Do people say what they really feel when they're drunk? (and other viewer questions)

Fewer questions, but we ran out of time because you guys submitted so many awesome questions. I thought we would do a part two to make sure we got to all. To make sure we got to all of your questions. Basically, now we're going to be answering several questions today. Like, for example, do people really say what they really mean when they're drunk? Is it really possible to get sober and be in recovery without getting treatment? Can I ask questions if they aren't doing what they said they were going to do? And many more. Now, I thought we would do just like we did yesterday. We would look at these questions together, go through them one by one, and then have a little bit of a discussion about it. And I'll weigh in with my sort of feedback and advice. All right, let's see if I can show you some of these questions here. Here we go. This first question I titled, can I ask questions? It says, hi, Amber, if a loved one mentions they are going to rehab, should I ask them what is going on with rehab if I see that they aren't going? So basically, you've worked with your loved one. You finally heard the words you've been waiting to hear forever, which is, I'm going to go to rehab. I need help, ready to get help. But then it's like days later and nothing. It's crickets. And it's like, did they call or did they do anything? Typically, if someone hasn't made any sort of action, steps on it, once they say it, then you kind of lost the window, as I call it, because you do have these moments of clarity, these little windows that open where. Where you're willing to get help and you're ready to get help, and you really mean it. But sometimes those windows only last for hours. Other times they may last for a few days, but not very long. Because before you know it, the person is either craving really bad, or maybe they're in withdrawal and now they're really uncomfortable. Or maybe the pain of whatever the event was that caused them to want to get help is kind of, you know, fading into the background, so they're less motivated. So to answer this question, I guess I'm okay. If you want to ask them, you know what? You know, are you still thinking about that? You know, is there anything I can do to help with that? But if you get a lot of resistance or avoidance, I probably wouldn't push it. I would wait until your next window opens. And then when that window opens and the person says, again, okay, I'm ready. I want to get help. Then what I would do is be ready with some options. I would be researching some options, thinking about some things, and then I would ask some questions. Like. Like, hey, would you like for me to call some places? What kind of place do you think would be helpful for you and actually start getting that ball rolling? If you just kind of wait for them to figure it out, make all the phone calls, make the arrangement and do it, they're likely going to be outside of that window by the time they get all that done. And even more likely, they're just not going to take all those action steps. So probably in this situation, you're going to end up having to wait for another window or moment of clarity. All right, let's take a look at our next question. Should I wait to get help? Is what I've titled this one. Let's look at it together. I'm new to your channel and I'm loving it. I binge watch you. Hey, thanks. I appreciate that. The husband has been. The husband has been using it for at least the past two and a half years. He's currently in an IOP that stands for Intensive Outpatient Program. If you're not familiar with that, and on a waiting list for residential treatment. Our marriage has not been the greatest lately with all that comes with addiction. I've seen videos of yours and others with a similar message about supporting being the cheerleader, staying strong in the relationship. How the heck do I do that? After all the betrayal? I do want him to get better. I've backed off and I gave him the reins to do what he needs to do, but I'm so hurt. I don't want to be a cheerleader. He can't go to counseling until he gets the problem under control. Or, excuse me, we can't go to counseling until he gets the problem under control. And I don't feel I can go and get help until he leaves for treatment. I'm stuck. Need help. All right. I think this happens a lot. And there's a few questions in here. One of the question is, how the heck do I be nice and supportive and positive when I'm really freaking angry with you and I'm upset and my feelings are hurt and I'm not having nice thoughts about it. That's a good question. We're going to answer that. And then also the second question is it's a question about getting help. And let's start with that one, because I think it's maybe a slightly less complicated answer. So the frustration here is the fact that this couple can't really go to couples counseling until the alcohol problem is addressed, which I would kind of sort of agree with. Because there's no sense in trying to hash out marital problems when there's a huge alcohol problem in the mix. You're just not going to get anywhere unless you are lucky enough to find addiction counselors who maybe do couple counseling together. But they kind of understand both sides of that equation. You might could find that, but even then, I'm still not sure how far you're going to get until specifically the other person addresses the alcohol problem. Now, when you say, I don't feel I can go and get help until he leaves for treatment, I'm not sure exactly why saying that there may be some logistical reasons for that. Like, I mean, it could be that you feel like you