Hello, my name is Katie and I am starting this blog so that we can begin a conversation about addiction. I am the mother of two addicted, thirty-something, children. After years of trying to understand and cope with it on my own, it's time to open up and try to find answers. Oh, I tried counseling, but got discouraged when my counselor almost dozed off. Recently, both of the kids went sideways and I used journaling to help ease the emotional stress. Not only did I come to understand how I felt, but why and how I needed to deal with the situation. During this time of reflection, I wondered if others might be willing to share their own experiences.

 

The number of individuals affected by addiction in this country is frightening, and can no longer be viewed as anything but an epidemic. So many times parents don't speak out for fear of being judged. Personally, I have been dealing with this for so long that I don't care who thinks what any more. Maybe if people do speak up we can help others to avoid some the pitfalls we fell into. As parents of addicted children, we are all in varying stages of emotional recovery. The first person we tend to blame is ourselves, no matter how many times our children and others tell us it's not our fault. I say, "as parents," but the sad reality is that addiction transcends every demographic in this country: black/white, wealthy/poor, straight/gay, and young/old. The reality is many children are having to care for their parents and younger siblings because of addiction. Grandparents are raising their grandchildren. One that I am very familiar with is not knowing for months on end where they are or if they are alive.

 

It is my hope that we might get recovering addicts and mental health/addiction professionals to join us in this discussion. The only way forward, that I can see, is to begin the honest, open, and probably painful conversation. Not only do we need to talk to heal but we need to listen. We must be ready to change how we treat addiction, we know that what is currently being done isn't working. Perhaps, we need to treat the whole family instead of just the addict. Please understand, I am not any kind of expert, only a parent of addicted children who would like to make a difference. My goal here is to get more answers, get more tools to help us cope, and bring this community together. Together, we will have a much louder voice and we can begin to demand results from our mental health professionals and social reform from our government.

 

Not only can we banned together to affect change in the legislation and the mental health community. By doing the research we can become the experts and sources of information. We cannot ignore what has and is working in other countries. If we become knowledgeable enough and strong enough politically the legislators will not be able to ignore us.  Some ideas may seem progressive but I urge us all to look at the statistics and data. In the interest of transparency, I am for legalizing marijuana, for a multitude of reasons. Why not use it to treat PTSD and addiction; for those two issues often go hand in hand. There are many different non-traditional medicines, Ayahauasca or Iboga. Yes, both of these are interesting options, but I do feel that they need much more exploration. Why not set up needle exchanges in all county health departments? If we have any hope for our loved ones, then we mustn't fail them in addressing the health risks of needle sharing...are we willing to risk HEP C or AIDES?

 

The bottom line is, if we banned together we can find solutions. Solutions for the parent who lays awake at night wondering what can or could I have done. Solutions for the children who are having to care for addicted parents and raising their siblings. Solutions for the addict who is homeless and in need of shelter, medicines, or help with rehab. We may find that this is a series of solutions depending upon recovery stages. We must be willing to move away from failed programs and embrace new programs that do work, willing to set aside pre-conceived ideas that have been proven false, and willing to see erroneous attitudes we ourselves may have held toward addiction.

The idea behind this article is to communicate. We have been silent long enough and now is the time to break that silence, come together, discover tools to help us cope, and just perhaps get strong enough to affect legislative changes. In our own way we have all been through hell. Please let's keep this positive, if I have an idea that sucks, then tell me why it sucks...explain why you strongly disagree. This is NOT for families to hash out their issues like I have seen on social media.  I realize there are many facets to addiction and no ones' story is the same and it is my sincere hope that we can deal with a good many issues on this blog. If there is a topic of interest to you please feel free to request information. If you have information please share it with us all. I will be the first to admit that I have been trying different things that haven't worked. I'm out of ideas and am at the point of, "What do I have to loose." All I do know is, if anything is going to get done, we, the people of this community will have to do it.

 

Sincerely 
Katie











 

This is a preview of your note.

Click the "Publish" button to save or "Edit" to make more changes.

Publish