You do have lots of questions and will get lots of information from members here garnered from their experiences. I do not know how long you have been dealing with your son's addiction - that plays a large role in not what to expect, but what you should do. I do not know how many times your son has been to rehab, or what the length of time he has been there is.(is it sticking) I do not know how many times he has been to jail, if any for crimes associated with his use. (consequences)
But, I can share with you what my experience has been and what over 10 years of dealing with our son's addiction has taught me.
When our son came home from his first rehab (he has been 9 times) I thought. "Good, he's fixed." "He'll go to meetings and keep himself on the straight and narrow. Nope... that isn't how it works. The problem is we assume an addicts behavior will change because he is now clean. He is clean from drugs but is he clean from the "cause" of what drives him to use. Remember, drugs are not the problem they are simply a symptom. If he has not had intensive therapy to uncover the reason's he uses and what he is trying to avoid, there is little to no chance he will stay clean for any length of time. Not only does his thinking and approach to life need to change, his surroundings need to change too. I know you may not want to hear that, but it's true. It's like sending a drug addict back into the crack district from which he came. His friends have to change, everything has to change.
His best chance for getting and staying in recovery is 90 days in rehab, 6 months to a year in a sober living home. (somewhat like a phase II) At this early of an age your son likely does not even begin to have the tools to survive in the "real world" much less the world where he became addicted.
You ask, who will he be? He will be someone who has (from what I gather) 30 days clean. That doesn't change his behavior or necessarily his thoughts. He will still revert to his old behaviors. There will be many triggers, places, people and things.
What is the single most important piece of advice I would give you? Go to Alanon. Get yourself a sponsor and stay alert.
Stay Safe. Hugs!!!!

30 days is a short time. All addicts are excellent at manipulation, telling you what you want to hear, not what the truth really is. First you need to stop the what if's, along with the coulda, woulda, shoulda. How long have you been dealing with your son's addiction? I dealt with my son's addiction for 8 years, and those 8 years seemed like 80. Alot of other parents on DS have dealt with their kid's addiction for 10 and 20 years. It's very difficult to stop enabling and helping, but something that is so important to learn, not only for your health and well being, but also your son's. JMO I think he should be going to a long term facility where they can watch and monitor him 24/7 - make sure he gets to the meetings, finds a sponsor, works the 12 step program. If he only does the 30 days and comes home he will be back to the same old shit in no time. OMG - please don't give him the use of a vehicle. The part that really worries me is that you have been debating for a month now about giving up his drug buddies, and he has finally agreed - he's agreed so that you will get off his ass about talking and seeing them - like I said he is saying what you want to hear. If you do let him come home, then you need to set up boundries and very strict rules - say what you mean and mean what you say. Think of it this way, when he was using, he went to any and every measure to get his drugs and/or alcohol, so if he is serious about staying clean, then he needs to use any and every measure available to him to get to these meetings and outpatient programs. You need to get into alanon, or some type of support system, otherwise he is going to control and manipulate the life out of you.

I certainly hope that he will be responsible enough to get himself to meetings. How can he expect you to jeapordize your job because of this? May sound harsh, but he has made a mess, drug you into it, and now you're worrying about the car, old friends, and tracking with the GPS? Perhaps he needs to be in a facility that could keep this contact with "the world" (i.e., cell phone, computer, FB, etc.) out of reach for awhile? Sober living maybe? Will this outpatient facility help you with any of this? No wonder you are asking for help here!

Don't let him manipulate you into having to make any more changes than you already have. It is your home, and he gets the privledge to stay there. Plus, you are stressing out about this! I went through this when it was time for my daughter to come home. Ididn't WANT her to come home! I knew she'd be biding her time and then get in contact with her old friends. I had to change my lifestyle for her to be "safe" and remain clean. Not that it's that exciting! It scared me so much. I could not face seeing her go into a downward spiral should that happen!!

Have you mentioned this to his therapist? We had to have several mtgs with my daughter's therapist, and during these meetings, discussed, then wrote a "contract" that we all had to sign prior to her discharge. I know this isn't something everyone does, but we were able to do this and it's manageable. Your son may have to find the job, ride into town with you and wait for the meetings and outpatient appointments. Turning over the car is very inconvenient for you and also a huge temptation for him. Don't let him do this to you before he even gets home. I hear your fear and pain and just hope something can be worked out. I am GLAD he's been clean, and hope all will go well for you in whatever you choose!

Great advice and information from these two members. I can tell you that they have helped me and are still helping me, immensely.