have to be home or you have to be watching him to make sure he goes to treatment and you can't get help for yourself. There could be a lot of reasons for that. But if there's not a logistical reason why you like physically can't get some help while until it goes to treatment, then I would say you definitely can get some help. And having your own person, your own ally, your own cheerleader, even just a sounding board, I highly, highly suggest, because that's one of the things that you can do that's going to help you with the original question. So let's go back to that, which is how the heck do I be nice to this person when I'm really freaking angry? If you're really upset with a person, then I don't know that you can be nice. So if it's one of those situations, the best you could hope for is try to be sort of neutral. And in order to do that, you probably need to back up, take a little space, take care of you so that you're not so angry that you're just oozing anger and resentment out of your pores, which isn't really going to help the other person get better. It's also okay just to take care of yourself and not to be so focused on the other person. In fact, that's one of the ways to get yourself out of all those negative emotions. Because probably part of the reason you feel that way is because you've been putting all your needs on the back burner. Life has been revolving around that other person and you're just sick of it and you're resentful of it. And so allowing yourself, giving yourself permission not to do that anymore will actually help you feel better. If You've seen any of our videos on the drama triangle, that might be super helpful because probably what's happening is you're. You're starting out trying to rescue the person and help the person because you feel like they're a victim. And that goes on until you get frustrated because they're not helping themselves, which then makes you the victim, which then leads you to lots of resentment and frustration and maybe even acting out and doing some not so helpful things, which puts you in the persecutor role. So you want to get off of that, what we call the drama triangle. If you haven't seen those videos, I'll try to remember to link them up here at the end so you can take a look at those. But what I'm saying is if you're too mad to be nice, you're too mad to be nice, and that's perfectly normal. And okay, so just back up, take some time for yourself and do the best you can to be neutral. Now, neutral is different than like silent treatment. I just mean neutral take care of you until you get to a place where you're in a better frame of mind. And then if you choose to step back into some kind of communication or relationship, then do that. Then. That's a super good question. I'm glad you asked it. I'm going to call this one in denial. Some days he's honest and knows he needs to stop drinking so frequently. And other days he's definite. He says he doesn't have a drinking problem because he doesn't get the shakes. I'm unable to get him to see that he needs to address it before it gets too bad. This is super common, right? Like probably all of you that watch this channel as a family member of someone who has substance use problem knows what this is like. And it's that kind of wishy washiness. In some of the earlier stages of change, the person is going to be like, you know, there are levels of this. It's like, well, I don't have a problem at all. You're crazy. Like, you're just uptight and you're just being judging. I don't have a problem. You know, like level one, Level two might be like, okay, I have a problem, but it's not near as bad as you're making it out and you're just totally making a big deal about it. And that's probably because your sister was an alcoholic and you're just crazy, you know, and so they, they say they have a problem, but they kind of minimize it. And then maybe there might be moments after some big bad things happen. And the person, like we talked about in the first question, the window is open, and they're more aware of the severity of the problem. When they're in those moments, they may say things like, I've got to stop. I need to quit this completely. I need to get help. They may make those statements, and then it wears off, just like we talked about in that first question. And it's like, around and around we go, and it's like they're not even consistent with how they see the problem. Which, to be honest, is pretty normal, although extremely frustrating. Even in counseling, it works like that. Clients will show up, and there are some days where they are, like, very motivated. They totally get it. They're insightful, they're ready and willing to do whatever. And then other days, they start to kind of backtrack and they start to kind of convince themselves that maybe it's really not that bad. You know, maybe they can just kind of cut it back or something like that. So I know how frustrating that that can be. The question here is, is kind of like, how do you get them to see that they have a problem and that they need to address it before it's too bad? And in general, the way that we do that is we use the craft method or like. Like what we teach in the Invisible intervention. Or as a counselor, I might use motivational enhancement techniques, and I do have a link where you can watch and learn some about motivational enhancement techniques for free. I'll put that in the description for you in case you want to check that out. But basically, you have to lead them to see the extent of the problem. You can't force it on someone. You can't tell it to someone. Even. Even if you do tell it to someone directly and you have, like, a good enough