Complicated

Since my daughter passed away, I appreciate seeing little children with their moms and dads. I see their eyes filled with hope, their minds eager to discover and learn, and realize so much wonder lies ahead for them in life. I seem to be more sensitive to the vast amount of potential their future holds. Sadly, by firsthand experience, I realize how many things in the world can squeeze all aspiration and hope from them. That breaks my heart and I wish it would never happen to a child again.

I have seen several documentaries on addiction, especially heroin. One of the things these exposés often do is show the people whose stories they tell when they were little children. As the pictures and videos roll across the screen, in their young faces I always see that same spark of hope and potential. It makes me ask what took that away, what robbed these precious souls of all the life and joy that was in them? Of course, the answer is complicated and diverse.

This past week I viewed a documentary produced by HBO called HEROIN: Cape Cod USA. In one scene a group of moms are talking at a family support group, one mom says, “If my son had any other disease that was as dangerous to him as his addiction, people would be bringing me casseroles; I haven’t received any casseroles.” They all laughed, but in their hearts, they knew it was true and they knew why.

Addiction carries tons of stigma and shame and is an extremely complicated disorder. It’s short-sighted to try to define it in one neat, pretty package. Evidence indicates that through long-term drug use, especially when a person starts using drugs early in life it changes the physiology of the brain, so addiction does have some of the characteristics of a chronic disease. We all know that somewhere a choice was made to use the drug so there is a measure of responsibility on the individual’s part. It’s also not uncommon for addicted individuals to have a history of addiction or alcoholism that runs in their family. Is that DNA, environmental influence or a propensity to become addicted? I don’t know, but I did once hear my daughter say that she remembered exactly what it felt like when she was given morphine and oxycodone for medical issues when she was a child. Many years later, at a party, someone asked her if she wanted to try heroin, she did, because as she put it “I knew what it felt like and I liked it.” Which introduces yet another element of addiction, a response to pain. In Lauren’s case, she discovered that the heroin, for a little while masked all the pain connected with her anxiety and anorexia. You can learn LaLa’s (Lauren) story on the post “How Did My Daughter Ended Up on Heroin“. The point is there is no easy answer to why that person you love so much, and who probably loves you, is stuck in addiction.

If you want to get a better understanding of what it feels like for your loved one to be addicted, watch the documentary I mentioned above. I will warn you it is very graphic, heartbreaking, and at times offensive. Another thing that happens in these documentaries is that many of the people whose stories are being told do not survive, sadly, this one is no different. I hate that.

I am very tired of seeing brokenhearted moms, dads with tear filled eyes, babies losing their moms, and lives being stolen from young people that have so much ahead of them.

I struggle with why many feel the answer to all of this is to let the person drift into isolation and leave them to self-destruct. Evidence indicates many more times than not it doesn’t work. Here is a very in-depth study comparing different approaches to helping those we love in recovery. I know we can’t “fix” them, I know we can’t make the decisions for them, and I know they must own the consequences of their choices. but we always have the choice to love them, and I pray we will.

In scores of places, science and sociology has shown us that people thrive in connection with other people. We need contact with other humans and when that contact is not present things get crazy fast. Thankfully, history has produced very few formal research studies about this isolation on humans. Regrettably, they have happened naturally in the world we live in. One of the largest and most notable cases being the orphanages in Romania in the 1990’s. An article in Popular Science said this about the conditions in the orphanages: “Romanian orphanages established after the fall of the Soviet Union have served as such a study site. The facilities, which have been described as “slaughterhouses of the soul”, have historically had great disparities between the number of children and the number of caregivers (25 or more kids to one adult), meaning few if any children received the physical or emotional care they needed. Many of the children who were raised in these environments have exhibited mental health and behavioral disorders as a result. It’s even had a physical effect, with neurological research showing a dramatic reduction in the literal size of their brains and low levels of brain activity as measured by electroencephalography, or EEG, machines.”

I have trouble understanding how an equally devastating disconnection from people that care about them could help an alcoholic or addict. There is a current “Slaughterhouse of the Soul” today, its called addiction, and in the United States over 78,000 people will die from it this year (that number does not include those that die as a result of alchoholism). Addicts are not easy to live with, they often push away the very ones trying to help them and that may be one indicator as to why they desperately need what the children in the Romanian orphanages lacked, “physical and emotional care”.

Choosing Love should never be enabling or giving your loved one free reign. While I was attending a family orientation at a renowned residential treatment facility the director shared a good question we can ask ourselves when trying to decide on doing something that would affect an addicted loved one, “Will what I am doing help my loved continue in their addiction or will it help them stay sober and growing in their recovery?”

A few weeks before Lauren passed away as I was returning from a trip in Southern California, she texted me asking if I would go visit a Sober House with her the following Monday. As I read the text my heart sank, and my stomach turned into a knot. Some sober houses are helpful, but some are not nice places and I feared the worst. Lauren’s mom and I had told her that we would never ask her to leave our home. No matter how ugly things got, she would always have an open door in our home. We also explained that because we would have expectations on her drug use there might come a day when she would choose to leave our home. That was not what we wanted but if she felt that was the best option for her, we would try to help her even in that, if it was helping her in her recovery. As I went to bed that night, I knew I could not make her stay, I would have to let her own the consequence of her decisions, but I did want to be sure she knew we loved her, wanted to help her and believed she could get well. When that Monday came, for reasons I just do not know, LaLa decided she did not want to go for the visit to the sober house. To discover more about this conversation with Lauren and things you can do that will help you love the addicted person in your life without enabling them read the post “Some Decisions Are Really Hard”.

I wish there were an easy answer to addiction but there is not, it continues to be complicated, but I believe the concerned people in an addicts life can make great progress for themselves and their loved one by focusing on ways to rebuild the relationship they have with that person. And yes, that will be complicated too!

This weeks featured image is another by Brooke Shaden, although it is not called Complicated but the image makes me “feel” that.