Excellent advice and I wish I had it in 1993 during my son's first rehab. I was so naive.
I really wanted to believe the rehab would work. I had to get educated about alcoholism for sure.
I made HUGE mistakes. I was manipulated big time. As a family, it was suggested we ALL go to Al Anon...I was the only one who went, for which I am eternally grateful.

Suggestion: Make a copy of the advice you have received, make several copies so you can carry one with you to remind yourself of the good advice.

Courage.

Thank you everyone for the reminders. I think, though, that I didn't give enough information, so people are jumping to conclusions.

First, he is 17 and we've only known about his drug use since last summer. He's been using for two years. He'll be 18 in three months. He originally tried stopping on his own and didn't make it. In our state he has to sign for in patient, and he refused. He agreed to go to intensive out patient. He went through detox at home with his doctor's supervision and he did go through withdrawal from the opiates. His plan was to kick the opiates first and then marijuana immediately after. Three weeks later he refused to quit the weed, stopped going to outpatient, and relapsed on the Oxy and other pills. I put up with him for about two weeks over Christmas and then finally told him he was unwelcome in our house unless he went to in patient. He made an attempt to bounce from friend to friend and ultimately found himself homeless at 4:00 in the morning in below zero weather. That was enough for him to realize that he had a serious problem and he agreed to go to in patient. He spent six days in detox at an adult facility, which he said scared the hell out of him. By next week he'll have been at the adolescent facility for another 50 days, for a total of 56 days.

From the beginning he has agreed that he needs to give up his friends. There was just one person he wanted to stay in contact with because she supposedly only smokes weed and is against the hard stuff. I don't want him to even hang out with someone who smokes weed. It took him awhile to realize that he couldn't just give up pills, so he didn't understand why it was a problem to have a friend who never took pills. Now he seems to get it that he can't have any mind-altering drugs, although he could just be saying what we want to hear.

He is not asking for the car or the cell phone or money, or any privileges. He mentioned to me last week that he doesn't expect to get any of these privileges back until he earns them. The only reason that I'm bringing up the question about driving is that it would be such a convenience for ME. I think you all are right, though, that it's not a good idea. We'll have to work together as a family to figure out a good transportation plan until he can earn driving privileges back.

Mgs1, I agree with you on finding out the reasons why he used in the first place. We really have also managed to get to what we believe are some of the core, underlying issues. He's adopted and it seems that he has a strong fear of abandonment. He mentions that he thinks about his birth mother every single day. Related to this, he seems to have been hit hard by the death of his grandmother, which brought up old issues related to his adoption. That was followed by bullying we were not aware of at high school when he came out as gay. The result was untreated depression and anxiety along with ADD that we were having problems finding a good med match for. At rehab he now has a non-addictive ADD medicine that's working along with a prescription for Paxil. We've got him hooked up with a psychiatrist for the meds and a good therapist for the underlying issues. The therapist also used to be an AODA counselor at the same facility where he will be doing outpatient. Another issue that we figured out is that every one of his using friends is also gay, and that's part of the reason why he hates to give them all up. It may be a good idea to find a connection to a non-using gay community.

We're also switching him from high school, which is full of triggers and bad memories and he will be doing his schooling on-line for the rest of this semester. Next fall, we also have the option of sending him to a local recovery high school, since he lost his entire senior year.

I am going to Al-Anon and I think we have a good support system for me and for him. My main issue relates to setting up the rules of the household. We are meeting with him and his counselor tomorrow afternoon to write the contract and I'd like to think these things through so we cover all the bases.

The outcome for this facility is that 2/3 of kids remain drug free after six months (no information on relapse after six months.) Given the last two relapses, I understand he could easily relapse again. If so, I just hope he survives to make it back to in patient to give it another shot. Last week we learned that 3 of the center's former patients died in the same week. (About 2,000 kids have made it through their program.) I want to do whatever I can to make it easier for him to end up in the 2/3, but I understand that's really not under my control.

Gay, opiate addict, ADD and who knows what else.
Dont expect too much from a short stint in rehab mom.
Your son needs a lot more help that.
Good luck
Joe

My son is 17 and went to 30 day rehab last year. Came home with big chip on shoulder and a bad attitude. Everyone's different. It sounds like you are preparing for the worst but hoping for the best. Good idea to carry these comments around with you to refer to. I do that sometimes. Good advice here. Remember he has to do the work, you have to take care of yourself and not enable. Hugs and prayers.