relationship with them to do that, they're probably not going to completely believe you. Like, sometimes people will ask me, like, do you think I'm an alcoholic? Do you think I'm an addict? And I'll say what I think, and they'll say, well, why do you think that? And I'll explain to them, like, literally, I'll read them the criteria and let them see that they have all of them. I will show, tell them about the stages of addiction and let them see that, where they are exactly on that continuum. But even then, when they believe me, they still go through this bargaining phase where it's like, maybe I can cut it back. Maybe I can do this. Maybe I can do that. And what I do about that in counseling, which may or may not be what you would want to do is because I know they have to go through all those bargains, I just allow it to happen. I'll say, what is it you want to do now? I'll usually say up front, most of my clients figure out that it doesn't really work so great for them. And actually they figure out that not using it all is a lot easier than trying to use a little. But I'm totally okay because everyone's different with figuring this out. You got to figure it out for yourself. And then I'll ask them, what do you think is a like, okay, reasonable level of drug use, alcohol use, whatever it is, I'll let them tell me. I let them set some limits for themselves, and then I'll let them cross their own limits. We'll talk about that. The reason why that's so helpful is because they've crossed their own limits. I'll say, tell me how you know you had a problem. Tell me how you know you might need to get more help. I'll let them say it out loud. And if it is addiction and they continue to use or try to dabble with it, they will cross those lines. It's the nature of addiction. So you kind of have to let them prove it to themselves that that's the answer for dealing with someone in denial. It's. It's slower than we want it to be, but it's the most effective way. Here's a question. Can you get sober without going to treatment? Can you honestly quit drugs without help or detox properly? The answer to that is yes, that is possible in many situations. In fact, research shows that most people conquer their substance use problem without getting formalized help like that. And even a lot of people who've been in and out of a lot of treatment, sometimes they eventually they just figure out, like, I'm really done with this. And they don't really go back to treatment, but they've been a whole bunch and they kind of know the drill and they know how to get themselves back together. Now, the detox part can be a little bit complicated depending on the substance. Like if it's alcohol or benzodiazepine or something, and they're very, very dependent on, it can be dangerous to try to detox yourself, just like cold turkey. So sometimes depending on the substance, you might need some medical help with that part. So there's not a clear answer to say, yes, everyone can do it without help, But a Lot of people are able to do it without help. You kind of have to get a good assessment and figure out where you are, your supports and resources are, you know, are you dependent? Do you need detox and stuff like that? This is the know it all question. Hi, Amber. Thank you so much for sharing or so much for your valuable help. How do you get through to someone who thinks they know it all? This is a great question. The way you get some through to someone that knows it all is you figure out how to get them to come up with your solution. It's going to have to come from them. If they're know it all and you try to give them a piece of advice or say what you know, they're just going to reject it because they know it, all, right? So you got to be sneakier than that. And you got to get it to come from them. You know, like, you got to get them to think it's their idea. That's the key to dealing with a know it all. Do they really mean it? Is what I called this question. Does research show that alcohol makes a person more prone to vulnerability and honesty than they might be without it? In other words, can we trust alcoholic statements about their inner world more than when they are somewhat under the influence than when they aren't? Essentially this is, do they say what they really think and they really feel when they're drunk? And the answer to it is sort of, kind of maybe a little bit, but not really. Let me tell you what I mean by that. When you drink, that takes your filter off, it literally turns down, like, your critical thinking part to, like, turns the volume down. Like, not completely off, but like real low. Okay. The front part of your brain, it turns up the emotional part of your brain. So whatever emotions that they're experiencing or have been experiencing are then sort of unfiltered and can come out, but they're usually kind of skewed and a mess. And they don't go through the normal filter of critical thinking. And you might be thinking, well, that just means they're not filtering what they say, which is to some degree true. So I would say there might be a little truth in what someone says when they're drinking, but it's not. I wouldn't take it as the Holy Grail because the emotions are running the show and there's no filter. Kind of like, have you ever got really angry and said something when you're angry that you really didn't mean? Like, maybe you'd had the thought before, but you really didn't mean it kind of like that. Hopefully that helps. Why so moody? When someone is in their illness, do their feelings and perceptions tend to change frequently or are they just more prone to self deceiving in their varying states? Or why all the moods and contrasting