This hit home. I'm

daku on TikTok not sure if you all can access tiktok but this hit hard this morning. Having a rough day. I feel like every time my son calls, if I don't answer the phone, then something really bad's going to happen to him. My life has become a jail to his life and he won't make the right choices or can't make the right choices. It is mental health and drug abuse. I think the drug piece is more serious than I thought and his mental health just keeps going down and he won't get help. He is still in Florida and I feel like driving there putting him like in my car and saving him. It is killing me inside. 😓
 

Not Unique

New Member
daku on TikTok not sure if you all can access tiktok but this hit hard this morning. Having a rough day. I feel like every time my son calls, if I don't answer the phone, then something really bad's going to happen to him. My life has become a jail to his life and he won't make the right choices or can't make the right choices. It is mental health and drug abuse. I think the drug piece is more serious than I thought and his mental health just keeps going down and he won't get help. He is still in Florida and I feel like driving there putting him like in my car and saving him. It is killing me inside. 😓
Hi brokeninside: I so get everything you’re feeling and thinking right now. I am actually on a nice getaway with my husband. I am sitting here poolside with 84° weather and staring at the beautiful ocean. I am also wondering where my son is, who is somewhere far across the country right now, and what he is doing. He called us two days ago for money again. His throat was so raw and his speech so rapid that I knew he was manic and using crystal meth. He just got out of the psychiatric unit the third time since he’s been out of jail two weeks ago. I have no words for the pain that I feel . I do know that I did not cause this on a cerebral level. As a mother, my heart thinks what did I do to cause this. Those feelings fight each other almost every waking moment. I have to remind myself that I never woke up in the morning and said what can I do to make my son mentally ill, Drug addicted, and homeless. I did do the best I could with what I had. And the truth is he led a very blessed life until he was first diagnosed at 17 with bipolar one/schizo affective disorder. He has since been diagnosed with borderline personality disorder, as well. So when he is medication compliant, he’s still incredibly difficult to deal with. Letting him go and letting God is not just the easier, softer way, it is the only way that I can cope. If I drove out there to save him, I would be doing harm to me and not helping him at all. My reality tells me this is the truth after over a decade of trying this again and again. My heart is definitely with you right now.
 
Hi brokeninside: I so get everything you’re feeling and thinking right now. I am actually on a nice getaway with my husband. I am sitting here poolside with 84° weather and staring at the beautiful ocean. I am also wondering where my son is, who is somewhere far across the country right now, and what he is doing. He called us two days ago for money again. His throat was so raw and his speech so rapid that I knew he was manic and using crystal meth. He just got out of the psychiatric unit the third time since he’s been out of jail two weeks ago. I have no words for the pain that I feel . I do know that I did not cause this on a cerebral level. As a mother, my heart thinks what did I do to cause this. Those feelings fight each other almost every waking moment. I have to remind myself that I never woke up in the morning and said what can I do to make my son mentally ill, Drug addicted, and homeless. I did do the best I could with what I had. And the truth is he led a very blessed life until he was first diagnosed at 17 with bipolar one/schizo affective disorder. He has since been diagnosed with borderline personality disorder, as well. So when he is medication compliant, he’s still incredibly difficult to deal with. Letting him go and letting God is not just the easier, softer way, it is the only way that I can cope. If I drove out there to save him, I would be doing harm to me and not helping him at all. My reality tells me this is the truth after over a decade of trying this again and again. My heart is definitely with you right now.
Thank you for responding 💕 I am so conflicted and confused. I keep thinking I can fix this but I keep banging my head against the wall. Then I detach and I think I form some sort of amnesia as a little time passes and I get that belief that I can fix this, that I could just get him back on the right path. Like you, I believe my son has a dual diagnosis with both drugs and mental illness. I feel like the drugs caused his mental issues and the pandemic worsened it.
I am glad that you are having some self care and the distance does help give you perspective. We just had a getaway where I was completely offline. I have a tiny hope inside that, while I was away, he would make some progress on doing things for himself. I did my best to detach, redirect thoughts, focus on my marriage. A few days back and I am just sucked back into the hell. While I want to run down there and bring him back home and take care of him, I keep reminding myself that the last time that I did that, I regretted it. I also have a 17 yo daughter that doesn't deserve any of this or her safety or her parents safety being put at risk. 😢 I keep pushing myself for her. It is so difficult bc we are surrounded by so many affluent, "perfect" families around us that I really have to dig deep to get through some of these events.It helps reading stories of moms like you that have hindsight that want to help moms like me. It is a puzzle with a million broken pieces. Please take the day to let the sun shine on your skin and have a beverage for all of us ❤️ we all deserve some time of peace.
 

