The scene opens with a small, emotional group of family and friends huddled around the struggling alcoholic about to perform an intervention – a showdown of sorts – aimed at helping the afflicted change their ways. After an hour, the tears flow, everyone hugs each other and the alcoholic makes a miraculous recovery. On television, there’s always an easy, happy ending. Ah, if it were only that way in real life.
To the uninitiated, the portrait of the alcoholic or drug abuser (who, we’ll refer to as addicts) is evident: the scruffy, unemployed middle-age man sleeping under a bridge with his bottle of Mad Dog 20/20 in a brown paper bag or the gangly teenager with matted hair, begging for money in front of a crack house. In reality, nothing could be further from the truth.
Addicts tend to be bright, resourceful individuals, often with advanced degrees and positions of power and responsibility, who come from good homes and families. For some reason – call it fate, if you will – their life took a left turn with the disease of substance abuse. To be sure, medicine now considers addiction a bonafide medical disease, along with diabetes and cancer.
For the family facing an addict at home, a rough road lies ahead that includes medical, financial, legal and relationship challenges. However, with the right guidance and resources, chances are good they’ll make a complete recovery.
Understanding the Addict
Addiction can lurk under the surface for years, until family members begin to notice the hallmarks of substance abuse: irrational behavior, neglecting responsibilities or appearance, depression, shakiness, and run-ins with the law. Slowly, relationships and responsibilities begin to unravel. In essence, the addict becomes another person. Making matters worse, addicts don’t respond to the same gentle prodding that works so well with others.
Typically, addicts:
- Are never cured
- Can never be saved
- Can’t be reasoned with
- Do not respond rationally to life
- Have more than enough will-power
- Behavior cannot be changed by you
- Are master manipulators, who prey upon others
Pretty heady stuff for a family to endure. The good news is, you have options. Plenty of them.
The Road to Recovery
In order for an addict to begin trudging down the road to recovery, they must reach a point in their lives where they’re out of options. No one can do it for them. You’ve probably heard the phrase: they have to reach their bottom. In order to successfully recover, the addict needs to come to terms with their own disease. They, and they alone, must decide that they’re ready to change their life.The first step in recovery depends on a number of individual factors, such as their age, length of disease, health condition, family and financial support. Typical places to start are:
- Detox centers
- Hospitals
- Twelve-step visits by experienced members of Alcoholics Anonymous
- Treatment facilities
- Sober living homes SMART Recovery (Self-Management for Addiction Recovery)
- Al-anon for family members
- Recovery concierge services
Once the addict has completed the initial phase of their recovery, they still have a rough road ahead. Twenty-eight days of in-patient therapy won’t come close to replacing the years of abuse and destruction they’ve left in their wake. And, for that, they’ll need you – family and friends.
Preparing for Change
One of the most important things family members can do to support their loved ones is prepare their home for recovery. Before the addict returns home, scour the home for abandoned stashes of drugs and alcohol. Practicing addicts are masters of deception and have spent years fine-tuning their environment to support their disease. You’ll find hundreds of depleted collections of baggies, containers, bottles and other paraphernalia in the most unlikely locations – under your bed, inside shoes, out in the garage – even inside the toilet tank. One addict who lived in a snow-bound ski resort hid his empty vodka bottles in his back yard, under the snow – which worked pretty well until the spring thaw.
You’ll need to treat the recovering addict as a normal, functioning member of society. To that end, open an honest, stress-free line of communication that allows them to explore and adapt to their new way of life. Avoid intimations that they can interpret as being different from other people:
- “I really feel bad for you that you have to go through something like this.”
- “I admire your willpower, it must be hard to resist the constant temptation to drink.”
- “How are you feeling? What have you been doing? Have you felt like taking a drink today?”
- “One day you’re going to be able to drink again.”
There are a number of triggers that make it easy for the addict to relapse, especially during early recovery. Being aware of them will make life easier for them and their family. Triggers to avoid include:
- Making major decisions for the first year. This includes moving to a new area, quitting a job, or making large purchases such as a home or car – anything that puts unwanted stress on life. Stress makes them drink.
- Getting into new, romantic relationships – especially with other recovering addicts from meetings or group therapy sessions.
- Setting unrealistic expectations for yourself or others. The world is a complex place, so learn to roll with the punches.
- Thinking that you’ll be able to return to your old lifestyle.
- Getting hungry, angry, lonely or tired (HALT).
Tough Love versus Enabling
Probably the most difficult task you’ll face is providing structure for the recovering addict. A well-worn concept that circulates around 12-step programs is that the addict’s growth stops the moment they began to abuse their drug of choice. For many, it means their maturation ceased during their early teens.
Thinking back to the time when the addict was a young boy or girl, families had to make hard decisions that often involved saying NO. For enablers, saying no to an addict or watching them go through recovery is too much to bear. It’s easier just to say yes. They need to learn how to say no, again. Family members have to resist speaking down or preaching. God knows, the addict understands they already have plenty to feel guilty about. They don’t need reminders from others.
