Stress Bunny
Active Member
Hello, everyone. I have been posting on the Parent Emeritus board lately, however, my oldest difficult child seems to be heading down the substance abuse path as well. I thought I would post here about that.
JT is 20 years old now. We adopted him out of foster care (neglect case), and he's been with us since age 2. JT's bio mom was somewhat lower functioning and could not seem to keep her act together in terms of living situations and conditions and proper childcare. She would often leave her very young children home alone, and she often left town with the carnival for months at a time. Ultimately, she abandoned her boys after refusing to take the necessary steps to get them back. I know she was a smoker, and she probably had an alcohol problem as well.
JT was a smart, outgoing, funny, and engaging character. But he was also very stubborn and had severe ADHD and oppositional behavior. Our family loved him dearly and treated him great. He has been surrounded by love and attention his entire life since the adoption. We have given him an upper middle class lifestyle, a deep extended family that loved him so much, a Christian community, two parents married for almost 23 years, support, and understanding. We never drank or had alcohol in the house, and we never abused substances. We always raised him to know the dangers of drug abuse. I could never have imagined this is where we would be all these years later.
Since leaving for college two years ago, JT has managed to flunk out of college, lose multiple jobs, get into accidents requiring surgery, draw on worker's comp several times, get charged with underage drinking and distributing alcohol to minors, get kicked out of our home after refusing to follow rules related to inappropriate use of our technology (watching porn), cigarettes, guns, and knives. He's had many short-term relationships with girlfriends that he tries to get serious with very soon. In fact, two weeks ago, he was supposedly the father of a baby to be born to a girlfriend of his, but then learned she wasn't pregnant. Just days later, he asked a different girl to marry him. So now he is "engaged", and we are supposed to be so happy for him, I guess.
Worse than even all of this is his attitude. JT is extremely narcissistic and fails to take any responsibility for his behavior and choices. He is argumentative and rude. He LIES non-stop! JT mocks us and has never respected us. We have learned never to try to help him by talking to him because he is all the more likely to do the exact opposite thing.
After a number of the accidents, JT was prescribed pain medication, and I believe he was abusing it. Whenever I spoke with him, I begged him not to take more than needed to control the pain and not to mix it with alcohol, etc., but that was a mistake on my part. I revealed a worry of mine, and after that, JT loved to call me and tell me how he was taking so many pills.
Two months ago, JT was jailed for distributing alcohol to minors and underage drinking himself. Unfortunately, we bailed him out because we didn't want him to lose his job. He did pay us back immediately. No consequence has succeeded in impacting him to modify his behavior.
I forgot to mention that JT is also sociopathic. He manipulates and uses people all the time and seems to lack a normal conscience. He is a chameleon, playing whatever role suits his self-interest. At times, I even think he enjoys hurting us.
After having a reasonably okay/neutral visit yesterday, which by the way, happened most likely due to the fact that he wants us to support (pay) for his upcoming wedding, he texted me at midnight last night, "I'm drunk". He loves to send me one-line text message zingers, to which I do not respond. We are doing well at disengaging and not enabling.
I am struggling greatly with depression over all of this, as well as extreme grief for the hopes and dreams we had for JT. We have lost him, or as husband says, maybe we never had him in the first place. husband has attended a number of Al-anon meetings, but he is disappointed that there is no advice given at the meetings. Advice is not allowed. We feel isolated, hurt, and hopeless. We watched America's Got Talent last night, and one of the participants was a young man who was so thankful for being adopted out of foster care at 5 years of age. Contrasting that with JT's attitude was very painful. husband is very angry, and I am just distraught.
We are not naive, and we know that JT is well onto the substance abuse path now. Any help or support would be greatly appreciated.
JT is 20 years old now. We adopted him out of foster care (neglect case), and he's been with us since age 2. JT's bio mom was somewhat lower functioning and could not seem to keep her act together in terms of living situations and conditions and proper childcare. She would often leave her very young children home alone, and she often left town with the carnival for months at a time. Ultimately, she abandoned her boys after refusing to take the necessary steps to get them back. I know she was a smoker, and she probably had an alcohol problem as well.
JT was a smart, outgoing, funny, and engaging character. But he was also very stubborn and had severe ADHD and oppositional behavior. Our family loved him dearly and treated him great. He has been surrounded by love and attention his entire life since the adoption. We have given him an upper middle class lifestyle, a deep extended family that loved him so much, a Christian community, two parents married for almost 23 years, support, and understanding. We never drank or had alcohol in the house, and we never abused substances. We always raised him to know the dangers of drug abuse. I could never have imagined this is where we would be all these years later.
Since leaving for college two years ago, JT has managed to flunk out of college, lose multiple jobs, get into accidents requiring surgery, draw on worker's comp several times, get charged with underage drinking and distributing alcohol to minors, get kicked out of our home after refusing to follow rules related to inappropriate use of our technology (watching porn), cigarettes, guns, and knives. He's had many short-term relationships with girlfriends that he tries to get serious with very soon. In fact, two weeks ago, he was supposedly the father of a baby to be born to a girlfriend of his, but then learned she wasn't pregnant. Just days later, he asked a different girl to marry him. So now he is "engaged", and we are supposed to be so happy for him, I guess.
Worse than even all of this is his attitude. JT is extremely narcissistic and fails to take any responsibility for his behavior and choices. He is argumentative and rude. He LIES non-stop! JT mocks us and has never respected us. We have learned never to try to help him by talking to him because he is all the more likely to do the exact opposite thing.
After a number of the accidents, JT was prescribed pain medication, and I believe he was abusing it. Whenever I spoke with him, I begged him not to take more than needed to control the pain and not to mix it with alcohol, etc., but that was a mistake on my part. I revealed a worry of mine, and after that, JT loved to call me and tell me how he was taking so many pills.
Two months ago, JT was jailed for distributing alcohol to minors and underage drinking himself. Unfortunately, we bailed him out because we didn't want him to lose his job. He did pay us back immediately. No consequence has succeeded in impacting him to modify his behavior.
I forgot to mention that JT is also sociopathic. He manipulates and uses people all the time and seems to lack a normal conscience. He is a chameleon, playing whatever role suits his self-interest. At times, I even think he enjoys hurting us.
After having a reasonably okay/neutral visit yesterday, which by the way, happened most likely due to the fact that he wants us to support (pay) for his upcoming wedding, he texted me at midnight last night, "I'm drunk". He loves to send me one-line text message zingers, to which I do not respond. We are doing well at disengaging and not enabling.
I am struggling greatly with depression over all of this, as well as extreme grief for the hopes and dreams we had for JT. We have lost him, or as husband says, maybe we never had him in the first place. husband has attended a number of Al-anon meetings, but he is disappointed that there is no advice given at the meetings. Advice is not allowed. We feel isolated, hurt, and hopeless. We watched America's Got Talent last night, and one of the participants was a young man who was so thankful for being adopted out of foster care at 5 years of age. Contrasting that with JT's attitude was very painful. husband is very angry, and I am just distraught.
We are not naive, and we know that JT is well onto the substance abuse path now. Any help or support would be greatly appreciated.