Dealing With An Addicted Family Member

So you're at your boiling point. You've had it. You're super close to just throwing your hands up in the air and walking away from your loved one who has an addiction problem. But you're not sure if you should because you're riddled with guilt, anger, frustration, sadness. Every kind of negative emotion that can be is all wound up inside of you. And you're trying to make this decision. Well, that's what we're going to be talking about on today's live video. And this is live if you're watching it right now here at 12 noon on the the January 30th. And so if you are watching live, you can talk to me in the chat and you can ask questions or add your opinions in, and I would love for you to do that if you're new to this channel. I'm Amber Hollingsworth, and you're watching Put the Shovel down, the YouTube channel designed to help you understand the science and psychology of addiction so you can get yourself or your loved one into recovery and get back to living the life that you want to live. Get, you know, the life before this addiction took over that one. So as we wait for people to get on, I do want to say thank you so much. For all of you guys who are sort of loyal followers and fans, you have done so much to help me. Hey, Heather, you've done so much to help me spread the message of recovery. Nearly at least every week, more than that, usually I get a comment from someone saying, I love your videos, but I wish I would have found you years ago. And I understand where they're coming from. And I kind of am like, I wish there was something I could do about that. There's not anything I can do about that going past. But you guys can help me get this information out to people who need it now so that they won't be commenting on that years from now and saying, I wish I would have had this sooner because there's really, like a lack of information out there for family members, particularly about what to do in this situation. Now, today is a hard topic. It's the question of when do you throw your hands up and just say, that's it, I'm done? Well, I've got some guidelines for you here to think about. I'm going to put it into a few categories here. The first category is if your loved one has become physically abusive or intimidating or psychologically abusive to the point that you're fearful of living in the house with them and you're scared of what you say. I mean, I feel like if you live with an addict, there's always that sort of sense of walking on eggshells because you don't know, like, which version of them are gonna walk in. But when you're literally physically scared that they're gonna hurt you, or you're having to sleep with your wallet under your pillow or locked up in your trunk or some kind of stuff like that, you know, you're being held hostage in your home, and that is a good indicator that it's time to back up and do something else. I know you think, well, you know, it's a. You know, you may say it's a disease. I have a video called it's not a disease. I just put it out. But you can say it's an illness that they have and they can't help it, and shouldn't I be trying to help them or something like that? And all of that is so very true. But I've come to realize lately that I might not have been sending the balance message enough that you have to protect your too, Because I'm all about empathy and compassion and helping to sort of motivate someone towards recovery. But there is a limit to that. And so if you're being abused physically or emotionally. Hey, Taylor. Then it's time to step back. I'm not telling you have to step back forever. I'm not telling you have to give on your loved one. Give up on your loved one. But you have to protect yourself. And if you're not doing that, you are enabling really bad behavior. You're enabling addiction, and you're basically treating someone or teaching someone that it's okay to treat you really badly. And I don't care what illness someone has. That's not okay ever, under any circumstance, no matter what. So it is perfectly appropriate to back up and protect yourself. In fact, I've been working on. I made a couple of videos just this week about dealing with aggressive behaviors. They're still in the editing process, and they'll be coming out soon. But it kind of breaks that subject down into a little bit more detail. Now, another reason why you may think about sort of stepping back, at least for a little while, is if the whole addiction thing has gotten to the point that you've completely lost yourself. You've completely turned into, like, a mad person. Like, seriously, you're not sleeping at night because you're getting up and you're searching stuff, or you can't leave your house anymore because you're scared that you're that they're gonna do something bad. You don't go on vacation. And when you're around them like you're like a lunatic because you've got to the point that the situation has driven you mad. Like, seriously. And this thing can and will do that. And we've all been there at points. But if you find that you are like that a lot and that you don't even know who you are anymore, then probably what's happening to you is you're either living so much in fear, fear that you're being held hostage by that, or you're being manipulated to the point that they're sort of doing things to make you act crazier so they can turn it on you and say you're the crazy one. And then you kind of know you kind of been crazy. So you're like, maybe they're right and it makes you do all this self doubt. So those are a couple of reasons why you could get to that point. A few years back, I helped these two parents. I never saw their son because their son was actually already not living with them by the time they came to see me. And this kid, I mean, I didn't see him, but from what they told me, it was really, really bad. And the mom, who was just the most loveliest lady you could ever meet, just both of the parents, honestly were like, super awesome. Even outside of addiction, she'll tell you, even herself, she's like, oh yeah, I'm like codependent, like crazy. Like I can't even tell my neighbor, know when they won't stop talking to me. And so she had that trouble anyway. And so when her son developed an addiction, she developed it like as a teenager, a young teenager, actually. So she'd been living with it for a long time. So when that happened, she immediately did all of the things, you