Fairy dust

Member
Hi.
I am so sorry that you are in so much pain. You need to walk the path that you feel comfortable with. After a decade and a half of trying to fix my son who has mental health and drug issues I finally realized that I had to love myself enough to let him go. All the money, spaces to live, rescuing him from his poor choices didn’t fix anything. so many things were broken, and at my very bottom I had to stand up and put the pieces of me together again. It took therapy, prayer, lots of reading, self care to see that I had become an enabler as well. I must have read the article on detachment a hundred times. You cannot fix him. He has to want to fix himself. Interestingly enough, when I was finally able to step back and let go of his responsibility, things started to change. Baby steps for sure but he is taking responsibility for his life, making better decisions , lives independently. Our relationship has changed. I have set strong boundaries and there are times I still hurt. But I also recognize that I will not be here forever and his life is what he makes it to be. I will always be in the background to support him, but he makes his own decisions. Some are not what I had envisioned but it is what it is. Love yourself enough to let him go. Otherwise this will destroy you and your remaining family. Sending hugs and love!
 
Hi.
I am so sorry that you are in so much pain. You need to walk the path that you feel comfortable with. After a decade and a half of trying to fix my son who has mental health and drug issues I finally realized that I had to love myself enough to let him go. All the money, spaces to live, rescuing him from his poor choices didn’t fix anything. so many things were broken, and at my very bottom I had to stand up and put the pieces of me together again. It took therapy, prayer, lots of reading, self care to see that I had become an enabler as well. I must have read the article on detachment a hundred times. You cannot fix him. He has to want to fix himself. Interestingly enough, when I was finally able to step back and let go of his responsibility, things started to change. Baby steps for sure but he is taking responsibility for his life, making better decisions , lives independently. Our relationship has changed. I have set strong boundaries and there are times I still hurt. But I also recognize that I will not be here forever and his life is what he makes it to be. I will always be in the background to support him, but he makes his own decisions. Some are not what I had envisioned but it is what it is. Love yourself enough to let him go. Otherwise this will destroy you and your remaining family. Sending hugs and love!
So well said ❤️ Thank you for the stength ❤️
 

BusynMember

Well-Known Member
Hi. I want to explain to you that you are doing something called catastrophic thinking or anxiety caused by jumping to the worst case scenario, way before you know what will happen. I had therapy especially to stop doing this and I learned, with practice, how to come to more normal conclusions and to be far more at peace. I will try to explain my favorite way of controlling it...

This a common catastrophic thought that I used to have even when I knew Kay had obtained ssdi, a food card, Medicare and Medicaid. Now Kay is homeless on the opposite side of the country, living with her abusive husband in an old dilapidated motorhome. He works part time at a pizza place. She has never worked.

My catastrophic thinking drove me crazy. It went like this:

"Kay is going g to die. I just know it. I may as well start grieving so that maybe it will be easier when it happens. But I can't take it! If she dies, how can I still live? So both of us will die and my family will then have to grieve me too...." yada, yada, Yada in circles as the panic turns to terror. I can barely swallow. My breathing is very fast. I feel dizzy and sick due to my body being in fight or flight mode.

Ok. My therapist told me that when I get a catastrophic thought such as "Kay will die" to write down the thought and all the feelings that follow it. My feelings were fear, grief, terror, horror, desperation (I am copying from my journal.

