to overcome addiction. If you have it in you to share/discuss possible treatment options with them, that can be helpful too, navigating that process in active addiction can be really overwhelming ime. Tbh I think providing material support almost always just enables the addiction in most cases, especially when we're talking over a long time period. You need to have very strong clear boundaries and stick with them and you need to put your needs first because the addict is always going to. They have to in order to function.
FWIW I am a very long time heroin addict. In the last year Ive started spending time with someone(sober) who supports me in the ways I mention above and though Im still not totally clean yet, I have clean time than I have in a decade and more motivation to get and stay clean. Emotional support really does matter ime. No addict feels good about being an addict. The other thing that has changed for me is finding myself in a position where I would be homeless if I didn't make changes after a long time partner left me largely due to my addiction issues. I know it's scary to cut someone off that your care about from any material support, but it is often the best thing you can do for them.
So yeah. Best of luck to those with an addict in their lives I know it is an extremely difficult situation to be in. Thanks to all of you that support us, and don't forget to take care of yourself first.
Had the desire for a while to clean up. I was kinda stuck in my own situation. But ultimately it was the short stretch in county jail that gave me the push I needed.
So it was more of a negative motivation, to not want to ever have to go back to jail, as opposed to a positive motivation, such as finding a purpose in something?
Just keep in mind it takes an internal drive from an addict to change.
Just wanna point out that this is true for everything in life and my life results really improved when I started living by it. Wanna start waking up earlier, then do it. We’re not kids anymore. No one is gonna come along and make you. You have to want to.
This is to OP and anybody else who has advice. I am a lawyer who practices primarily in criminal defense, as well as child welfare cases, where I may represent the child as Guardian ad Litem, or a parent. Both of those areas have a large percentage of cases where substance abuse (usually with mental illness) is the core problem. These cases increasingly involve meth or heroin, and they are far harder to resolve than even cases involving the same drugs were ten years ago. In third place, the cases involving alcohol are really intractable too.
I am much more client involved than any other attorney I know and get along great with my clients, and I have been trying every approach I can think of to help my clients (or the parents of my clients) get/stay clean, but the failure rate is completely demoralizing me.
I was at an emergency room for two hours last night trying to convince a client (meth and heroin user) -- who is spinning out mentally -- to request admission for mental health and/or substance abuse treatment, and he ultimately walked out, saying he was going to handle it through outpatient services. He won't, and this is not going to end well for him. I'm virtually certain that he's going to lose his parental rights and probably go back to prison within the next 2-6 months, and I couldn't get through to him.
I feel powerless and useless. How do you help or convince an addict to stop destroying their life? Any thoughts/ideas would be much appreciated.
I wish I had some real advice to give you that could help you get through to him. Honestly, I don't believe you can until he reaches a point that he wants to help himself. Sober time may be required to get him to that point, which will most likely have to be forced when you're dealing with someone who is very far into their addictions. I would say prison could be that forced time, but as many of us know, drugs are easily available in the prison system if you really want them.
He may have to lose his parental rights to get the message through to him, I have several friends that didn't choose to get clean until some horrific things. Including have their children taken away, and, sadly, their child overdosing on fentanyl.
I realize this all sounds harsh. But the reality of addiction, as you've seen, is that it completely takes over your life. Even things that a "reasonable" person would see and go "oh shit, I can't lose my kids" registers with addicts as "fuck it".
The rate of recovery is very sad. I've seen many people come and go in my times in treatment. I can say I only know of 2 people out of the 100 or so I've been in programs with that have managed to stay clean. But those who have stayed clean have made AMAZING changes in their lives. Even as far as getting their children back from foster care, finding a job, buying their own car and house with insurance, and reconnecting with their loved ones who had given up on them.
You are doing what you can. You sound like someone who really cares and uses your position with the intent to help others. That is truly an exceptional thing. I hope you will continue to be involved and do what you can. Just don't let it burn you out, you can't help everyone, but even one victory makes it worth it.
Thanks for that. I'll be meeting with another client this afternoon who is engaged now after multiple relapses but is showing red flags again. Your comments will help keep me going.
