Knowing What You Want

  I knew as a young man that my family should not have to witness the events that I did as a child. I grew up in an alcoholic house and later learned that drugs were also being used. My dad is an alcoholic/addict . Nobody ever explains these things to children. My brother and I were told dad "had the flu" as the reason he was puking or passed out in the bathroom.
  A few years later he was the cool dad.Bought beer and wine for me and my friends when we were learning to party so we would be cool. Taught me how to drive while being high but always telling me not to drink and drive. Nobody ever got a speeding ticket when they were high was his motto.
  I took all those life lessons from dad and decided that was no life for my wife and children. Sure my wife has seen me drunk but that was many years ago. My oldest daughter remembers me being drunk once in particular. But as the girls grew older I knew I wanted them to have a normal childhood. No drunken fights with their mother or dad having the flu. I wanted to set an example and teach them from my life lessons.
  Knowing what you want and getting it are two seperate things. Even though I didn't do the things my dad did my girls still found the alcohol and drugs. We as parents are kidding ourselves if we think that they won't find the drugs and alcohol. It's gonna happen. It's called peer pressure.
  Little did I know that one daughter had found the hard stuff. She had become an addict. We missed all the signs for so long. I thought with my experiance I would be able to tell if the girls were coming home drunk or high. Man was I fooled. I was fooled for years. I was kinda embarassed for having the wool pulled over my eyes. Not what I wanted.
  I have come to terms with myself. I"m not to blame . The outcome of what I wanted and what I got is just a bump in the road. My ad is getting help now and has grown as a person and discovered much about herself. I will continue to teach my girls as I have always done and I tell them "that one day you"ll realize dad was right". I hope it is sooner than later and they will know what they want and don't want in life.

We Are Victims

On one of the programs that I recently watched, the sober coach asked this young man that he
was helping if he was to walk into the house and see someone attacking his mother over and over and
over again, what would he do. He answered that he would do all he could to get him off of her and likely beat the crap out of him. He asked him another question "If you could see that this attacker was going to kill your mom, would you kill him?"  And he answered that he would. He told this young man that his drugs is the attacker! That every time he uses, over and over again, that his mom is being attacked and beatin down.

We had an episode here at the house about 8 months ago... I work here from home and have for quite awhile now. I help other folks that also want to work for themselves and so I had this lady call me and tell me a little bit about herself, her background and why she was needing to earn additional income. She was recently divorced, had children, couldn't afford daycare and definitely in need to do something really soon.  And so we scheduled to talk later that evening so that I can educate her further on what we could possibly do to help her.

A couple hours before my appointment with her, we had a really bad situation come up. My (ad) was clearly using and one thing lead to another, arguing, fighting, name calling, just a big blow up that completely wiped me out emotionally. I was so upset, so sick to my stomach, so unsure of what to do, just totally hurt and numb from the whole incident.  I forgot about my appointment with this lady.

My point simply is that when you have someone that is a user/addict in your life, it affects so many people. People that are very close, family members, friends, and it will even affect those that you may not even know. It becomes a trickle down affect. It can affect your own job, your own relationships with friends or co-workers, your marriage, your own health. The snowball just keeps rolling and continues to roll over many lives.

We too are victims or I have heard some call us hostages.

I forgive my (ad). As of right now she has been at rehab for 5 months. Hopefully coming home in approx 4 weeks. I'm still ready to fight, but I will be fighting for her.

Enabling the Addict

Some folks, whether it parents, friends, co-workers or anyone who is associated with an addict sometimes do not realize how much they are actually enabling the addict.

It is of course very important that this person in our lives does understand that they have our love and our support. It is not completely wrong to offer them a ride to a meeting, to the store, etc... or to give them a place to stay for awhile. However, you do want to be very cautious of your actions that it is not something that you continue to do for weeks, months or years. You want to help them when you can, but at the same time you also want to see progress with them helping themselves.

Constantly doing everything for them, always giving them money, paying any or all of their bills is not going to help them. You can temporarily help and assist, but if you want to truly help this person, your love, you listening, you guiding and pointing them in the right direction is they only way that they can begin to gain confidence in themselves to move forward.

We know it is not always easy for us. We know that it can break our hearts in many ways and over and over again, but they need your guidance and strength in order for them to find their way, doing it for them will not help them get anywhere.

Addiction ...is for anyone

No one at any particular time in their life woke up one day and decided that they wanted to be an addict.
I have learned from others that some addictions came upon them very quickly and for some it happened over a longer period of time.
We have those that are drug users, those that are alcoholics or a combination of both.

Addiction is for anyone. It doesn't matter your age, your color, your religion or lack of religion, it doesn't matter if you are rich or poor, homeless or if you live in the city, country or in a mansion. Addiction is there for anyone and everyone, waiting to take control of your life.

We have seen 'using' start because of several different reasons. Such as a parent used, another family member used, it was the thing to do after school, it was perscribed because of an illness or injury, it's always around at parties, a friend suggested it, the list goes on. It is not at all difficult to come by.

Sometimes it may also be hard to diagnose. The actions of the user may show many different kinds of changes in their life and sometimes those of us looking in from the outside may think that the person is having a bad week, a bad month, a bad year. Maybe there are just depressed, maybe they are ill, again so many possibilites come into mind that we don't often give it a thought as to if maybe they are drinking or using drugs. Users are very good at hiding what they do. They are also great manipulators and there are times too that we ourselves might not want to admit that addiction or using could be the case.

We are not experts (meaning my spouse and I writing this blog). We are simply wanting to share as much information and resources as can. We are also wanting to share some of our experiences so that you can know that you are not alone. We are just getting started with this blog and there are many bits of information that we look forward to sharing with you.

Please feel free to contact us if you would also like your story posted here. We would be sure not to mention your contact information etc.... but we know for some, it may benefit you in many ways to write down your thoughts and feelings, to vent and to share with others.

Just know that no matter what stage you are in as an addict or as someone who has an addict in their life, that we ARE capable of finding help, we are capable of overcoming obstacles, we are capable of so much..... and we have that choice.