Tough Love Delays Recovery For Heroin Addicts

Tom – thanks for this. I just referenced this post – and you, in my most recent blog post, “One Year Ago . . .” I am grateful for your words in “Hitting Bottom”, that affirmed what I felt and moved me to reconnect with my heroin addict daughter – and help her get the help she needed to find recovery.

Hi Tom,

I agree with you completely. I think for me, one of the causes of my frustration, fear and complete despair during the first year of this ride, was that I felt compelled to listen to the “experts”. After all – I knew diddly squat about how to deal with a heroin addicted child and they had been doing it for years.

And just as you described above I went back and forth between the two extremes for a long time. It made things worse for Keven and made me miserable.

Then I had learned enough to start trusting my own instincts and doing what I believed to be right for each circumstance. My default position was ALWAYS enabling so I had to (still have to) keep a close watch on that.

Then I met YOU and you were one of the only people that confirmed what I was doing, and you just happen to be a professional in the field! It was very validating.

Now I realize I don’t give a darn about being validated, being right or being wrong, I just want to do what’s best for my son. I take each incident, each conversation one step at a time to determine what is best at that moment.

As a result, I am less stressed out, Keven has consistency from me and knows my boundaries, and he’s thanked me many times for learning about what he’s going through and for not making him feel unwanted or like a loser.

in our family’s experience with hard core heroin addiction-and you and I know there is “addiction” and then there is “junky”- I have found your posts to be consistently a voice of reason. I wish more of the parents would take the time to really educate themselves about letting them hit rock bottom.

Tom,

I regret having missed your above post regarding ‘tough love’ at the time you offered it. But, I’m really glad I found it today. I’m going to refer others to it, often. It’s exactly on target.

What I have consistently observed in other family systems, and experienced in my own family’s 15 year journey, is that strategies synonymous with ‘tough love’ often end up the vehicle by which parents/other CSOs (even some clinicians, unfortunately- but that’s another topic) levy the dysfunction-perpetuating byproduct of their own unresolved anger/frustrations onto the substance use disordered family member.

“Power of the pattern”. Often times, at the heart of that ‘tough love’ methodology is unresolved, then projected anger/frustration aimed at the substance use disordered family member. This ultimately serves the scapegoating of the substance using family member, which increases stress/anxiety levels of the substance using family member (increases every family members stress levels, at that)…But, in effect, it’s the substance use disordered individual who pays the highest price for the projected anger in the form of their perpetuated coping with drugs/alcohol and potential increased risk of self-harming behaviors.

Tough love implementation can be dangerous at worst and benign at best. I’ve seen it over and over again -Parents/CSOs using this method of interaction under the guise of ‘boundaries’ and recovery purposed reasoning…But, so often there is unacknowledged resentment harbored by the parent(s)and/or other family members/CSOs, as well as the substance using family member. So, often times the ‘tough love’ implementation ends up being reduced to a tangible extension of the parents/CSOs unaddressed resentment. Though the anger/resentment experienced is understandable….It’s always toxic to recovery.

Addiction is beyond difficult …for everyone involved. But that anger/resentment must be individually acknowledged/owned in order to increase self-efficacy and collective momentum in recovery. This resolution of resentment will, quite naturally, help facilitate development of healthy relational boundaries -supporting and fueling recovery efforts. It takes increasing awareness and willingness to own ‘our own stuff’….But the result will be better functioning individuals… stronger, better- balanced family collective.

I want to make it crystal clear that I am in no way making a critical character judgment about parents or other CSOs in siting unacknowledged/unaddressed anger as a significant source of perpetuated dysfunction in the family system/relational dynamic, and as a maladaptive coping mechanism that acts as a trigger for substance use. I believe that the vast majority of family members/CSOs absolutely, truly desire to help their substance-using loved one. As parents, we do the best we can at any given moment with regard to the coping skill set, level of awareness we have to draw from in the moment.

So much of the time, the addiction challenge in the family system is the result of an inherent, generational pattern of coping that has been unconsciously ‘handed down’. It has survived, (sometimes for decades), in the lineage of a family system.

Due to that insidious nature of addiction, parent(s)/other family members are at a disadvantage in terms of conscious awareness and don’t recognize the resulting road block our unresolved anger represents/the role we play in perpetuation/propensity of a family member to cope with daily life via substances. But, the great news is that we can up our awareness…thus our ability to support ourselves, as well as healthy support of our addiction-challenged loved one through the change process.

In addition, we inadvertently add to the collective stigma associated with addiction, as parents and family members, by continuing to use vague, subjective recovery-centric language, which translates into vague, subjective methodologies in response to addiction. Methodologies that were, no doubt, originally intended to serve as support, but that really don’t end up helping us build the individual self-efficacy required to problem solve, and engage/sustain a healthy change process.

We can foster healthy change…little by little. It’s a process that takes as long as it takes. Every family system is different. But we can all learn from one another -facilitate hope as we make our way. Hope is a clinical component in the journey. As parents and other CSOs, we must get proficient at identifying those supports that nourish and encourge along our individual self-efficacy.

I’m so grateful for your wisdom, expertise and dedication, Tom. Happy New Year to you, and to all us parents/family members continuing to learn, hope and cope better and better…increasing our momentum and making our way to healthier, better lived moments. Keep up the great work. And heartfelt thanks to you for all you do in service to others.

Warm regards,

Patti