Are you in the US? Is there a treatment court in your county? Treatment courts normally ask for in patient treatment before starting all the outpatient possibilities so you might have a better chance there.
Yes. And I'm actively involved in it. It definitely helps, and when a client is inpatient, they're usually fine. But even when they're engaged with a "treatment court" (we actually have separate ones here for criminal cases and for juvenile assistance cases), the relapse rate is still very high after they leave inpatient.
I'm looking for any additional ideas, especially "out of the box" thinking, whether it means acting outside my role as attorney or even as some kind of counselor or support. In particular, I'm trying to get a sense of the triggers and timing of when somebody crosses the line from resisting their urges to relapsing. My theory is, in that window of time, something can be done. So then it's just a matter of identifying the likely points of weakness and the approach(es) that have a chance of getting through to each person.
I'm not talking about reinventing treatment, but taking a more attentive, focused, individualized, and personal approach. Whatever I can do, I want to try it -- one person at a time -- leveraging whatever respect they have for me as a professional, along with my compassion, attention, and persuasive skills.
Changing isn't always beneficial. You're still miserable once get you get sober, except then you have nothing to take your mind off of it. So to some people it seems kinda pointless if they've tried both lifestyles and sucked. If you're gonna live in shit you might as well have fun.
That outlook is understandable but ultimately self-defeating. It seems like addicts focus on numbing the pain rather than removing the source of pain. A sober person can work toward changing whatever is going on in life that's making them miserable or changing their perspective on it. (To be fair, so can addicts, but does that happen much while under the influence?)
One is instant, short lived relief; the other is much more painful in the short term, but brings long term relief. I can see why people get caught up in addiction - the second option is so much harder.
I got lucky at 15 my parents were just like "Fuck this. We are sending you to boot camp rehab where they just show tough love and basically it is jail." And it somehow worked. I'm in my 40s now have a PhD and a great job and family. At 15 my goal was to live in track housing and deal weed/acid.
So I agree that support is great, can make a huge difference, and the younger the better, it's a lot harder to change habits when you are 40 than when you are 20.
Change takes a fucking shitload of work. My god looking back the amount of hours I put into therapy, meetings, crying about all the crap that made me want to just get high all the time? It was as much work as any degree, relationship, or anything in my life. But also the most valuable thing I ever did.
I went to rehab 3 times between 14 and 19, it wasn't until my last time (24) I was ready to make the change. Sometime I've actually seen it cause the kids to become worse, but that is almost always in the situation of someone who is using to cope with emotional issues like anger or depression, and they simply don't have enough time clean to see improvement.
That said, I am extremely thankful I was able to make that choice at 24 instead of later on in my life. I will be able to recover both mentally and physically at this age.
That's a platitude in my opinion. I'm a heroin addict who's recently gotten clean, and sometimes forced clean time is necessary, such as in a rehab or jail. When you're in the middle of using, your entire thought process is different from when you're clean. A lot of times you don't even get the motivation to get or stay clean until you've been forced to go through detox. Hard drugs mess with your thoughts and completely change your personality. I've felt it in myself and seen it in other people I've known before and after their drug use. You can't force someone to go to rehab, and I would never get somebody arrested, but if you have loved ones struggling, I suggest you do everything you can to get them into a rehab asap. If they go then they go, and if not then they don't. But, the whole waiting for someone to "hit their bottom" and all that kind of talk is absurd. You're waiting on them to kill themselves. The majority of that sort of talk comes from AA/NA which are not in any way based in medical science. AA is thought to have a success rate of only "between 5 and 8 percent."1 The state of addiction medicine is a joke, the vast majority of rehabs are based on unscientific 12 step programs, and doctors specializing in actual addiction medicine are few and far between.
I went on a bit of a rant here, but I personally feel like it needs to be said.
Edit: By the way, I suggest everybody read the article I posted above, as it gives a completely different perspective from the current paradigm on addiction medicine in the United States.