statements? Great question. And the answer to that is because, well, you actually ask it in two parts. So the answer to that is, do their moods change frequently? Yes. Is it because they are self deceiving? Yes. So both they are moody because they're on a roller coaster because there's chemicals in and chemicals out and they don't have any steadiness of their emotions or mood, which then affects how they think and how they behave. So, you know, there are moments when they feel pretty good, when they have the right amount of substance, There are moments when they've had too much substance and they feel a different way. And then sometimes they're in withdrawal, which makes them angry and cranky and irritable and sensitive. So, yeah, the mood is all over the place. A lot of that is just about the biochemical effects of the drug or alcohol or the addiction. But some of it is also prone to the self deceiving ways. Because as you know, if you watch my videos, when someone is struggling with an addiction, there's a lot of justifications and rationalizations that get wrapped up in protecting that addiction. And so you will frequently see someone with an addiction, they'll kind of nurture their resentments, as in like ruminate on them, play them back in their head, get themselves worked up about stuff. And so that's another contributor to the mood and the behaviors being all over the place. Why can't they make up their mind? Why not an alcoholic romantic partner put their person of interest through cycles of approach and avoid? What is the purpose of showing up only to step down again and again? And how might their significant other handle that? And then it looks like there's another part of that question. What is the link between alcoholism and self sabotage? Let's take that a little bit at a time. It's kind of the pull you close, push you away question. The person is like, sometimes nice and I love you and I couldn't live without you and you're the only thing I, you know, live or whatever, you know, they're pulling you in and then it's, I can't stand you, you're controlling me, you know, nightmare. And there's sort of two reasons for that. One reason kind of goes back to the question just before, which is the mood and the roller coaster. Emotions, right? Like depending on what's going on with them physiologically can depend on how they feel about you at the moment. And then also some of the push pull is just plain manipulation, right? They're pulling you in to get something they want. They're pushing you away because you're confronting them or trying to make them accountable for something or something like that. So there's a lot of reasons for the push pull. What is the link between alcoholism and self sabotage? A lot of people like to go like super Freud and it's almost like some kind of purposeful self sabotage. But I. I don't think so. It's definitely a thing. I usually say people with an addiction will literally like ruin something great in their life at the last minute. Sometimes it's kind of like if you have, if you're almost finished with your college finals and you've literally written your paper and you just have to go and turn it in, so excited about it, you go out and you party with your friends to celebrate that, you know, you're done with your finals and then you oversleep and you don't get up in time to turn your paper in. That kind of self sabotage. I don't think that there's any kind of underlying deep psychological. I'm trying to ruin my life here. I really don't. I think it has to do with the unmanageability of the substance use when you're trying to manage an addiction. It really is a 247 job constantly and trying to do that and then manage your real life. The real life stuff eventually starts falling to the cracks and that's where the self sabotage stuff comes in. Abusive when drinking. And by the way, I see you guys who are there live and I am going to come back to you guys in just a second. So if you want to add a question or a comment, be sure and put it in there because when I get done with this one, we're going to look at what you guys have to say, all right? Abusive when drinking. When I see my husband has been drinking, it sends anxiety through the roof. This is because if he drinks successfully, I'm at risk. My gentleman turns into a monster. I wish I could find the strength to calm down, but I fell. I had to leave back in September for 10 weeks with just the clothes on my back and my dog, as he had threatened to take all of our lives and he couldn't cope anymore. The mental health unit assessed him and then asked him to come back as it was not helping him. I did I did return. He got sober and things were good for about three weeks and then he relapsed. My husband addiction has gotten so bad that I had to ask him to leave. I miss him, but no matter how much I try, it's sending me into despair. He's been living in his car for five days, which is confirmed by a friend on his way to work, he saw my husband's car at 4pm parked up in woodland car park in minus degrees temperatures and minus temperatures. But now he's in a hotel temporarily. It's breaking my heart as I love him and I worry about him. But he has stayed sober for three weeks a few times. But then his mental health due to his childhood trauma gets out of control, so he drinks to block out the pain. We've been together for 33 years. I found out about his addiction four years ago when things changed. But he's admitted that it's been an issue for many years. He's been attending AA groups and has phone calls from Turning Point here in the UK and is on meds for depression. But even though he's asking for help to stop, I have called his