Seeing someone you love go through addiction can be highly distressing, heartbreaking, confusing, and disturbing. As you try to navigate your feelings regarding the situation, you may also be wondering if you can provide the necessary support to help your loved one heal. You can do many things to help loved ones struggling with addiction, but mistakes are often made that worsen the situation, even with the best intentions. Learning how individuals improperly provide support to loved ones and how you can avoid them by learning the correct techniques can help your loved one and yourself.
When you first learn that your loved one is having problems with drugs and alcohol, you may be in disbelief. You may even be tempted to write off your worries as false, but this can cause more damage down the road. When you make excuses or ignore the problem at hand, it enables the person to continue their behaviors, which can cause their addiction to worsen over time. While addiction can sometimes be a complex topic to discuss, it is vital to confront the problem head-on if you wish for your loved one to find healing. You can start this process by first educating yourself on addiction.
You can’t expect to truly help your loved one if you don’t fully understand what they are going through. Doing your research on addiction, such as its causes, symptoms, long-term effects, and recovery can give you a better idea of how to approach supporting your loved one. Of course, you must first identify the signs and symptoms of addiction to ensure your loved one is struggling. These include, but are not limited to:
Once you can identify these signs and symptoms in your loved one, learning more about how the disease operates can help you better understand what they are going through. Specifically, you should research how addiction affects the brain, what withdrawal is, and how addiction can impact a person’s life. Learning about these things should give you a clearer picture of what they are going through so you can begin preparing your approach to supporting them.
More often than not, loved ones of people with addictions find themselves in codependent relationships. These types of relationships usually occur with spouses, intimate partners, parents, and children due to the relationship’s closeness. Codependency is a type of relationship dynamic in which one person’s care, love, and helpfulness help support the other individual’s bad habits, choices, and behaviors.
In addiction, this usually manifests as shielding the person from the negative consequences of the disease. It is essential to realize that codependent individuals typically have the best intentions and are trying to help their loved one. However, because of their lack of knowledge regarding how to properly support a loved one with an addiction, they often enable the behavior.
Common signs of codependency include:
To help your loved one, you must also help yourself. Watching a person you love struggle with addiction can cause you to feel a mix of emotions and take a toll on your mental and physical health. While you may want to drop everything to help the person, it is essential to remember that you can’t pour from an empty cup. This means that if you aren’t taking care of yourself, you can’t expect to help anyone else. Setting boundaries that allow you to look after your mental health can help you during this difficult time.
Such boundaries should include not allowing the person to use drugs or alcohol around you, no asking for money, no lying, no asking for support regarding drug use, and refusing to bail the person out of legal trouble. While you may think these seem harsh, they will help you and help the person realize the negative impact of their addiction.
It is never easy to watch someone you love struggle with drug or alcohol addiction. You may feel powerless, lost, or even stuck. However, there are things you can do to give your loved one the support they need and protect your own mental and physical health. Taking things step by step will keep you from getting overwhelmed, but having some guidance along the way can help too. For extra support during this time, contact NorthStar Transitions. We are one of the top-rated treatment facilities in the country, located in Boulder, CO. Our clinical practices and individual approach to treatment have set us apart from other facilities. We also offer programs to help family members of individuals struggling to get the support they need during this time. We will provide education and various techniques to help you get through this challenging period. To learn more about our programs, give us a call at (303) 558-6400.
