Damn, this one hit me hard. I am also a baby brother to a couple of sisters and I also had a drinking problem, though not this severe. I also relate to the inescapable feeling that your family is judging you somehow or other.
Aside from the booze, imagine growing up and looking up to your sister, watching her do normal things like go to parties and have boyfriends and assuming you would be doing the same...and then not, because you don't know how to socialize the way she can. It can really make you feel like a fuckup. Like there are normal people and then there's you. How can you face your sister after this?
For me, I think having a full time job was the best deterrent to drinking. I'm sure the idea has been brought up with this guy. Still, I would speculate that part of the problem is he feels like the world doesn't need him to be sober. That any job he gets is would make him not an asset to society, just less of a burden. When you're the little one, nobody relies on you.
Now I have to decide if I'm going to delete everything I just wrote or actually click Post. 3...2...1...
On my first pass through your letter, I got exactly this far before bursting into tears:
I can’t prescribe anything to help you — but suggest you lock the door and turn off your phone at night. How does that sound? ”
On my second pass, I got through your letter and as far as this line from Polly before repeating the tears:
“Everyone doing their best is what’s worst for everyone involved.”
January 10, 2016 was my 47th birthday. I got three texts from my 22-year-old son that day:
1. Happy Birthday
2. I need my mom.
3. I want to die and and I don’t know how.
After the third text, I turned off my phone. I’d already shut the door the day before, at the intervention in which we laid out our love for him (unchangeable), what we were willing to support financially (treatment), and our boundaries (which are not “behavior I expect from you” but “behavior you can expect from me.”) The two major boundaries? First, the bank account and credit cards were closed (he’d already lost his apartment and we would no longer pay for a hotel.) Second, he could not come home.
I tell everyone that we were lucky in a lot of ways. Because he was at university 3000 miles away from us, by that last year when the spiral of heroin and meth became critical, the changes were so drastic it was impossible not to recognize that something was horrifically wrong. On intervention day, we hadn’t laid eyes on him in two months. He’d always been tall and thin, but at over six feet tall he now weighed no more than 110 pounds. At that moment, I knew with absolute clarity that I’d never had a child so close to death—and my second son had cancer when he was 11. We’re lucky that everything—from awareness to crisis point—happened so quickly that we couldn’t normalize the trauma and we were desperate for any help we could get. We were lucky that we had resources and found help (those who are themselves in recovery and choose to help others should all get a pass straight to whatever heaven they wish.)
At the end of the intervention, he declined treatment. We left him on the streets of Seattle, got on a plane and flew back overnight to the children we still had at home. When we landed, it was my birthday. Four hours later, I got those texts and turned off my phone.
I want to be really fucking clear: there was nothing natural about what we did. It went against every single instinct a parent has. The truest statement I know about parenting is this: “The hardest part of being a parent is doing nothing.” I did it for one reason—because my son was either going to treatment, or he was going to die. But he would not die in my house, or believing that I didn’t care enough to say Stop.
We are also super fucking lucky that we got the outcome we wanted. After a week, when he realized we weren’t going to give in, he went to treatment. He went to a year-long program, every day of which was necessary. He hated us for months. We spent that year doing family counseling and attending parent meetings and learning about addiction as a family systems disease. We learned new ways of thinking and new ways of relating. We learned to share all of this openly, rather than hide, because addictions feed on silence and secrets—and because honesty and sharing is how we all stay well.
And at this moment I’m on a plane flying to visit my son. He is nine years sober. He has a wife and a job and a house and two cats. I don’t take any of that for granted. It could change tomorrow. But today is a good day.
Some people don’t like it when I say, “We got lucky.” They say, “You didn’t get lucky, you did everything exactly right.” Those people still want to believe that intentions and actions can control outcomes. But here’s the thing . . . we might have done all the same things and made all the same choices and our son might still have died. The hardest thing you will ever ask a parent to do is accept the fact that they cannot keep their child alive against their will. Not forever.
The point of boundaries isn’t to force someone to do what we want, or to punish them by shutting them out. The point of boundaries is to protect what’s inside—the family, the love, the relationships, the history—so there’s something for the person we love to come back to. The alternative is the addiction burning down everything and everyone it touches. One good thing about having had a child with cancer before dealing with addiction—the illness descriptor becomes very clear. Allowing ourselves to not see the extremity of one son’s addiction would have been like seeing another son’s tumor on the MRI and choosing not to treat it. You know what’s unnatural? Cancer treatment. The entire point is to push the body as close to the edge of disaster as you can get to destroy the disease. The same people who have called us unnatural for leaving one child on the streets would have stoned us for not injecting our other son with toxic chemo drugs.