The most difficult part of supporting an addict’s recovery is setting boundaries and avoiding being an enabler. This may be a new concept for many, and applies to any addictive lifestyle, including sex, shopping and gambling. As loving friends and family, we naturally want to do as much as we can for the recovering addict, taking pains to avoid confrontations. But, if you get too close, there’s always the chance that the addict will take you down with them. Then, who’s going to help you?
Family members are usually the most accessible enablers, allowing themselves to be drawn into the addict’s world by lending them money, cleaning up after them, bailing them out of jail and driving them home after they’ve “slipped” and become intoxicated – again. Every time you succumb to the addicts requests, you are setting their recovery back a step. True, your intentions are good, but the result can be catastrophic. To avoid being drawn in to the addict’s world, it’s imperative that family members attend Al-anon meetings or classes that teach them how to set healthy, realistic boundaries. Now, about money…
Managing Money in Recovery
Back in the 1980s, one of the most popular bumper stickers seen around southern California freeways was, My other car is up my nose. That’s because, when it comes to money and finance, alcohol and drug addiction is an equal opportunity devastator. Whether you’re the president of a bank or a high school dropout flipping burgers, addicts blow through money faster than a mid-western tornado. The path of destruction devastates the addict and everyone close to them.
When it comes to successful recovery, money management stands shoulder-to-shoulder with people, places and things addicts should avoid. Even for non-addicts, poor money management can turn life upside down, leading to catastrophic decisions. That being said, like food, money is a part of life – something we can’t do without. But, there are solutions.
After the initial phase of recovery and their health has returned, it’s important for the addict to find work. The stability and responsibility of a job can serve as a cornerstone to long-term sobriety. It can also play a key role in understanding how to achieve goals, interact with people, and build confidence. It’s one of the reasons why half-way houses assign menial tasks to their residents. It not only brings the addict back to earth, but teaches them accountability and the importance of doing a job well. Any job.
There are two ways to help the recovering addict manage their money: ask a family member to handle their finances, or hire a trusted financial professional. Either of them should be authorized to receive the addict’s paycheck and mete out money for living expenses. They can help re-educate the addict with how to create a budget, rebuild savings and pay down debts. There are a number of tips that successful money managers use to help recovering addicts:
- Work with the addict’s employer to set-up a direct deposit account. In some cases, it may be prudent to shut off all access to the addict.
- Avoid paying the addict with cash. A paper paycheck is another guaranteed way for the addict to have nothing left the day after payday.
- Consider dispersing money to the addict using a prepaid credit card. Next Step is a specially designed prepaid credit card for those in recovery. Designed by three men who met while in recovery, Next Step is a reloadable card that is administered by family members or other designated guardians and teaches newly-recovering addicts how to manage their money. “When I left treatment, I spent hundreds of dollars on stupid things like Starbucks, just to fill a void,” said company co-founder Eric Dresdale. The family member can have an accompanying card that can used to make purchases. The card can’t be used at ATM machines, bars, casinos or liquor stores. “The truth is, if someone wants to buy drugs they will find a way,” Dresdale says. “But we act as a hurdle from achieving that goal.”
Support Through AA-based Meetings and Literature
For the newly-sober, attending meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous is indispensable. Meetings serve as the backbone of members’ sobriety, introduce addicts to others pursuing sober lives and adds structure to their lives – something they likely haven’t had for a long time.
Established in 1935 by a Wall Street stock speculator and a physician, the two are responsible for creating an internationally known program, designed to help recovering alcoholics lead normal lives. AA currently has over 2 million members and 117,000 groups in almost every major city in the world. In addition to attending meetings, new recovering alcoholics are introduced to the 12 steps and 12 traditions, and work with sponsors – people who typically have long-term sobriety and have experienced similar problems on their way to success. There are also off-shoots of AA for sex, overeating, gambling, drugs and every conceivable type of substance abuse. To find a meeting near you, Google alcoholics anonymous meetings, and the city you live in.
Occasionally, recovering addicts introduced to Alcoholics Anonymous have difficulty with the concept of a higher power – or, God. For those people, the SMART Recovery 4-Point Program® (Self-Management for Addiction Recovery) can help the recovering addict recover by building and maintaining motivation, coping with urges, managing thoughts, feelings and behaviors and learn how to live a balanced life – all without the inclusion of religion or spirituality.
With so many quality programs available to people struggling with alcohol or substance abuse problems, there’s no reason why everyone can’t begin to enjoy life again. Of course, the harsh truth is “once you’re a pickle, you can’t go back to being a cucumber.” Nonetheless, with so many people from so many walks of life successfully living sober, substance-free lives, there is undoubtedly a solution for you. Regardless of your age or stature in life, it’s never too late to begin.
