How Family May Prevent Recovery

In an age when every second is fast-paced, and we are bombarded by media, I urge you to take a moment to think about your life. Take time to breathe, relax, and think about how life always moves forward. If you struggle with addiction yourself or know someone who is, life can seem unreal at times. You may think to yourself “will life ever be the same?”

It is as important for you to move forward as it is for your loved one who was struggling with addiction. Families sometimes don’t realize this and can make recovery harder for an addict. The family will sometimes resort to:

• Guilting them for struggling with addiction even when not intentional
• Not letting things go
• Bringing up things in the past to make a point or prove them wrong
• Constantly doubting their intentions

These are only a few examples of how a family may prevent the recovering addict from being successful. It is important to use judgement however as there are times in recovery it is appropriate for families to question and following up on things.

For your loved one to truly recover, those around will also have to have some sort of recovery. Families need to be there for support but not always assume there is something wrong. There will be some emotions that will be hard to let go, but if you do, recovery will be that much more enjoyable for both you and your loved one. Let me put it this way, have you ever had a loved one do something that reminded you of behavior in the past and took you out of the moment? Well, that feeling works both ways and there are likely times that you may do something that unsettling for them.

To assist with this, you must get the help you need for yourself, just like you got the help for your loved one when they needed it. It could be a counselor or even a friend you can vent to, who will listen without judging and who won’t advise you to be spiteful or get back at the person. Moving forward with your loved one and getting back to when things were better or creating a new time when things are better is important and greatly aids the recovery process.

I hope this helps. If you have a loved one who you do not know how to help, give us a call. We are available 24/7 to help.