doctor who just says he hasn't the resources and refers him to Turning Point. The help is limited, just a phone assessment asking him how he's getting on reducing his alcohol. I keep in contact with my husband by phone as I don't want him to feel completely abandoned. Landon, he wants to get well and come home. Any advice would be greatly appreciated on how I can get our life together. All right, this was a little bit of a long one with a lot of details, but sometimes the details really kind of help me understand what's going on and give better, more specific advice. I'm gonna go back to the beginning of this because there was some important stuff that you said which is right here. When he's drinking excessively, he turns into a monster. And at one point he had threatened to take all of your lives. Okay, so I'm going to talk to you about maybe how you might could help your loved one or maybe some things that would be helpful or what they need. But way more important than all of that is safety. So anything I say to you goes out the window when safety is an issue. And under no circumstances, for no reason, should you stay in an abusive, unsafe situation. I don't care if they're mean because someone was mean to them, beat them up when they were a kid. I don't care why they're doing it. I'm just telling you it's not okay. And you should put some distance, which it sounds like you've done, and you feel kind of guilty about it, but I'm telling you, you've done exactly what you need to do. It's not okay. And if. If you can't see that just for yourself, then let me tell you, you're not helping him by doing it either, because you're allowing him to act like a monster. And that's going to we him with shame and guilt and regret, and that's going to make it even harder for him to get better. So for you and for him, and because you don't want him to go to prison, right? So get some distance and keep yourself safe, first and foremost. All right, now let's take a look at kind of the clinical part of the situation, what you're telling me, which is he'll get some weeks sober and then relapse. And it looks like you're telling me that a lot of what happens is unaddressed trauma. So what that tells me is one of two things. Either he needs to be getting addiction counseling and trauma help simultaneously, which can be done, or he's just using that as an excuse to you to why he's going to relapse. Because that one works. It's like the ace card. And I'm not saying, like, everyone uses an excuse. Trauma is definitely a real thing that will trigger someone up, up. But there's usually more than that. If they get three weeks and then they relapse, there's definitely another piece of that, even if it is being triggered by trauma. And the piece of that is they are convincing themselves that this time it's going to end differently. This time they're going to drink just a little. This time it's only going to be beer, or this is the one last time, and they're not going to drink tomorrow. And so they're. They somehow convince themselves why it's okay to use the substance instead of use the coping skills, or they give themselves permission somehow. So it's not just the trauma. There's other addictive thinking that goes along with that, that needs to be addressed. And unfortunately, most people have to try several times before they really figure it out. Most people do have to, you know, do a lot of trial and error with sober times and then relapsing times so that they can figure out that, yeah, it always ends badly. Like, there's no way around it. There's no, I'm gonna manage it. They kind of have to do all that trial and error and figure it out for themselves. So that's what I would say to you about that. Let's see here. And the, the other piece, I guess, of this situation that you sent me is you, you're frustrated with the lack of resources and real help out there. And I hear you on that. I'm in the system and frustrated and there's a million reasons for that, just a ton. I can't, I can't even go into all of them for you. There's just a lot of systems issues, there's a lot of programming issues, there's a lot of burnout in this field. There's a lot of frustration even if people that are in the field and you know, there are limits on even what treatment can do or doctors can do and nurses can do. And so it's frustrating to everyone involved. It sounds like you really want, what he's been referred to is just Turning Point, which you're in the uk, so we don't, we don't have that here. So I'm not sure exactly how that works, but it looks like they're just sort of maybe like calling, checking on them, sort of like a case management thing. But it's not really treatment from what I can tell by what you're saying about it. So this person sounds like maybe they've done inpatient before, they may need to do inpatient again. They maybe they need longer, maybe they need more accountability when they get out. But I kind of agree with you. If all it is is just a call and a check in of how are you doing with drinking less, that probably is insufficient. So I'm just going to agree with you and empathize with your frustration about that. And I wish I knew more about resources in the uk if someone is watching that, knows about things in the uk. Possible options, please leave that for our viewer in the comments or in the chat because that's super helpful information and unfortunately I don't know exactly what resources are available there. All right, let's say hello to our people who are watching live. If you're joining, joining us on the playback, we are super happy that you're here too. Feel free to leave your questions and comments down in the comments because I