[tjpp]

At a loss really as to what to do. My brother has suffered from severe alcoholism for years now. Lost his family, his home and his job. Staying with my mum now he drinks any money has has but we suspect he has started salting hand sanitizer as a drink. I am sure there is an underlying depression issue but he continues to refuse any and all treatment options available to him. I want to challenge the hand sanitiser drinking but don’t want to make things even more worse for him. Any advice gratefully received.

[natalie130]

Hi,

So sorry to hear about your brother, I relate to this a lot as my Dad is an alcoholic and unfortunately he also wont get help. I am pretty sure that most people with an addiction have underlying depression issues and the alcohol is used to supress their feelings of depression.

I didn’t know about how I was ‘enabling’ my dad to drink for years until I started attending a monthly support group. Enabling them is doing anything from giving them money, food, shelter (all the things as loved ones we want to give them as seeing them suffer in unbearable) but as long as they have someone enabling them they unfortunately wont get better. They need to hit their rock bottom and do it for themselves. My dad lives with his elderly mum who herself is in denial about his drinking, I managed to get him removed from the house when I first realised we were all enabling him and it was the best he had been in years, he was engaging with the services and we started to see changes in him which was amazing. Then my nana took him back under his roof and since then we have been right back to square one.

I know it is easier said than done and it is so heart breaking but it sounds like your brother is being enabled to drink as he is living with your mum. Could you both think about him being moved into some other housing. This doesn’t mean you’re both not there to support him and love him but it means he will have to help himself and will maybe start coming to terms with his addiction?

Also for yourselves can you find a support group for you both to attend, this is the best thing I have ever done. Speaking to others in the same situation so you know you are not alone. I have learnt so much from the people in my group and I am in a much better place mentally as it really was starting to take it’s toll on me. It is also clear from the group I attend, the people who’s loved ones are in recovery are those with the families that have shown ‘tough love’ and have hit their ‘rock bottom’

Again i’m so sorry you are going through this, it is so so tough. I really hope you can get some more help with this.

Best wishes,

Natalie

[tjpp]

Natalie

Many thanks for taking the time to respond. Your words ring true with both my mum and I – but taking that step to make him “homeless” is so difficult. We worry about suicide, bringing on an early demise etc etc. But I recognise the honesty in your advice and my mum and I will undoubtedly chat this all through. Did you find value in challenging your dads behaviour – either in your dad changing what he was doing or in you feeling “at least you tried”?

[natalie130]

I totally understand that, it took me a long time to get to that place and I felt like the worst person in the world doing it when I had to take him to the salvation army. The whole thing of “how can I do this to my Dad, I literally have a roof he could live under” but from doing a lot of work on myself and with the support group I had got to a place where I knew that he would not get better if I then took him in and the pros of making him ‘homeless’ outweighed the cons.

For me I have stopped challenging his behaviour as it just leads to arguments as he will always lie and deny it as he unfortunately doesn’t want to get better. However at the start you need to do that to be able to get to a place where you can feel like there is nothing else I can do, it’s up to him to get better etc. etc. (I hope that all makes sense!?)

In one of our support group sessions we had a talk from a man who has been clean from drugs for 4 years now and he said something that really made me think. He said nothing was enough for him to stop, not even the birth of his new daughter, she wasn’t enough. He had to get to the place himself, which did help me as I would always get the feeling of “how can he not do this for us”. The same man also said though he had to get to his rock bottom though for that to happen.

I completely understand your worry about your brother taking his own life though etc. and there is so much guilt for us on this side of it all with everything involved with the loved one with addiction. What I will say though, and I don’t want this to sound heartless or awful but your brother is already killing himself by doing this.

I really think it would be good for you and your mum to speak to someone for support if you haven’t already. I didn’t start coping with it properly until then.

Another thing I have done since joining the group is I learnt properly about boundaries (and making sure they are boundaries I will stick to) for instance if I turn up to my Nana’s and my dad is drunk, I now just leave. Rather than challenging him and asking him if he’s drunk etc. I just leave. he knows that is something I now do so he can’t question it.

I have recently got some workbooks which I am also finding helpful by SMART recovery. They are called “Uk SMART recovery. Family and Friends Handbook” and also “SMART Recovery Handbook” (that one is for the addict) they are a very good charity.

Sorry I feel like that’s all a bit of a ramble, I hope it makes sense

[tjpp]

Thanks Natalie – for the the help. Your insight has reshaped our thinking and as a family we are mulling over what comes next.

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