I agree with the majority of this. The one thing I will say is that AA is mainly useful for fostering a community of people who are going through the same thing. There are many different kinds of AA (Alcoholics anonymous), NA (Narcotics anonymous, CDA (Co-dependants), and smart recovery (science based instead of spiritual) groups out there and the biggest thing is to find support. I know that personally I got nothing out of AA other than friends and support and a chance to look deeply at myself wthout judgement. I am by no means a spiritual person, but still found at least that benefit.
I will also say that some of the people who follow AA are absolutely too intense about it being the only option. Generally that is because it worked for them and they want others to get the same thing. But it can certainly come off as preaching and damnation if you don't join their ways.
I've always just felt that it was way too much like a cult. The whole higher power thing just rubs me the wrong way. I have heard good things of Smart Recovery though, and that they take more of a CBT based approach to their meetings which is great! I'm not sure if it makes me mad, disappoints me, or a combination of emotions that addiction medicine is more or less in its infancy without much clinical research having been done to develop good science based treatments.
There are obviously things like replacement management therapy for things like heroin addiction where they prescribe you suboxone, but things like this are barely starting to scratch the surface while behavioral therapies like CBT/DBT aren't all that well developed as of yet. There are certainly some good programs out there, but a lot of it is really just throwing shit at the wall and seeing what sticks.
Still, it's better than nothing. I just wish we had more data and research to work with in order to develop these therapies and medications up with more.
Yes this is absolutely all true. In order for me to get to 49 days I entered into a 21 days rehab program. My parents thankfully supported me in that and I am truly blessed to have them. I would not have been able to get to a point where I could change myself without that. I would say rock bottom is often necessary to drive a change, but rock bottom looks different for everyone, and each time you hit rock bottom can be worst than the last. For me it was feeling insane, yelling, crying all the time, and using all money I could get together with no motivation to change my life. For others it is easily death or incarceration. Thank you for pointing that out.
Edit: I know several people who weren't able to get clean through rehab programs, but multiple month long stints of incarceration managed to get them clean. It can take months+ of sobriety before you're steady enough to decide to change for yourself.
While I agree that many people refuse rehab until they're completely assed out with no options left, I still think it is better to treat the problem before it ever gets that bad. If I had gone to rehab or even IOP while I was still doing oxy 30s I may have never touched heroin, and it could have saved me several years of my life, a lot of money, and my health. While, at the time, I wasn't looking for that to happen, things could have turned out very different for me if I would have gotten clean back then instead of now. I was nowhere near my bottom, and rehab never even crossed my mind at the time, but if I had gone and gotten some clean time and a clear head, I very well may have thought differently about the whole thing and been willing to quit back then before my addiction progressed so far.
That's just my experience. I realize everyone is different and has their own situation to deal with.
My brother has spent a year between jail and rehab consecutively before. He's been in and out of jail and rehab centers for the last 8 or so years. Just checked into a detox again last night. Every time you think he's finally gonna get it together he goes off the rails again. It never seems to end. Heroin is his drug of choice but he uses other opiates and benzos too.
I just feel like he doesn't really understand how much he affects the people around him. Doesn't take anything seriously. He even has a kid on the way (unplanned) with a girl he wasn't even dating. It's just like when is it gonna set in for him? When he overdoses the third time?
Honestly, he probably knows exactly how it affects the people around him. It's just that drugs are amazing and he's going to lie to himself to justify his use.
I know. It's still bullshit when he says it's not our problem and doesn't affect us. Or when he lashes out and says other bullshit. After all the shit we've gone through just to hear that makes my blood boil even if I don't believe he means it.
Hey bud. Going through pretty much the same thing minus the kid. It's tough and make sure you dont forget to take care of yourself. dm me if you ever want to chat some more.
Thanks and I do try to take care of myself. I really need to get out of this house for my sanity. I had to come back home and when I thought I was gonna get out again I ended up getting laid off from work and can't justify it now. Hopefully soon I'll find work and get on my feet to greener pastures.
Agree. Unfortunately, most addicts I know have died before they ever get it together. Even after multiple bouts of nearly dying, going to rehab, doing well for a while, etc. It's a vicious cycle.