always come back and read them and try to respond to as many as I can. Let's see what's going on. We do have some people that are here with us live. This isn't even our normal lifetime. So thank you for joining us. We have Karen and Sarah. Sarah has some questions here. Let's take A look. Sarah says, what expectations should I have after someone is 60 days sober? There is positive progress, but how long until I can have more than basic expectations? He has a job, meds, Iop, doing a couple of normal household things. But there's much more. I feel like any progress is enough. Am I being impatient? I've been patient for two years and it's hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Will it ever get better? Will it ever get better? Enough is enough. I feel like this is a very common thing for families because usually if you have an addicted loved one, the family member has been holding everything together, meaning they've been taking care of all the responsibilities, they've dealt with everything. And they're kind of like it's time for you to step up and you're really at your wits end. So when they start getting better, it's natural that you kind of want them to like get into full swing really quickly. But I can tell you, as unfair as it is, and it is completely unfair, if you try to push too much too fast, then the whole thing crumbles. So the way I like to think about it is it's like they're juggling balls, right? And so you give them one ball, right? Maybe that's just going to treatment or whatever, going to their counseling and let them juggle that and see until they get it smooth, right? And then give them another thing to have to handle and let them juggle the two things until they get that and they're doing really good with that. And then a third and then a fourth. If you throw everything in at once, they're just going to drop them all. You're going to have to start all over. So if possible, a little patience and adding one thing in at a time while they get their rhythm is the best way to go about it. But you're feeling about the situation is absolutely understandable and I feel the same way as you. All right. Joelle says loved one has found a living situation with a friend who provides free drugs and says the drugs are free and there's no struggle. It is difficult to walk away and motivate herself to go back to treatment. She goes dark for days at a time and won't respond to our check in calls or texts. Family and friends say we should do a welfare check, put pressure on the living situation and try to pull her out of there. Been there, done that. It never works long term. We are hesitant. Let me see if there's the rest of that somewhere. We are hesitant Because I can't see the rest of that. Well, I can probably guess why you're hesitant, Joel, so that's okay. You're right. If someone is in a situation where the substance use is working for them, as in they are in a living situation, substances, they're being taken care of, there really isn't much chance that they're going to change outside of like they get in some kind of. Or the relationship, the one that's feeding them the drugs, falls apart and they get sort of done with it, or they just have some kind of moment of clarity and decide they want to do something different. As far as anything you can do, you can maintain your relationship with them, you can practice the principles of the craft method and slowly start to shift their thinking, but there's no fast route to it. If you're, if you're worried about their physical safety, it's okay to do a, a mental health check or a welfare check to have them checked on. Like, if you think they're suicidal or you think you know they're in danger, you can do that. But as far as just going up to that house and trying to yank the person up out of there, it's not going to do you any good. Like you said, been there and done that and just didn't work. Right. That's not just for you. That's for pretty much anyone in that situation. Let's see. I see, I see a couple of names on here I can't pronounce. Cat. Catus. I'm probably saying that wrong, but we're glad that you're here. I wish I could say it correctly, Aaron. I think if you limit your addict's exposure to addictive behavior, doesn't a. Wait, let's see. What are you saying here, Aaron? If you can limit your addict's exposure to addictive behavior, doesn't have a parent a duty to do so. I need more details, Aaron. Are you saying like, like you maybe you have a teenager or college age kid who engages in drug or alcohol use and they have like using friends and should you keep them away from those using friends? Is that what you're asking? Because that's what. What. That's what I think you're asking, but I'm not sure if someone's already having an addiction and struggling with addictive behavior. You can try to like I call it, manage it from the outside, which is like manage the people, places and things and people to hang out with and all that kind of stuff, but you can't ever win that way. Because you can run off one friend and there's the next one and the next one, the next one. And while you're trying to do all that, you're usually making the person really, really mad. And that's not helpful because the only influence and leverage you have or you can have will come from your relationship with them. And if you ruin the relationship, you're truly giving away your power. I know it's super frustrating and you can set boundaries as far as what can and can't happen in your house and stuff like that, but trying to control things on their side of the street, probably. I mean, it's not the best. It's just not effective. Let me know in the comments or chat if you've tried