Confronting An Addict or Alcoholic (WHAT WORKS AND WHAT DOESN'T!)

How do you get your addicted loved one to see the damage that they're causing, to accept responsibility for how their choices and behaviors have not only just affected them negatively, but affected you negatively and or the whole rest of the family? That's what we're going to be talking about in today's video. For those of you who are new here, welcome. Thank you for joining us. You're watching Put the Shovel down, the YouTube channel designed specifically help you understand the science and psychology of addiction so that you can get your life and your loved ones back on track and get back to living the life that you want to live. If that's something that you want to do, you're definitely in the right place. This channel is full of information that helps you if you're the family member and you've got addicted loved one, or if you're a person who's either in early recovery or struggling with a substance use disorder and thinking about making a change. This channel is all about the psychology. And as always, I have put a ton of additional resources for you in the description. So now that we said all that, let's get back to our topic of how to get an addicted loved one to acknowledge what the heck is going on. It's so frustrating to be dealing with someone who's in denial about their addiction. Not only is that frustrating, but what's more frustrating is when someone won't acknowledge how they're behaving. Behavior is affecting you and or the rest of the family. The hurt, the lies, the manipulation, the deceit, all of that stuff. You feel very wounded. And it can feel like you're never going to get better or trust this person or be able to have any empathy for this person unless they can acknowledge that first. And honestly, I think that's pretty fair and pretty understandable. But you've got to be really careful about how you choose to go about doing this. For example, just last week I got this comment and it wasn't the first time I've gotten this comment. I've gotten this comment several times. The comment is, wow, Amber, I really love this video. I'm going to send it to my loved one who has an addiction or some kind of comment about, wow, this video. You nailed it. Love that part. But the second part of, oh, I'm going to send it to my addicted loved one. I'm always like, oh, cringe, don't do it. And I'm like, oh, I hope they haven't done it yet. Before I respond back, say, don't do it. The Reason is if you're going to take a video that I made, which, hey, I'm super happy that you like it and that you want to share it, definitely don't want to discourage you from sharing, but I do want to discourage you from using my videos or any other piece of information that you read in a news article that you see on TV, any other YouTube video as a weapon to try to directly confront someone about their addiction, about their denial, about how their behaviors are affecting the people around them, all that kind of stuff. Because I'm always teaching you guys, don't come at it head on. Don't directly confront someone with that sort of sharp in your face kind of stuff. Because the more you do that, the more walls that come up. Here's how I want you to think about it. Do not try to engage this problem through the front door. Because by now your loved one has got maximum security on that front door. Like, they got like camera to see if anyone's coming. I'm telling you, they got maximum security on this. Like come through the front door of addressing someone's addiction. It's not going to work. You're going to have to find a around that. In fact, not long ago, I made this video about how to confront someone about their substance use disorder. If you haven't seen that one, that might also be a good one. I'll put it up at the end of this video. But the important thing here is don't come at it head on. And you might be wondering, what do you mean by come at it head on? Don't try to tell someone that they're addicted. Don't try to guilt someone about what they're doing or make them feel shameful. It's not that you're wrong. Hey, I know that you're right. It's just that that method isn't effective. And I'm all about doing what works. Last week when I got that question about, you know, can I send them your video? What I ended up replying to that person was, hey, if you're gonna send them one of my videos, send them one of my videos that you think that they'll totally agree with. The reason is, is because when you do that, you're actually helping to build rapport between your loved one and the videos. And if they feel like I get them and I understand their side of the story well enough, so send them videos where I talk about their side of the story. They're gon feel heard and understood even though they've never even met me. Then once you can do that, if they start hearing some of these other videos where I start talking about your side of the situation, that information is going to be able to come through. So it's kind of like it's how you get them to unlock that front door, take the deadbolt off and let that other information come through. So please, by all means, share my videos anywhere and everywhere you want to. I love it. It helps me. Most of all, it helps other people because you never know who's going to watch that video and it's going to be exactly what they needed at the exact right moment. But never use these videos as a weapon. And it's kind of like they're trying to shove this information down their throat. I'm telling you, every single time you do that, you're making it ten times worse. Please, please, please do not do this. The whole goal here is to figure out how to not hit those defense mechanism trip wires. And in order to do that, you've got to really, really, really understand the of addiction. Which is why I'm going to put that playlist up here for you to watch next.