After 11 years of this I can add only one thing. Every time my son had access to money and a car - he relapsed. I spent years driving him back and forth to work and to daily meetings; altered my life completely. I worked 12 hour night shifts and had to pick him up at 2 pm (middle of my night). He's been kicked out of several halfway houses. This last episode he was clean for 7-8 months, he had a decent job and we loaned him money to buy a used car. All gone, flushed into a vein or snorted. He's very convincing and manipulative.

I may have already mentioned this, but I know that last year allowing our son the use of a car too soon was a big mistake.

My son knows that when he has money he will drink. He hasn't driven a car in years.
When he got out of rehab the first time he got a job and prompty left it because "they were talking about me". Little did I know then that it was his severe paranoia.

Thanks, everyone. He's been back since Tuesday. Things went very well the first three days. He's been cleaning the house, eating healthy, exercising, and going to daily meetings. Today things went downhill quickly. He started by inviting a friend to pick him up for an hour, and it's a friend who "supposedly" is clean. By the time I found out about it, the friend was on his way over. She said she had to work in an hour, so they would just hang out for a few minutes and get caught up. That was 9:00 this morning. He just walked in the door at 8:30. Apparently his friend got someone to take her shift. One of our rules was that if he went out he'd have to call every two hours. He checked in at the two hour point, then again 3 hours later. With that call he asked if he could skip tonight's NA meeting and double up on another day. I said I would not agree to that, but he blew me off. Then I didn't hear from him again until he came in 6 1/2 hours later. He went directly to bed.

I just finished packing up some new Burt's Bee's products that he asked me to buy for him this week. That's just about the only privilege that he has left. The car is out of the question now. He also hasn't seen a penny other than $1 to put into the basket at each NA meeting. We'll also need to do a drug test. I suspect it's going to be positive for THC and I hope that's the extent of it.

I've got to learn to stop panicking. He was clean. His friend from New York called and said he had two pills with his name on it and he turned him down. He won't be talking to him any more. While he was at his friend's house yesterday, his friend's brother started smoking weed so they decided to take off and spend the day at a state park. So, he may have rebelled against the rules, but he made good choices about using. This morning he also followed through with his commitment to double up on the meetings. He went to an AA meeting and I went to Al Anon. Tonight he'll go to his second meeting. I'm also going to start going back to Al Anon. Today I ran into an old friend at the Al Anon meeting who is apparently having the same type of problems with her son. That gives me another reason to go.

Life sure is a roller coaster and I've got to learn not to get so high on his good days and so down when things don't go as well. I've still got work to do on detaching.

My daughter will be coming home from 30 days in rehab on Wednesday of next week. This is her first stay in rehab. In the past, she was on suboxone but did not attend meetings or get therapy. Of course, that didn't do much good. She will attend the full day program for as long as I can afford it, then the partial day program.

I am hopeful because her attitude is excellent and the program was so comprehensive. It included individual therapy, group therapy daily, family therapy, daily 12 step meetings, weekly doctor visits, nutrition training, art therapy, accupuncture, massage, daily gym workouts. She'll have all of that except family therapy and meetings when she is in the day program. She'll have to do meetings on her own and family therapy we'll schedule as needed.

We will have our last family session on Tuesday and will come up with a contract for home life. She'll hear that I won't be able to afford this kind of treatment in the future, though I'll be supportive. I have to be hopeful, though I know she will be at risk for a long time.

My son has been home four weeks today. He stayed clean 3 days. Within one week he was back to his drug of choice. Last weekend we made him take a drug test and it was positive for OxyContin, benzos, amphetamines, and THC. He also was arrested last weekend for disorderly conduct. Monday, after being ordered by the court not to use alcohol or drugs, he went out with his friends and got drunk two hours later.

There's more to the story. I'll send you a friend request, upsadaisy, so you can read my journals. I pray things go better for you and your daughter.

Trevor had his ups and downs in rehab, but at the end he was the model patient. He earned all of his points and even reached the sponsor level. We did come up with a written relapse prevention plan/contract, but as I look back at it, he has consistently violated every single agreement. It's not worth the paper it's written on.

At the rehab facility they said there is no way of predicting who will do well and who won't. They've seen some kids leave that they thought for sure would be dead in a month end up completely staying clean and building a good life for themselves. Others they thought had things under control relapsed right away. All you can do is pray.

The number one deciding factor that made Trevor relapse was contact with his old friends. The phone started ringing as soon as he walked in the door. Within 3 days one of his friends offered him two pills. It's been downhill ever since.