that before. Hey, Cheryl. Aaron also says, is there a connection between addiction, eating? So yes, there is. A lot of females who have addiction also have eating disorders. Although that can happen for males too. It's not just, just females and there, there's just not a whole lot of difference between the two. Honestly. They're both sort of like compulsive behavioral patterns. So, yes, there's a strong connection there, Cheryl says. Really found that extra incarceration time can be a huge blessing. Yeah, sometimes if they're in a situation where they're really not using, they're in jail and they're not using. Allowing their brain deal is good. Every sober day helps. I always say it's like if you're pregnant with a baby every day. Closer you get to nine months, the better. Right. It's like, like the, the stuff is healing, the wiring is fixing. So, yeah, I agree with you, Cheryl. Sarah says with addiction, can parents pretend to be sober? I can tell the behavior that they are acting erratic and forgetful and making decisions that disrupt normal routine. Yeah. Parents can pretend to be sober. Are you asking should they pretend to be sober or can they? Can they? Yes, they can. Some aren't very effective at doing it right as you're saying there. And sometimes it is actually pretty easy. Like if the addiction is to opioids or something, it's not. It's not always very obvious that someone's intoxicated. They don't slur, they don't smell funny, they don't stumble, their eyes aren't bloodshot. So depending on the substance, sometimes that's easier to pull off faking like you're sober than other substances. What you can't fake for very long, you can for short periods of time, is that you're present and involved with whatever's going on the situation because if you have a drug problem, it's not that you can't have good moments of parenting, but you're going to be inconsistent in how you do that and your kids are going to pick up on that in one way or the other. They may not know why, they may not know it's because you're intoxicated or not. But in a big sense you can't really have the problem long term. Hopefully that answers a little bit. Another thing from Sarah. How can you have a talk with them to be honest with people? I finally had to disconnect from my person. You're saying you want, you want the addicted loved one to be honest. We actually talked about that in part one a lot and that's that you have to kind of let it come out itself. You can't go and tell people for them, you can't do the honesty thing for them. It just backfires on you and they just get mad at you all. And sometimes the people you're telling actually get mad at you too. And be smart. I think smart recovery is big in the uk. Thank you for that, Mary. I appreciate that. Smart recovery is another helpful, usually community support. Kind of like there's aa, there's smart recovery and it's less religious and more science based. So that's super good option for a lot of people. Marcus says for the UK for alcohol misuse, they could only offer rehab if they are physically addicted to alcohol. So what you're talking about is Marcus is as alcohol dependence as in I need to drink if someone is drinking to the point that they're living on the street. Because I know Marcus, that you're, you're trying to help the, the viewer that wrote in about the person in the uk. I feel certain that this person who's writing in about their loved one, that loved one is definitely meets that criteria that you're saying there, Marcus, which is there are physically dependent on alcohol because to be out living in your coal, in the car, in the cold and homeless is pretty bad. So I would say for sure it would meet that level or I guess I would say I would suppose I can't really be sure. But thank you. Thank you for watching Sarah. Martha says addiction is so is a difficult road for the patient and the family members. Thank you for all you do, Amber. I always feel better after watching videos. Oh, thank you. I feel better after you said such nice things. I appreciate that. Cheryl says, sorry I didn't finish. The extra time gives us an opportunity to find a longer rehab 12 months now we have a much stronger commitment and an extra four months towards R. There you go. I like it. Silver lining. Hey, Al. Thank you. Thank you for watching Harvey. Is my girlfriend addicted? If my girlfriend is addicted to pain pills, but she doesn't believe she is because they're prescribed, should I demand she gets off of them before marriage? Good question, Harvey. Should you demand she gets off of them? That's not really helpful. I wish it were that easy. You get off of those things, or else what you can say is, I love you, honey, but I don't. I feel, you know, I can't really make this commitment until this issue is addressed. So you can kind of set that boundary for yourself, which is slightly different than demanding if you haven't seen them. Harvey. I've got a lot of videos on boundaries, and a lot of times it's the wording and the intention there. So I do think what you're trying to do is set a healthy boundary for yourself. It's just maybe how you go about wording it that's going to be really important. Great question. Let's see. Finn says, my loved one and I have separated for over a year. I had a hard time dealing with the trauma of the addiction and the impact it had on my mental health. I was pretty crazy by the end. How do I help myself other than Alanine? You might want to talk to just. You might want to get your own counselor to talk things through, to maybe figure out if it's been a while. It sounds like it's been over a year, and it's. And you still feel the trauma. Trauma of it. I don't