Today is day nine of the A-Z Blog Challenge. Today is the day for the letter I. Today I have chosen to post about, The Insanity of Loving an Addict. This post was written and posted last year and titled Things I learned From My Addict: The Insanity of Loving Them. According to the stats, only two people have read it. I decided to revive it for the challenge.
It's been said that Insanity is...
"Doing the same thing over and over repetitively expecting a different result each time."
We who love them do this all of the time. From enabling them to trying to control them then we move on to try to fix them. The "help" we think we are providing does more harm than it does good. Nothing we do is
ever right. Although we are told many times we can't control this and we can't fix our loved ones we continue doing it. This is the insanity of loving an addict. We are obsessed with this. In fact, we are addicted to our addicts.
The easiest way to describe all the feelings on the insanity of loving an addict is that it feels like I have visited an amusement park that I didn't want to go to in the first place and now I'm on a roller-coaster ride of ups and downs and cannot and do not know how to get off this crazy ride. When we stay on for too long we become so obsessed with the addict that it is as if we are addicted to our addict.
This almost feels as if we have lost touch with all reality and we have. We are out of touch.
The earliest feelings is that of denial. I think we spend so much time denying a loved one has a problem with addiction and drugs because deep down we are afraid of what we'll find out if they are using. Often deep down we know what it is and what our heart is telling us. We deny, cover up the problem and spend so much effort into trying to fix it. In the end, there comes a time when we can no longer deny. Its name is out there. For us it's name is heroin.
Even when we know what it is and can call it what it is and say it. It is heroin addiction, it is easy to still be in denial because often we still accept their explanations of mysterious things as in items missing from the house or when they are visiting us watching them set and text and then go in and out of the bathroom time than they actually visit with you. Trust me, they don't have to live with you to be missing spoons from the kitchen and shoe strings from the spare closet of shoes. I'm slow it took me a few months to figure this out. Even then I had a hard time facing it. That is the insanity of loving an addict. When I confronted about my Dollar Tree silverware collection it only led to a bigger fight. Just why did we fight over spoons that only cost a dollar? Insane.
Now that I know what the long bathroom means and just what the hell those stains were in the bathroom that took so long to scrub and because I stand firm when I say, HELL NO DON'T COME TO MY HOUSE AND USE. In fact, I DON'T WANT TO EVEN SEE YOU HIGH. Now IF they even visit me they are allowed a few minutes in the bathroom before I start banging on the door. They know I don't like this and I am so tired of the disrespect. Honestly, I'd rather them not seem me than to come here disrespecting my house.
Insanity has led to our lying and covering up for them and their problems with addiction. We were so afraid others will find out. What will others think? This is because likely due to the embarrassment that any addiction to drugs places on you and your family. Many times in the past when I tried to reach out to a police officer I was told my son was garbage and a piece of trash. Why would I want to reach out?
And well...
Who really wants others thinking bad things about our loved ones addicted to drugs? We want others to love them too for the person that is inside of the addiction. Often when others discover they don't understand the mind of an addict and so they tell you things that can often send you into a whirlwind as well.
How hard do you think it is to admit that you are powerless over your loved one's addiction? Especially when you spend so much time concentrating on fixing something you had no control over in the first place.
We spend so much time trying to change them and fix them that it often turns into an obsession.
How hard do you think it is to convince yourself that you had nothing to do with this? When all the times you confronted your loved one about their drug problem they blame you for it. So here you go in a mind spin thinking back to times that they were babies wondering if you really did do something in the way you raised them. This soon turns into blaming everyone else and in times
We love the addict and want to do everything in our power to help our addicted loved ones but we also don't trust them.
The addict will lie to us. We often find it hard to believe them and yet we still fall for their manipulation. We often will enable them until we have no more money. Our bank account drained. Struggling to make ends meet.
We have enough qualifications to be a detective but we don't have a certificate.
We spend so many sleepless nights awake, fearful for our loved one.
We can go from praying for our loved one to get help and in the next prayer be praying for God to just take our loved one home so they don't have to suffer from this anymore.
We grieve for our loved ones who are alive.
We spend so much of our time and energy concentrating on our loved one who is addicted to drugs. We try so hard to control it by fixing it when we are powerless to cure it.
We are so guilt-ridden with blame thinking this is something that we did this or we caused this that we concentrate so much on this it can often leave you feeling depressed.
The emotions alone make us hurt in places we don't realize we even had muscles there.
How hard do you think it is to accept that you cannot cure your loved one's addiction to heroin when all we want is for them to get better?
We cry a lot for our loved ones. I have cried until I thought I had no more tears left.
This can often leave us hurting in our bodies, our minds, and our soul. We often ache in places we didn't know had muscles. If we allow it we easily slip into depression.
This is the insanity of loving an addict until the day comes that I had to stop what I was doing, realize and admit that I am powerless over the power of heroin, the addiction and the hold it has on someone I love.
I have to focus on my own recovery from this. I have had to step aside and out of the role of the co-dependency in order to restore my own sanity and for serenity and peace. Remember Step One is admitted we are powerless over this drug, over this addiction and what it has done to someone we love. Step Two is Coming to realize that a power higher than ourselves can restore us to sanity.
Let me know what you think about the Insanity of Loving an Addict. I hope you stop back tomorrow to read my post, Just For Today.
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