[helenjh]

If you have never found yourself in the unfortunate circumstances of loving an addict then I do not expect you to understand how I feel – some choose to judge yet have no experience of what we have been through but believe they could have done better

For those starting their journey of watching a loved one with an addiction my heart breaks for I know the pain they will endure

Loving an addict consumes you every day!
Watching the person whom you love physically deteriorate and emotionally detach themselves from everybody and everything exhausts you in ways you never imagined possible
If you watch the person you love and adore disappear in front of your own eyes for long enough – you start to dissolve too!

I wonder how normal people would feel if they woke up every day wondering if today was going to be the day their child would die…..they have no idea they don’t understand how that feels and worse than that they have no idea how lucky they are to not know or understand!
Loving an addict means I fear a late night knock on the door or the phone ringing every day!

Addiction is an illness – it is not caused by somebody else it does not discriminate it does not care if you come from a loving home or a broken one – addiction is caused by a lapse in judgement by the addict that alters the course of not only their life but everybody in their life

If you’re lucky they will recover if you’re really lucky they’ll recover and still be there for you as you have been there for them

You learn to hate the demons but still love the addict – you learn to separate who they were with who they are – it’s not the person who steals it’s the addict, it’s not the person who screams obscenities at their family it’s the addict and it’s not the person who lies it’s the addict but all too often the addiction wins and the person dies

The journey of watching your child become an addict is a terrible one from which my wounds are deep and open! The pain caused when facing decisions to try and get help, begging for help but nobody listening, then to rehab, incarceration and removing them from the family home is indescribable and unimaginable for anybody who has not been through it!

I raised my children the same way loved them the same way and yet somewhere along the way he made the decision to go down this road – I can only support him when ever possible and encourage him to make better decisions – nobody loves my addict like I do but I do know now after years of trying that I cannot fix this nobody can except him

For me life will never be the same again ….as a young boy he played games with his brother learnt to ride a bike without stabilisers loved dressing up as a cowboy and playing Cowboys and Indians with his brother …. When I see him now I mourn the loss of my beautiful boy – somewhere along the way I lost him – those that are lost sometimes find their way back but most don’t! I do not grieve this loss for it will not help him nor me! An addict does not live in the past or the future they live in the here and now!

Through all the years and all the pain and heartache I have learnt to accept these things – I fought hard to save him and I lost and nobody knows how crushing that is – to feel like you failed like you didn’t protect them you couldn’t protect them that there was nothing you could do to stop it – you were powerless

I have learnt to accept that I did everything I could but there was nothing I could do to change the path he chose and continues to choose! This has enabled me to focus on helping him when and where I can but also make sure I give the best to the rest of our family!

I do not hate or resent my child for putting himself and all of us through this pain – I do hate the things he does I hate the lying the stealing and the using but I love him very much – I have just found a way to separate the two!

My child is an addict it’s an illness the worst kind that means I cannot hope for his future I can only hope for one day at a time that I don’t get that dreaded phone call or knock on the door …. People who have never loved an addict usually fall into those who think you didn’t try hard enough to save the
Addict and those who don’t know why your still trying …..do not expect these people to understand only people who have experience of loving an addict would!!

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