know what happened in your situation, Finn, but sometimes you can have for real deal, like anxiety disorder to develop that you have to get treatment for. I have seen that lots of times in family members. So you may need that. It may be one of the things that you can be doing to keep yourself stuck is you could be ruminating on it a lot, allowing yourself to kind of go, what I call, like, in the rabbit hole. And that's to think and remember. And you can kind of like. Like keep fueling the trauma and the memories and stuff. So if that's something that's going on, which I have no idea if it is or not, what you can do to. You can kind of start trying to keep yourself from going in that rabbit hole and reliving it, because when you do that, you're kind of re. Traumatizing yourself. So that's just another small step you can take. Mar Says, can you actually kick an adult child out of your home? Aren't their laws against that? You can, but you have to go through a, like, formal eviction process. Now you can say, I'm done with this crap. Get your butt out of here. And they might just leave. So if that works, you can do it. If they're like, make me. Then you might have to go down to, like, your county courthouse and file an eviction notice. Almost like if you had a tenant and you have to do, like, the 30 days and stuff. So, yeah, you can, but you might have to go through the process. This. But if you have a loved one who doesn't really know that, and you just tell them they have to leave, you could try that. If they try to fight you on it, though, and the police come up or something like that, they will tell you that you can't just kick them out if they have proof that they've been living there and that. And that goes for anyone you've let live in your house. Like, if you take in a friend or a stranger off the street and you let them live at your house and they're getting mail and stuff there, they're officially a tenant. And you can't kick them out without going through the formal process. At least that's the way it is here in states. I don't know if you're in the states, but I'm guessing you probably are. Hey, Alyssa, thank you for watching. Phil says, I'm seeing some new names, which is kind of cool. Would. Why would family members of addicts attempting recovery knowingly enable with lesser substances? What I think you're saying here, Phil, is like, if you've got a loved one who's going to treatment or in recovery, but you're, like, letting them drink or letting them smoke or something like that. Is that what you're saying? Why would they do that? That comes from one of two reasons. Either they're being held hostage by the person and they're scared not to. They're kind of like walking on eggshells. And I. That's what the person wants to do. And. Or they really don't understand the nature of addiction. Because a lot of people don't understand that if you have an addiction to one thing, it probably means you don't need to be messing with anything that's addictive. So sometimes it's just a lack of understanding and education. Other times it's fear, and sometimes it's both. Are there any good documentaries about addiction and recovery that you would recommend? This Question goes out to people in comments as well. Thank you for all your important work. Yes, there are. And of course, as soon as you ask that question, my mind goes blank. There's a lot of movies that depict addiction really well. As far as documentaries, I'm trying. There's one specific one's coming to my mind, and I don't know why I can't get to it in my head. You guys in the comments, y' all make sure and talk to Sarah and leave her some comments because I know you're thinking of them when I'm blanking out here. Let's see. Cheryl just started watching and stumbled onto this live. I can't encourage you enough to watch every episode of Put show on. Oh, I like it. Say that, Cheryl. Keep encouraging them. Amber taught me how to work on me. Boundaries and. No. So grateful. So grateful for you, Cheryl. Thank you. And thank you, Joel, for your kind words. And Ben and Kimberly aren't. Kimberly says after four months of blocking him out of my life, I felt like I had to try to help him out and tell him yet again to get help because our oldest son has decided that he will no longer be involved. So it's. It's like you, Kimberly, what you're saying is you've distanced yourself, and I'm guessing maybe this is an ex spouse or something, or maybe a current spouse and your oldest son doesn't want to have anything to do with. With the dad or something like that. That's what I'm assuming you're saying here. You can't. I mean, I was gonna say you can't tell someone to get help. Of course you can tell someone whenever you want to. It's not very effective. You can set boundaries, though, and you can support your son and. And his boundary that the son is wanting to put in place. I know it's frustrating to watch people make bad decisions, and we want to hurry the process and we just want to sort of force it faster. Unfortunately, if you. The harder you try to force it, the more you slow it down, which is kind of crappy. I know. Trust me, I've done it myself lots of times. Still do it all the time, and it never works. I try to force it faster. Thank you, everyone who joined us live. And for those of you who are watching on the playback, feel free to always leave me your questions and your situations in the comments, because I do answer them and sometimes really good question that I think other people might want to hear, then I might respond to it on one of these videos. I will see you guys next time. As always, there are lots of resources in the description. I'll see you next time.