After I get that out I am supposed to logically write down how likely this is to happen. Right after all those thoughts I wrote...."it will. I believe this 100%." I was supposed to put down how much I believed it would happen.

Now I had to write evidence that Kay will definitely die and I found myself calming down and arguing with myself. I wrote "Actually Kay has shown she can get her needs met and can buy food and get medical help plus she gets a monthly check. Her FB posts are angry but she doesn't talk about not feeling well and suicide rarely comes up. Kay has been doing this for several years already. She is alive. Also one day she could get clean and start getting help and working....there is no evidence to think that she will, but it is a possibility. If not her, maybe Lee will finally get a better job. She COULD survive. She has all this tome." After my writing back to my terror, my belief that Kay will die dropped to 30% and I was much better until the next catastrophic thought, whenever I had one. I did rinse repeat of this evidence based CBT method of using my rational mind. Eventually, by practicing this, my catastrophic thinking was much more controllable. I could talk back to it with reality and logic!

Anything in our mind that predicts the future ("what if" thoughts are the worst) can lead to catastrophic thinking.

Youtube has videos about stopping catastrophic thinking too. I use them! There are a ton!

I hope this helped. That choking panic while alwYs jumping to the worst case scenario can cripple us. But this anxiety problem IS treatable. Lots of tools to work with on youtube. Put in "Stop catastrophizing" and videos will come up


Love and hugs.
 
Hi. I want to explain to you that you are doing something called catastrophic thinking or anxiety caused by jumping to the worst case scenario, way before you know what will happen. I had therapy especially to stop doing this and I learned, with practice, how to come to more normal conclusions and to be far more at peace. I will try to explain my favorite way of controlling it...

This a common catastrophic thought that I used to have even when I knew Kay had obtained ssdi, a food card, Medicare and Medicaid. Now Kay is homeless on the opposite side of the country, living with her abusive husband in an old dilapidated motorhome. He works part time at a pizza place. She has never worked.

My catastrophic thinking drove me crazy. It went like this:

"Kay is going g to die. I just know it. I may as well start grieving so that maybe it will be easier when it happens. But I can't take it! If she dies, how can I still live? So both of us will die and my family will then have to grieve me too...." yada, yada, Yada in circles as the panic turns to terror. I can barely swallow. My breathing is very fast. I feel dizzy and sick due to my body being in fight or flight mode.

Ok. My therapist told me that when I get a catastrophic thought such as "Kay will die" to write down the thought and all the feelings that follow it. My feelings were fear, grief, terror, horror, desperation (I am copying from my journal.

After I get that out I am supposed to logically write down how likely this is to happen. Right after all those thoughts I wrote...."it will. I believe this 100%." I was supposed to put down how much I believed it would happen.

Now I had to write evidence that Kay will definitely die and I found myself calming down and arguing with myself. I wrote "Actually Kay has shown she can get her needs met and can buy food and get medical help plus she gets a monthly check. Her FB posts are angry but she doesn't talk about not feeling well and suicide rarely comes up. Kay has been doing this for several years already. She is alive. Also one day she could get clean and start getting help and working....there is no evidence to think that she will, but it is a possibility. If not her, maybe Lee will finally get a better job. She COULD survive. She has all this tome." After my writing back to my terror, my belief that Kay will die dropped to 30% and I was much better until the next catastrophic thought, whenever I had one. I did rinse repeat of this evidence based CBT method of using my rational mind. Eventually, by practicing this, my catastrophic thinking was much more controllable. I could talk back to it with reality and logic!

Anything in our mind that predicts the future ("what if" thoughts are the worst) can lead to catastrophic thinking.

Youtube has videos about stopping catastrophic thinking too. I use them! There are a ton!

I hope this helped. That choking panic while alwYs jumping to the worst case scenario can cripple us. But this anxiety problem IS treatable. Lots of tools to work with on youtube. Put in "Stop catastrophizing" and videos will come up


Love and hugs.
Thank you, Busy. I will use these tools and Google some videos. I appreciate the information. I'm still in disbelief that I am on this journey. Thank you!!
 
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