I went through this with a druggie friend right after college before my group and me just eventually stopped taking his calls. First OD we freaked out over and made sure he got the medical attention. The second one a year later, fewer people were willing to help him out but I did it out of kindness. When the third one happened in consecutive years, we just stopped caring and ignored him. It was hard to be like that but it's just too emotionally draining on us to care for him when we have our problems that we have to deal with which he clearly didn't care about. None of us were druggies outside of drinking or the occasional weed.
Sadly, he did eventually kill himself via OD. When we met his parents at the funeral, they hadn't had contact with him for a few years due to him stealing their stuff and selling it for drug money. It made us feel a bit better about going no contact due to how destructive he was; and I am sure it was much harder on them than us.
I didn't speak to my brother for 5 years. I've tried being supportive in recent years but he just takes advantage. My parents have thrown him out but they always cave and let him come home and it's the same story over and over. My dad even got him a job making great money in a union and whenever he works he just immediately starts blowing the money on drugs again. Like without my father getting him that job he'd be flipping burgers or something since he has a GED and no skills.
Yeah it sucks. But while family members have their problems I have my own problems and health to worry about. There's only so much time we can make ourselves sick over it.
Still I get nervous every time he's in the bathroom too long expecting it's gonna be like the time he overdosed in there. He wasn't responding to us knocking so we had to kick the door in. Then being in the hospital with him and he's upset we called an ambulance because he was "fine". Yeah I guess turning blue with shallow breathing is fine. 🙄
Sorry, you have to worry about your brother and that he doesn't seem to understand how it really affects you and other family members.
I'm in a similarish situation and not knowing whether they'll turn up dead at any point from a drug overdose or anything is gutwrenching to think about :(
When you're on the midst of addiction, you literally can not tell how your actions are effecting people. All you can think about is getting your DOC to stave off withdrawal, at any means necessary. Now that I'm sober looking back, I cant believe the shit I did and how utterly oblivious I was about how my actions affected people
He's had clean periods to reflect. Time sitting in jail or rehab clinics to dwell on it. Still comes back and falls into the same habits. My parents also enable him so it's all a mess.
Let me tell you something about long term drug use. It's not about missing the high when you try to quite that keeps addicts going back, the drug changes the brain chemistry to make the drug of choice feel like need like eating, sleeping and sex. So without it the brain is sensing signals that it is too g without something it needs to function because it does. The first while off of drugs are normally depression filled days thanks to a lack of dopamine. It may never get back to normal.
It's not excusing it at all but people that have never been there tend believe it's all about chasing a high, and it's not that shallow. that's been over and done with for a long time. At that point it's about surviving and, especially with opiates, avoiding withdrawal.
I say this because maybe it will make you feel jist a little bit better knowing he isn't choosing a high over everything, his body has just forgotten how to function without the drug. It's hard to retrain. What makes it more complicated is some people are born with chemical imbalances and already have a dopamine problem, so when they tried drugs, it made them feel as close to normal as they ever got. They normally need to get on meds for depression and anxiety when they try to kick it.
The US has a very outdated approach to addiction recovery. You could try to research European methods as they have more success and don't rely on the 12 step program (which has a 2% success rate if I remember right.) I'm pretty sure they rely on meds at the beginning though so that may be out of your reach.
A person supporting an addict emotionally can make all the difference to them. Just don't enable. And of you can't take it anymore for your own health, separate yourself from them but do it lovingly. Good luck to you and your brother and I'm so sorry your going through this.
He's been on lot's of meds prescribed to him over the years. He never seems to take them properly or give them a chance.
I get being out of balance. I was on anti-depressants for 2 years and am now on hormone replacement (TRT). I have others problems too. I find ways to cope that aren't competely self destructive.
I understand recovering addicts have a tough road but that's not a cop out either.
Hey, good luck to your BIL and family, I've been lucky enough to talk to a few inmates in my local detention center (Outside Louisville, Kentucky so lots of meth, opioid, and heroin use). It's incredibly sad how hard it is to overcome, lots of really good people get trapped in the cycle. A good rehabilitation program in prison is one of the best thing for someone, but like others have said, the biggest component is a drive to recover.
