Posted on 07/18/2016 6:54:26 PM PDT by WhoisAlanGreenspan?
Looking for some comments and any advice.
I lost my only son to this horrible addiction to heroin just a few months ago. 4/2/16 Now I've been contacted by a nephew (in-law) who shares the same problems.
I want to help him if I can.
The thought I had was in addition to gathering his papers from another location, driving him with those papers to the Secretary of State office and paying for the new ID, that he needs to get a (for sure) new job. I would also give him a five dollar bill. And tell him he is to hold that same bill if he ever wants me to help him again.
The thinking is that an addict spends everything he has on getting high, but if he can maintain some self control by saving the five bucks in his pocket I loaned him, I'll talk with him and continue trying to help.
A) He will only accept help if he is ready
B) Never give him money, feed him, clothe him, etc.
C) Get him into Rehab and Narcotics Anonymous
Hello...what?!
Sorry, wish there was an edit function...
B) Never give him money, only feed him, clothe him, etc.
“only” was missing.
If you give an addict money, he is going to spend it on his addiction.
That is the only thing that matters to an addict. If he doesn’t dose, he is going to get very sick, and that consequence trumps all other consequences.
The truth of the matter is that he is the only one who can help himself. No one else can, except for God, and the way that God can help him is to give him the strength to help himself.
He has to love himself enough and love his life enough to muster the strength and will unlock the chains he wound around himself. He must then walk away from the chains and never look back, or he will return to them and bind himself in them again.
And that is very serious for heroin users, because what often happens is that after X amount of time sober, they may fall back just once, and give themselves the dose that they remember doing last, and with no tolerance, it kills them.
If he does not love himself and his life enough to release himself from the prison that he built, he will be consumed by his addiction.
You can’t save him, no matter how much you may want to.
Tell him this.
Put him into a sanitarium before he crokes, never give him any thing other than a visit to see how he is doing. If he wants to get free of stupid he will have to do the work himself. You can not do it for him. Two MD shrinks and a judge will get him committed. Then it is up to him. Tough Love.
You are going to love that nephew to death
I am sorry for your loss. It is heart breaking.
The sad truth is most never recover. At some point the natural consequences of all his decisions and actions are his. He will spend that five and much much more before he changes. There is nothing YOU can do. For your own sanity I highly recommend getting into some family support group such as alanon or naranon for your own sanity.
This is not your battle. You have nothing to offer your nephew in the way of experience, strength, or hope. All you can do is muck up what might be his bottom by helping him out.
Shed your tears. Pray for him. Let him walk his own path of pain.
Sorry to hear about your son. Opiates are a very tough addiction to kick if not impossible.
Do what you can for your nephew but DO NOT become his enabler, ever. Codependence is insidious.
He needs to get into treatment and make that decision to do so himself. He needs to experience the consequences of his addiction himself. An addict will look to transfer those consequences on to others at the first opportunity.
You will not love him into treatment.
Do not bring it into your family again. Your responsibility is to them first. You are still mourning the loss of your son and are very vulnerable to someone like this.
I’m speaking from experience.
Best of luck to you.
I dont have any advice. Addiction to heroin is terrible. I’m very sorry for your loss.
Amen to everything he said. Addiction is a real bitch.
Yours is the best advice here.
When you give an Addict something - anything (I’ve even found that an ear is too much) then you are hampering their recovery.
They need to lose everything. And I mean everything. Nothing. Not a stitch of anything. Shirt, pants. Maybe not even socks and shoes.
This is step number 1. Without this, the addiction will win every time.
My ex business partner is living under a bridge in Detroit. No shit. He’s under a bridge. his parents spoke to me recently that they wanted to get him into a program. I advised against it. You see, his stay at the program is “something”. He will do it because it will gain a bit of trust. When he gets out he’ll have another shot to get money from his parents and he’ll use it to buy pills.
He’s not a bad person, he does bad things. Addiction is like that.
But the addiction is not coaxed out of him. It’s not lead out of him. It’s not negotiated and it’s not argued with. In order for this to go away, it needs to be “exorcised”. Look up the meaning of that word. Addiction must be exorcised.
Like Chemo treating cancer. What it does is destroy the body. In it’s whole. To get the pirates off the ship, you sink the ship.
This is your process. God bless the OP for his loss, may you gather the strength and share that strength with those who are dealing with this.
While I was in college, I had a very good friend who was absolutely brilliant in his field of study and a great guy. I watched him in less than a year go from a casual drug user to full blown junkie. Meth, coke, herion and acid.
His family tried to convince him to go into treatment, I tried to convince him to go to treatment, and he refused, he cut all of us out of his life.
At the time, I had an extra room in my house and we secured the room by boarding up the windows, emptying the room and securing the door.
Another friend had a van and we went looking for him one night and found him walking on a street where drugs could be scored.
We grabbed him off the street, tossed him in the van, handcuffed him and tied up his feet.
We took him back to house, placed him in the empty room and let him detox.
He screamed for days, ripped the Sheetrock off the walls.
To feed him we would open the door, shine a spotlight in his face and enter the room. We gave him a bucket to go to the bathroom. He did not always use the bucket.
It took three weeks for him to even talk to use, a week later he agreed to treatment.
Today he is clean, has a family and is an architect with his work in AD.
It worked. We saved his life.
I wish it were possible to lock away addicts for 6 months in comfortable cells. I think that’s the only way to help the addicts who are too weak to break the habit themselves.
Lock them away and let them watch tv and eat good food.
Second he will need an ID, to get help he needs. However if he's not ready to accept help, it will be a waste of time.
For the record, I'm an alcolalic, with six years of being clean and sober and went to a lot of group meetings with opioid addicts.
Not knowing where you are in the State,not sure where you can go to get him help?
Dude. I am a recovered addict. Contact me by Freepmail. We can share phone numbers. There’s a lot you have ZERO clue about. I can shed some light.
That’s how it needs to be done, imo. Once they are detoxed, even if not quite clean, I think most want help.
But they cannot get to that point unless clean.
I did. You have to get enough consequences to want to change, tho.
Allow me to offer a prayer for you and your family.
The name of Jesus is in our hearts because in his name there is peace. We believe in your name, who died on the cross and we in faith receive your endless love and boundless comfort. Please bless this family and their heart who in your sacrifice find themselves fighting pain.
We seek your blessing and guidance. That is all, that is enough.
Yes indeed....I too recovered.
But you and I both know the statistics aren’t good
Consequences can make you sick and tired of being sick and tired
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