What out of character decisions / actions have you made / taken in your journey loving someone struggling with addiction?

#1

Loving someone in active addiction puts us in chaotic situations and relationships we’ve never been trained to handle. Making decisions in the face of this chaos and concern for someone we love can be stressful and confusing. Decisions we make can be out of character (to put it nicely) or totally insane :wink: to speak some truth - in line with the fact that we are facing an insane situation!

What decisions or actions have you taken that are totally out of this world or simply out of character as you’ve been in this journey alongside your loved one?

Maybe to jumpstart - finish this sentence… ‘I never thought I’d have done / be doing [this action] but…’

I have so many to add, but I just shared one in this post to start: dealing with stealing

#2

I didn’t know at first my boyfriend was addicted to alcohol. We didn’t live together and we lived far from each other. But it seemed on the weekends he drank a lot and one weekend he showed up drunk and never left and he drank a lot. I saw him passed out in a parking lot and he didn’t look good and it was not safe. So I told him he could drink at my house so it would be safe and no driving. It has been one of the worst things ever because it made his drinking worse. He was not a good drunk person it made it to where my grand daughters and other grandkids were in the mix of his drunken behavior he cussed a lot and there had been times where I packed up his stuff and made him get out then he would go to the VA for months and he was good for a few months but I don’t think he wanted to stop drinking. And at this point since his TBI he is all the way different. I’m thinking we are not on the same page in our relationship we are not closer to each other. We are not in the same room as each other much. He is a sweet guy who has lots of issues and uses alcohol to cover up the other labels that he has been given and the fact he can’t get over any of it. Hurts me the most. To him alcohol is the way out of pain that he is in. A veteran who has ptsd, bipolar, a traumatic brain injury and has been suicidal that how he sees his self. He needs lots of help and I need to stop enabling him to drink. I can kick him out it won’t help him… So what do I do.

#3

I think our family bent over backwards to keep a relationship with my 24-year-old son even while he was under the influence. The worst was when we all went to a theme park for my younger son’s birthday, and my older son was hungover and actually threw a tantrum (just like a toddler) at the end of the day - this was on my younger son’s birthday. We changed where we went to eat instead of taking him home and going out without him. After that episode and another horrible day (his birthday) when he was under the influence and started yelling at us, I decided we have the right to leave if he is misbehaving - we don’t have to put up with that behavior for the sake of “family unity” or togetherness or whatever. But it took years to get to that point.

#4

I never thought I’d need to call my dad’s (very shady) drug dealer to tell him to BACK THE F OFF. :raised_hand: I’m not sure that this is out of character… but definitely out of the usual!

#5

Great share @katie - OMG I know this - my husband still gets texts from dealers (that he’s removed from his phone!) and also gets asked on the street all the time. It’s like N.O.!!
#nothelpful

#6

Had to asked to everybody he knows if he was with them and called one of that guys (who is an alcoholic as well) a piece of shit, because he was gone for more than 24 hrs and didn’t answer calls or texts.