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Is there no hope?
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<blockquote data-quote="recoveringenabler" data-source="post: 697214" data-attributes="member: 13542"><p>Welcome. I'm so sorry for your struggles with your son. It's heartbreaking to watch our kids go off the rails.</p><p></p><p>For every one of us here, detaching from our kids has been the most difficult thing any of us had to do. None of us approach detaching as an option for quite some time, usually not until we've run the gamut of having done every possible thing to help our kids and finally realize, nothing helped. It's a long road. It's painful. Most of us seek professional help, a therapist, a counselor, a support group, NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness- you can look online for their chapters, they have wonderful support groups for parents), 12 step groups, wherever we can find support to do the unthinkable, to step back and allow our kids to orchestrate their own lives. We don't give up hope, there is no finality, we give up enabling. There is quite a large distinction there. </p><p></p><p>What we usually come to is that even though these are our precious children, we cannot control their choices, we cannot stop them from harming themselves, we cannot do much of anything to halt their decline.......a very powerless and painful realization. That is when we begin to understand that our helping, our continual support of their negative choices has produced no results and in fact, made us crazy, filled with fear, grief, anger, resentment and unrelenting pain. At that point, many of us choose to learn how to step back and begin learning how to accept what we cannot change........no one desires this, no one relishes this, we land there because we've literally run out of options.</p><p></p><p>My suggestion to you is to get yourself support. Provide your son with resources if that feels right, offer him options to get the help he needs, other than that, there is little you can do to help, he is a 32 year old adult man, he can choose however he wants to live and unfortunately, there isn't much you can do. I know how powerless that is. I have a 43 year old daughter who went off the rails for many years and nothing that I did made any difference at all. Interestingly, when I began detaching and stepping back, she began to change. That is not always the case, but it happens often. We as parents believe that we have the power and the love to change our kids, but the sad truth is, we don't. Only they can change, only they can make a difference in their lives. And, when/if they do, it will mean a lot to them that they managed it on their own.</p><p></p><p>It may help to read the article at the bottom of my post here on detachment. It may help to read the book Codependent no more by Melodie Beatty. It will surely help you to continue to post here, we really know how you feel and how much this hurts. You're not alone. We understand. I'm glad you're here.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="recoveringenabler, post: 697214, member: 13542"] Welcome. I'm so sorry for your struggles with your son. It's heartbreaking to watch our kids go off the rails. For every one of us here, detaching from our kids has been the most difficult thing any of us had to do. None of us approach detaching as an option for quite some time, usually not until we've run the gamut of having done every possible thing to help our kids and finally realize, nothing helped. It's a long road. It's painful. Most of us seek professional help, a therapist, a counselor, a support group, NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness- you can look online for their chapters, they have wonderful support groups for parents), 12 step groups, wherever we can find support to do the unthinkable, to step back and allow our kids to orchestrate their own lives. We don't give up hope, there is no finality, we give up enabling. There is quite a large distinction there. What we usually come to is that even though these are our precious children, we cannot control their choices, we cannot stop them from harming themselves, we cannot do much of anything to halt their decline.......a very powerless and painful realization. That is when we begin to understand that our helping, our continual support of their negative choices has produced no results and in fact, made us crazy, filled with fear, grief, anger, resentment and unrelenting pain. At that point, many of us choose to learn how to step back and begin learning how to accept what we cannot change........no one desires this, no one relishes this, we land there because we've literally run out of options. My suggestion to you is to get yourself support. Provide your son with resources if that feels right, offer him options to get the help he needs, other than that, there is little you can do to help, he is a 32 year old adult man, he can choose however he wants to live and unfortunately, there isn't much you can do. I know how powerless that is. I have a 43 year old daughter who went off the rails for many years and nothing that I did made any difference at all. Interestingly, when I began detaching and stepping back, she began to change. That is not always the case, but it happens often. We as parents believe that we have the power and the love to change our kids, but the sad truth is, we don't. Only they can change, only they can make a difference in their lives. And, when/if they do, it will mean a lot to them that they managed it on their own. It may help to read the article at the bottom of my post here on detachment. It may help to read the book Codependent no more by Melodie Beatty. It will surely help you to continue to post here, we really know how you feel and how much this hurts. You're not alone. We understand. I'm glad you're here. [/QUOTE]
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