Families & Friends Of Addicts Support Group
Addiction affects more than just the individual. This community is dedicated to the families and friends of individuals suffering from any form of addiction. Mental health professionals are increasingly considering alcoholism and addiction as diseases that flourish in and are enabled by family systems. Family members react to the addicted person with particular behavioral...
Hello - I have just joined this group, and I am glad to be here.
I am the mother of a 27-year-old son, who is a recovering alcoholic. He has been sober just about one year now, thank God. He is very good about going to AA meetings, even though he used to resist them, and has been in in-patient rehab a couple of times, but hopefully, those days are over...
My dilemma now is that my husband (I have been unemployed for several years, as my chosen field "disappeared" in the city where I reside - hospital social work) has been supporting my son since 2005, when my mother died, and my son reacted by starting to drink (he lived with her, and was extremely close to her.) Besides the obvious severe financial problems, with my husband supporting two households, (and he is 61 years old), my son has been diagnosed as clinically depressed, and also has a rare learning disability, diagnosed when he was in high school by the Board of Ed...so it is very difficult for him to hold a job or to even keep his apartment clean. For the latter reason, his landlord wants him OUT ASAP, and I am absolutely terrified that he will have to live with us. When he was drinking, he was verbally abusive (although not physically, but the verbal abuse was bad enough) and made our lives a living hell. I have a history of panic disorder and depression, and I feel high anxiety even at the thought of him living with us.
We have completely run out of money, so cannot move him into another apartment (because of having to give the new landlord one month's rent, a security deposit, and the real estate agency gets a fee, etc...plus moving costs...) I cannot imagine living with him again, even though he has changed in his behavior, now that he is sober. We rent ourselves, and lately apartments have been extremely difficult to find,so I am also aware that in taking him in, I may be jeopardizing our lease in our own apartment. I am afraid that I will "cave" to feeling sorry for him, take him in, and then I will go under, or my marriage will suffer as a result.
What does a parent do when the adult child not only has an addiction problem, but also has other problems, such as depression and learning disabilities? I'm unclear about the line between being a caring parent and being co-dependent. I have tried Al-Anon, but it was not helpful to me.
Any suggestions would be welcome...
Janet
I am the mother of a 27-year-old son, who is a recovering alcoholic. He has been sober just about one year now, thank God. He is very good about going to AA meetings, even though he used to resist them, and has been in in-patient rehab a couple of times, but hopefully, those days are over...
My dilemma now is that my husband (I have been unemployed for several years, as my chosen field "disappeared" in the city where I reside - hospital social work) has been supporting my son since 2005, when my mother died, and my son reacted by starting to drink (he lived with her, and was extremely close to her.) Besides the obvious severe financial problems, with my husband supporting two households, (and he is 61 years old), my son has been diagnosed as clinically depressed, and also has a rare learning disability, diagnosed when he was in high school by the Board of Ed...so it is very difficult for him to hold a job or to even keep his apartment clean. For the latter reason, his landlord wants him OUT ASAP, and I am absolutely terrified that he will have to live with us. When he was drinking, he was verbally abusive (although not physically, but the verbal abuse was bad enough) and made our lives a living hell. I have a history of panic disorder and depression, and I feel high anxiety even at the thought of him living with us.
We have completely run out of money, so cannot move him into another apartment (because of having to give the new landlord one month's rent, a security deposit, and the real estate agency gets a fee, etc...plus moving costs...) I cannot imagine living with him again, even though he has changed in his behavior, now that he is sober. We rent ourselves, and lately apartments have been extremely difficult to find,so I am also aware that in taking him in, I may be jeopardizing our lease in our own apartment. I am afraid that I will "cave" to feeling sorry for him, take him in, and then I will go under, or my marriage will suffer as a result.
What does a parent do when the adult child not only has an addiction problem, but also has other problems, such as depression and learning disabilities? I'm unclear about the line between being a caring parent and being co-dependent. I have tried Al-Anon, but it was not helpful to me.
Any suggestions would be welcome...
Janet
Thank you for responding so quickly...
My son made many attempts to get disability or public assistance, but never got these benefits. We live in NYC, and sometimes it is very difficult to get either welfare or disability here. (I don't know how it is in other cities...it could be just as difficult...) I know that once he had finished the public assistance process, and the worker told him he would start receiving a welfare check - but then he returned to finalize the process, and had another worker who told him the first worker was inaccurate in telling him he would get aid. Being a social worker myself, I have interacted with welfare workers, and know that things like this do occur, often.
Right now, we have found an excellent disability center (in fact, he is going there today for another round of testing) - this place has a really good reputation, and claim they will really pinpoint what type of disability he has, and then channel him into a job that he could do successfully - or else start the process for receiving a disability check, based on his depression and learning disability.
It's just that this ia a VERY long process, as they are very backed-up with appointments...and I am worried about what happens if he is forced to leave his apartment prior to finishing this program...
Thank you for your compassion...we have tried various social service agencies, but most of them are geared for the addict who is actively using, and they can't accept a recovered alcoholic in their programs, as insurance won't cover for the services...
Janet
My son does not have a lease with this apartment. His landlord has also been, at some point in time, my landlord, and my mother's landlord (two separate dwellings he owns,) and I think that he has tolerated my son's slovenliness as long as he has because of some kind of sense of loyalty to our family, as we have rented with him for decades. We keep in touch with him often, and we did start an organized cleaning effort with my son last year, but he can't seem to keep up the regimen. So your suggestions are great, but we have already been doing these things. Actually, my son's landlord has been remarkably patient with him, given his alcoholism and his beyond-sloppy apartment.
I do think that our efforts to supervise the cleaning of my son's apartment and our keeping in touch with the landlord did help prolong his stay there. I am hoping these factors will continue to keep my son in that apartment until he can finish up with the disability agency and get his life in some kind of order.
Thank you -
Janet
It is a good idea, and that's why we gave up on the government to offer my son help, and took the advice of another parent of an alcoholic and turned to a private agency. Thank God my son has Medicaid benefits, so the services offered there are covered. They actually seem to care about him at this agency, and he is not just another "statistic". Right now he is in the middle of very thorough testing to determine what kind of disability he has. They also, of course, take his alcoholism into account when accessing him.
My son's life seems to be taking a turn for the better right now, so it is ironic that I am having all these fears about his having to move back in with us. It is this fear which is testing me - that he will disrupt our lives by living with us, after we have been going through a sort of post-traumatic stress disorder recuperation after having lived with him through his active alcohol problem. I don't think I could live with him again. But it is futile to worry about something that may never happen - so I try to focus on the positive - that he will get his life together, find a job and a roommate, etc.
Thank you !
Janet
Thank you for the information about sober living homes. I had no idea these existed.
I looked at the website, and was about to discuss it with my husband and with my son, when I heard my son got an interview today with UPS for what sounds like a really steady job with good opportunities for advancement within UPS. I am trying not to get my hopes up, as it has been so difficult for him to get or keep a job, but I am hoping for good news this afternoon, that he got the job.
One thing I was gearing-up for about the sober living homes is that they don't seem to have any in NYC, where we live. My son is incredibly attached to NYC, and when he was actively drinking, we had many arguments about how there may be better rehab programs for him outside of the city. Although it turns out we couldn't have afforded them anyway, without his NYC insurance, he probably would not have left the city anyway.
However, if he continues to not be able to find a job, I will look into the sober living houses and tell him about them, so he can look into them himself. Thank you so much for the information...
Those of you who believe in prayer, please pray for my son, if you would be so kind, that he will get this UPS job, if it is meant to be.
Thank you - Janet