I just need prayer!

[Suz]

(And you would be surprised how different our advice to each other, here on the site, is from the things we heard in therapist's offices or at treatment centers.)

I did not have this experience.

The longer I am here and the more stories I hear, the luckier I feel about the support system ex and I had when Rob was at his worst.

His therapists (in his treatment center and out) and his Probation Officer and the Behavior Specialist we had when he was on wraparound services, ALL supported the "detach" theory that we talk about here in PE.

Suz

 

[standswithcourage]

Suz - what is wraparound services? I just wondered. I am going crazy. My son is here for a day or so. he is claimiing I wont help him get suboxone. I told him to get it himself. He is wanting to stay at our house - we said no. I just wish there was somewhere else for him to stay. I know I am diong the wrong thing but that is why I come here! thanks

 

[rejectedmom]

Stands, I have nothing to add but did want to send my support. -RM

 

[Suz]

Because of Rob's psychiatric and emotional issues, he qualified for Medical Assistance when he was a juvenile. Wraparound was a special program that brought therapeutic services to our home and/or his school.

I have no idea if there are similar adult programs.

My son is here for a day or so.... He is wanting to stay at our house - we said no.

Am I reading this right? You told him no when he said he wanted to stay at your house but you let him come anyway?


Suz

 

[susiestar]

Susan,

I am sorry you seem to be in the same situation still. If you told your son he couldn't stay with you, and he is sleeping in your home, what message are you sending?

That you don't mean anything you say?

YOU don't have to go to drug classes. So don't drive him. Let him find rides with others. Let him call his PO and say "I don't have a ride. Please help me."

Because if he really WANTS to do this, he will. And if he doesn't really WANT this, all your actions just help him keep on using.

Let HIM figure out where to stay if his situation is a bad one.

Let HIM figure things out, do what he needs to, deal with things.

You talk a lot about him having problems with his "nerves". The BEST way to cope with this is to detox from all the things he is using. It is not fun. It is ugly and scary.

But THAT is the ONLY real way to deal with his "nerves".

Please make him get up and leave. If he won't leave on his own, call the police. If you let him stay then he will talk you into more, and more, and more.

Stop NOW before you go down the slippery slope of more enabling his drug use.

Love him enough to make him be a MAN, not your son, not a boy, but a MAN who has to make it on his own.

Turn your energies to your other children, your work, your husband, and hobbies. Find ways to fill your days so that you CANNOT drive him around, etc....

 

[Hound dog]

Stands, if he needs suboxone, he can go to county mental health. He can tell the psychiatrist he is an addict and wants treatment to get clean. Odd's are the psychiatrist with give him a script if he thinks difficult child is serious. I know because my best friend just did it after nearing bankrupting her mother who was trying to "help" her.

My K is facing homelessness soon if she can't figure a way out of the situation. All of my Mom instincts want me to bring her here. My grandchildren, thru no fault of their own, will be living on the street if she can't manage her way out of the situation. She may even lose custody of them to CPS if she doesn't get it together.

The only help I am giving them is all the support I can muster and all the resources I, and others here on the board, can think of. I'm not doing it to punish them. And I'm certainly not doing it because I don't love them. It's because K and her husband need to get this adult responsiblity thing down once and for all.

Nine years ago I helped K. I brought her and Kayla to live with us because they were homeless. I set her up in GED classes, babysat while she went, cheered her on, watched her get her diploma. Got it arranged for college, helped her get that first apartment, car, on and on. And she threw it all away and went back to MO with her now husband, knowing that there was nothing there but what had been before, living hand to mouth with always the threat of being homeless hanging over their heads.

Now that she's almost 30 I know from talking with her that she's fed up with that existence. She may love her husband, but I think she "outgrew" him. He is like having another child. And now she has not one, but 3 kids and a serious illness to consider.....and she's feeling trapped. She regrets deeply that decision she made all those years ago.

And I still can't help her. Because she has to learn that if she wants her situaton to improve she has to be the one, sick or well, to take the bull by the horns and do the steps it takes to make the improvements.

You know what? I've been waiting months for her to tell me she had the welfare insurance. Suddenly, she has it. I'd been pushing her to go to HUD housing for months......suddenly she's on it. Why? Because she has no other choice. There is no one but her.

And so I lavish her with praise and let her know I knew she could do it. It's sort of like when you teach your kid to ride a bike. You don't ride the bike for them, that would be stupid. They have to ride the bike while you support them, cheer them on, then jump up and down for joy when they manage to do it on their own.

All the while I pray my heart out and I worry. Cuz I'm a Mom and I'm human.

You can do it too, Stands.

Hugs

 

[standswithcourage]

So it is so physically draining for me to do that on my own. I feel like every time I need my husband he is not there - I know I should be strong enough to take him to the mission and drop him off but for some reason I am not - I got in another shouting match this morning with him about not staying here - my husband is coming home today and he is not happy that my son is still there - i told my son to come up with a plan of somewhere to go - he will not go to the facility that has everything because it is too rigid I am sure - i just know it is harder for me to be around him - i just need my husband and me and my son to sit down and have a come to Jesus talk - maybe then he would chose to leave because our rules are going to be too hard for him - I dont mean to be a weeny and I am not I just get caught in this chaos and am trying to get outl.;

 

[Suz]

Susan, it was your decision to let your son come home, not your husband's decision, or your other childrens'.

If you don't like the end result of your decision, you have 2 ways to go: (1) live with your decision without complaint or blaming others, or (2) make another decision.

Your choice.

Suz

 

[standswithcourage]

True Suz. you are exactly right. My husband came home and said he could stay one more night and that is it. Please pray we stand firm even though we have wavered. I think I am a work in progress and make mistakes more than right decisions. I pray I make more right decisions for our family.

 

[ScentofCedar]

We just all do the best we know, Stands. For us, the turning point came when (thanks in large part to this site) we came to understand the part drug use was playing in what was happening to all of us. Anything we do to help an actively using addict services the addiction, enabling it to get a deeper hold on our children. It isn't that any of us wants to turn the kids away. One day, we learn to hear the addiction boiling away under the skins of our children, stealing them from us and, more importantly, from themselves.

There is no right or easy or comfortable answer. What is happening to all of us is a wasteful, tragic loss ~ the loss of our children's potential, the loss of our dreams for them and of their dreams for themselves.

I am sorry this is happening to you, and to your son and your family.

Barbara