know, enabling, can't tell him no. And he would ask for crazy things. She just could not tell him no for pretty much anything. And it got to the point, I mean, I just can't even tell you how seriously bad it got. Really bad that this mom, once he was out of the house, she had to change her phone number so that the son couldn't get a hold of her. Because if he did, she. He would badger her relentlessly because he knew he could make her give in. Now, the dad still had contact with the son, so it wasn't like there was no contact or they weren't doing anything for him. It was just that mom knew she was like the weak link. In this story. And she knew that he would just harass and harass and harass her. And so she had to make that big decision to do that. I know, Taylor, that's like thinking about that, Thinking about, like, not even letting your kid call you. Isn't that super scary? That's like, what has happened. And so in another fairly similar situation, it was another set of parents, I think, and that was you last year, Heather. I know, it's bad. I was dealing with another set of parents. And the mom, it was a daughter that they were dealing with. And the daughter had a tendency to just sort of provoke the mom, like, star all out long that it was just like she couldn't stop doing it because the daughter knew exactly what buttons to push, and she would push them. I mean, she would just berate the mom. And it wasn't like she didn't try to do that to dad. She did, but it just didn't work on him as good. And so I actually had her change her phone number and said, you know, dad is the first line of defense. And so there's no calling mom, because she would play. The daughter would play, like, really pitiful and sad and get the mom to do something for her. And if that didn't work, she'd pick it all out. War and a fight, or she'd steal or something. Like, it was, like, really bad. And so I almost had to, like, put the law down with my mom. I was like, you're leaving this house right now, and you're changing your phone number and you're not giving it to her. And if you want to send her the last text, you can say, hey, changing my number. If you need something, call dad. And so that actually worked pretty good for a while. You know, she tried to push that boundary. She tried everything possible to sort of get through that. But with dad, it just wasn't quite so easy. And I trained dad. I don't want you to be mean to her. I want you to be kind to her, But I want you to set the limit. And if she's talking to you ugly, then I want you to say, like, hey, you know, you seem like you embarrass me a lot. Let's talk about that later. And then just hang up. And so you almost have to retrain that person how to interact with you, because if you allow that behavior to go on, it's just gonna get worse. I mean, I hate to say it, and this sounds like, really mean, but I don't really mean it that mean, but it's like a toddler. If you let them throw a fit and you let that behavior work, then you're just, like, reinforcing it. You're just gasolining it and nurturing bad behavior. So do not let that kind of behavior continue. And the third, and I was gonna say last, but it's probably not last because there's probably a laundry list of more Heather saying he'll say terrible things to her. Yeah, intimidation. And I think that kind of thing is emotional abuse. I really do. It's like they're using intimidation to bully. They're bullying you, and that's what's happening. The last kind of situation I want to talk about today, like I said, there are, I'm sure, more. But the. But the last one I want to talk about today is when it's caused you so much financial distress that you are falling apart. You can't pay your bills. Like, maybe there's kids in the house and electricity is getting turned off because either they're stealing or they refuse to work and they won't contribute to the bills. Like, if it's your husband or you've paid so much in treatment and counseling and everything else that you, like, completely out of file bankruptcy. I mean, there are just a lot of ways that addiction can impact you financially. And there is a point when you may have to walk away financially, and sometimes that means sort of backing up emotionally and financially. Sometimes if the person's not ugly or something like that, you can sort of walk away financially, but stay connected emotionally. You have to make that decision. You know, sometimes it's both, and sometimes it's just one. But there is a time where you're going to have to protect yourself and your family emotionally. And if there are other people in the family or in the house dealing with situation besides you, and you're letting them run all over you, you're letting them ruin the finances and tear down the house. It's not just about protecting you. It's about protecting everybody else in the household. And anybody that I know in recovery will tell you, oh, they'll tell you. People I know recovery tell you long before Amber will tell you, like, oh, you need to cut them off. You don't need to deal with that. You need to put them out. People in recovery are tougher about these things than I am because they remember what they did to their families, and they know exactly what their intentions are. And they're like, oh, no, you do not need to let that happen. Do y' all know anybody in recovery? I think they would be. They would tell you to be tougher than I would tell you. So those. Those are the three things in which you might want to seriously think about throwing your hands up. Like I said, it does not have to be forever. You can put small boundaries. It can be a day at a time. It can be like, I'm backing up today. Like, I'm done today. If you want to talk to me nicer tomorrow, we could try again. Or it may be, I'm backing up until, like, further notice. You know, that sort of thing. It's okay to do that when it's ruining you, when it's tearing you down emotionally, physically, financially, and you're to the brink. Seriously, take the life raft back up. Do something else. If you want more information on how to have healthy boundaries with a loved one with a drug or alcohol problem, I have a whole playlist about that. And once I get off of here, I will link it up for you right here. So you can just click it and sort of move on down those and learn some other things about other ways to protect yourself. Okay, guys, see you next time. Thanks for joining me. It.