Greetings and Salutations.

On Sun, 25 Jan 2004 15:54:49 GMT, Doug Winterburn
wrote:

*snip*

Another concrete example:

A family member who has had drug problems for forty years. He has been in
treatment many times. He has drained taxpayers money and family money for
forty years. His latest treatment involves wearing some sort of patch
which he trades to his "friends" for money to buy better stuff. We give
him new clothes because he usually looks worse than most street people and
he trades them for drugs. A sister had him set up with low cost housing
and was managing his government assistance money and all was going well
for almost a year. He was booted out because of all the high traffic of
short duration into and out of his apartment. I'd like to hear a solution.

-Doug
Yep...that is a difficult and complicated sitation to deal
with too. I don't know that I have a "solution" for anyone else
(shucks, my own life is hard enough for me to muddle through). But
(and there always IS a big, old but) I know that rule number one is
that if anyone is going to change that desire for change has to come
from within, not from others. If that desire to clean up one's life
is not there, then there is NOTHING that anyone else can do to MAKE
that person clean up their life.
One big problem with addicts (especially those on harder
drugs) is that they WILL sell their baby sister into prostitution
for that next hit. Their entire life revolves around the buzz and
nothing else is important to them. It has been my experience that
any kind of enabling will simply perpetuate the problem, and, at
some point the folks around the addict have to say to them, in
very simple and clear terms that the addict will get no more
help or support until they take the steps necessary to get clean
and stay clean. Then, alas, comes the hard part, as everyone
has to stick with that, and after years of forking over support,
it is really hard NOT to take pity on the addict and "just help
them this one time". However, as y'all have found out (and
I have a GREAT deal of sympathy for you and your family as
regards the situation) the addict will turn every bit of help
given to them into drugs.
Don't make his problem into YOUR problem. He is an
adult, and, by now should, like the rest of us, understand
that there are consequences to our actions, and, sometimes
those consequences are fairly unpleasant.
There are root causes, I believe, for every self-destructive
thing that we do. Once we are willing to admit there is a
problem, and, honestly turn towards trying to SOLVE that problem
to move on to a better life, it is possible to dig down
and perhaps find what caused the problem in the first place.
Once we have dug up the problem, and brought it out in the
light, it loses some of its power over us, and we have
a better chance of controlling it, instead of it controlling
us. Once the fact there is a problem is faced, there are
many ways to get in contact with folks that can help one
through the painful path of recovery, ranging from high-
priced health care professionals, to absolutely free AA
or NA meetings.
Regards and best wishes.
Dave Mundt