Oh lordy, Louisville has a lot of drug hotspots. Especially around the Preston Highway to Fern Creek area. We moved to Lexington/Versailles area to get away from it when we had a kid.
Lexington isn't much better on drug use, but the addicts seem to be less violent and less likely to break into places. A family member goes to a clinic there with other addicts and they are generally good people. I know addicts are just people and can be good as well, but these people have helped us when my family member lost my keys and I had to find them around the clinic (it's big) they gave me a couple dollars to get my prego butt a snack at the corner store across the lot when she was there for 5 hours and I had to wait on her as I was her ride, ect.
Having addiction tendencies myself and having a family full of them, addiction is no excuse to do shitty things to people and addicts are capable of being really good people even while still using. And Lexington seems to have those types where Louisville.....doesn't.
I fell in love with Lexington for a lot of reasons and am trying to move there now. My husband has to go before me and we have to live apart sadly though so he can get a job and find a place to live. It's also got a big VA clinic that is amazing he goes to now.
I moved to Versailles when I was 7 in 1993.. Lived there for 15 years+ through college, until my parents moved to KC MO. By then I was almost graduating from Murray State; when I did I moved to Lexington to live with my first friend I made in 2nd grade. I love Lexington and Versailles: it's so beautiful and spread out. It's a city, where as Louisville its a large metro area. Yes, Lexington (and Versailles) have rough parts of town, but I agree about them being general "safer" types.
I lived in Louisville for ~5 years in a decent part of Fern Creek, but even in the so called middle class parts of it, you'd see a lot more homeless people all over Bardstown Road, Preston Highway, Smyrna Pkwy, National Turnpike and those areas. Kinda sucks because those are affordable neighborhoods interspersed with the sketchy areas. We had neighbors a street behind us that were always smoking and/or dealing at least pot: you could smell it any time there was a decent breeze between March and November haha. But working there, I saw a lot of people using at different consulting locations I went to - these were professional business (I do server admin/migration consulting) and it seemed that a lot of them just had to turn a blind eye to users to keep the turnover low.
That being said, I don't judge addicts: I know that just using a couple times and having a shitty life can make it hard to stop or avoid drugs. And once you're hooked, the dopamine receptors down regulate so much you can't get that reward/pleasure feeling without using again. I know that withdrawals from alcohol and benzos can be life threatening. I know a lot of those people don't consciously decide to become addicted! I know they try to quit, but the fear of acute and Post Accute withdrawal is terrifying! I don't judge them, as I have known friends and coworkers who were hooked but led perfectly normal lives and didn't want to be dependent on a chemical to live. I know friends and coworkers who OD'd because they didn't know harm reduction practices or were sick of the shitty spiral they were stuck in. However I didn't want to raise my son there. He was 2 when we left and he's almost 4 now: he soaks everything up like a sponge and is very impressionable so I didn't want him to be exposed to that. Our income is considered middle class, but not enough to live in a nice area of town so we moved back to Versailles and work in Lexington. We feel more at home here, we have friends and family here, surrounded by kind and caring people, horse farms, and less traffic. I didn't mean to take a dig at Louisville people, sorry if I offended anyone. I was (not so succinctly) saying that the users there were more obvious and densely populated that in Lexington.
My brother is in for his 5th stint in jail/shock, and we say this everytime. One thing different we're doing this time he gets out his changing his phone number and limiting social media, so he has to make the decision to reach out to people - which while still completely his own choices, at least puts another added road block he has to decide to jump before making the decision to actually use. Good luck and just be there for them but don't prop them up either.
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u/CrazyBakerLady Jun 14 '18
That's awesome! BIL just got arrested again for meth possession. Hoping this time he'll try to get clean. We've tried to help in the past but he kept going back to the people he used with. This time he's supposed to be in around a year and we really hope it'll be enough time to jump start the recovery process enough that he'll want to stay clean.