Hi AJlost,
I was talking to my sister (she is a senior mental health nurse) the other day about rehab and if it was a good idea for my ex to attend who has a cocaine addiction.
I understand that there have been success stories from rehab so not something that should be written off completely but this is just an opinion
My sister said that rehab as has smaller success rate as they are taken out of their own environment and put into somewhere completely different, where they can stop drinking and taking drugs but the chances of relapsing when they get home is much greater as they seem to slip into the same routine, to pick up where they left off. Also it costs a lot of money to put them into rehab.
She was telling me that weekly meetings is a better alternative as they can attend the session in their own town and meet people that are also trying to stop that are close to them for support as they will be going through the same experiences as him and will understand what he is going through. The thing is he will need to want to go to them. I have struggled to get my ex to go to the meetings as he believes he is too good for them! But like she said even if he needs the help hes got to want to get it too. This is the thing that hurts the most, you need to support him as you obviously play a major role in his life and supporting him, but the road to recovering is up to him.
The thing with addiction is there is no algorithm to fixing the problem. Think of it like someone has a broken leg. They go to hospital, have an operation, in a cast for 6 weeks then to be taken off. Problem solved. That’s the algorithm to fixing that broken leg. When it comes into addiction and mental health “there isn’t a one size fit all” making it difficult to figure out what is the best solution to help. This is how my sister explained mental health/addiction to me when i first told her about my ex. and its so true, its just trial and error. Also i understand that all of the meetings have stopped because of Covid-19 which is a really isn’t good!
Do you know of any groups around your area that he could go to once the quarantine is over? Also is your brother taking medication for his mental health on top of the drugs and alcohol he is consuming? I was reading your other post and said that he did go to the doctors, did you go with him or did he just tell you that they were condescending? I’m sorry if i’m being too intrusive and you don’t have to answer if you don’t want to. Here if you need to talk 🙂 x