Hello MOF, I have a 48 year old addicted son, who has spend years in this kind of living. He is currently in jail serving his 2nd term for manufacturing meth. He has lost all his teeth, his family, his job and his drivers license. Not to mention what his mind is now. I just visited him for the first time and was pleasantly surprised, not only at his demeanor, but the prison was a nice clean place (at least what I saw) and the visit was handled quickly and all staff was respectful. I have spent years dealing with how to handle matters. Long ago, when he was in the early years of addiction and married, he would spend all his money on drugs, then his small children had no food so I would pay him to mow my yard, my mother would pay him to do hers and that is how we kept the kids fed. Then I joined an online group for family members of addicted people and realized that the money I gave him was only enabling him to continue affording drugs so I stopped. He was on the run from the police for a year before he was arrested because he was making meth in the basement of his grandmothers house with his addicted girlfriend and the house caught fire due to an explosion and she was badly burned. He ran and for a year he hid. He is now doing his prison sentence and I told him recently that I would no longer visit him in prison, feed him or take his calls if he doesn't get clean this time. I know it is hard to draw lines, I have had many bad days trying to know what to do and what is right and what may be wrong. I am at the point that I will give compassionate love to my children, but if they use, or do not put an effort into making their own lives work, I am not an option to them. And I do expect that when they are in my home that they behave in a manner that is respectful. I don't have to put up with lazy people who won't work, I don't have to support them and put up with them having no respect. I have days when I agonize and days like today when I don't , but through this forum I am getting stronger and feel that I have to help myself at this point. During my son's year of hiding, I would not let him come to the house and it killed me to do that. He was living in a shed and it was below zero. But I also knew that he was still making drugs and was not ready to change and the effect it could have on me would have been devastating if he was in my house with drugs or his druggies wanted to hurt him, and he was at my home so I stuck to my guns as I did not feel safe, as long as he was into drugs. So MOF I understand where you are and how hard defining your boundaries are, it is a killer to have to do so with your children, we did not want it this way. Hang in there!!
I'm sad for him. He hasn't called or contacted us. I'm not sure how to feel.