Desperate Sister—the first thing you have to do is save yourself. Because you only get to make choices for you. That doesn’t mean you can’t or shouldn’t help your parents see options or choices. But you’ve got to find some way to live with the fact that you might not get the outcomes you want. I’m not much for recommendations, but it’s possible you (and maybe your parents) would benefit from Al-Anon. If nothing else, being in a room with people who get you and don’t judge is a reminder that none of us are entirely alone. I know that I will be carrying you all in my heart from now on.
This was incredibly moving, thank you for sharing it. 💜 It's also very well-written. I wonder if you've considered writing a book. It might help a whole lot of parents who are struggling with similar things.
Woof. This sounds a lot like my family, but on a different timeline, if that makes sense. Avoidance is at the core of my family's biggest issues, and it's generational. It absolutely, without a doubt, hinders opportunities for REAL, meaningful connection. I can relate, and I am so sorry.
Last year, I checked myself into an intensive outpatient program for my mental health. I'm not positive, but I think they have similar programs for addiction. I hated it for the first few weeks, and then it started to click. I could see this type of thing being valuable for you and your brother, honestly.
The truth really can and will set you free. You just have to be brave enough to stay the course. And dust yourself off, again and again, when you have to start over again. Eventually, impossibly, even, it does get better.
This hit very close to home. My brother drank himself to death, with the usual “better then worse” dance for years. He did months long rehab at the best facilities in the country. At one point he was sober for 1.5 years, and literally decided he didn’t like it. Sobriety was boring. He chose the fun of Hollywood bars and numbness of alcohol. Which is fine. It was his life to live how he wanted to. And my parents got to react how they wanted, which was mostly denial and enabling. I suggest more Al Anon for the letter-writer, to realize more fully what she’s in control of (herself only) and what she’s not (the dance the rest of her family is going to do, probs until her bro is dead). I know that sounds cold, but there’s an element of stepping back and looking at it objectively that has to happen to disengage from the family trauma. Once you’ve centered yourself you can have compassion without trying to jump in and change people (who don’t want to be changed). You can acknowledge it’s horrendously difficult and tragic and painful; but that train isn’t on your tracks. As a sister you might feel like that IS your circus, but sadly it’s not, and those monkeys are going to make their own choices. You’re not going to somehow magically show them the light *this time*. It’s a tough road, my heart goes out to you.
Damn, this one hit me hard. I am also a baby brother to a couple of sisters and I also had a drinking problem, though not this severe. I also relate to the inescapable feeling that your family is judging you somehow or other.
Aside from the booze, imagine growing up and looking up to your sister, watching her do normal things like go to parties and have boyfriends and assuming you would be doing the same...and then not, because you don't know how to socialize the way she can. It can really make you feel like a fuckup. Like there are normal people and then there's you. How can you face your sister after this?
For me, I think having a full time job was the best deterrent to drinking. I'm sure the idea has been brought up with this guy. Still, I would speculate that part of the problem is he feels like the world doesn't need him to be sober. That any job he gets is would make him not an asset to society, just less of a burden. When you're the little one, nobody relies on you.
Now I have to decide if I'm going to delete everything I just wrote or actually click Post. 3...2...1...
To A Desperate Sister,
On my first pass through your letter, I got exactly this far before bursting into tears:
I can’t prescribe anything to help you — but suggest you lock the door and turn off your phone at night. How does that sound? ”
On my second pass, I got through your letter and as far as this line from Polly before repeating the tears:
“Everyone doing their best is what’s worst for everyone involved.”
January 10, 2016 was my 47th birthday. I got three texts from my 22-year-old son that day:
1. Happy Birthday
2. I need my mom.
3. I want to die and and I don’t know how.
After the third text, I turned off my phone. I’d already shut the door the day before, at the intervention in which we laid out our love for him (unchangeable), what we were willing to support financially (treatment), and our boundaries (which are not “behavior I expect from you” but “behavior you can expect from me.”) The two major boundaries? First, the bank account and credit cards were closed (he’d already lost his apartment and we would no longer pay for a hotel.) Second, he could not come home.
I tell everyone that we were lucky in a lot of ways. Because he was at university 3000 miles away from us, by that last year when the spiral of heroin and meth became critical, the changes were so drastic it was impossible not to recognize that something was horrifically wrong. On intervention day, we hadn’t laid eyes on him in two months. He’d always been tall and thin, but at over six feet tall he now weighed no more than 110 pounds. At that moment, I knew with absolute clarity that I’d never had a child so close to death—and my second son had cancer when he was 11. We’re lucky that everything—from awareness to crisis point—happened so quickly that we couldn’t normalize the trauma and we were desperate for any help we could get. We were lucky that we had resources and found help (those who are themselves in recovery and choose to help others should all get a pass straight to whatever heaven they wish.)
At the end of the intervention, he declined treatment. We left him on the streets of Seattle, got on a plane and flew back overnight to the children we still had at home. When we landed, it was my birthday. Four hours later, I got those texts and turned off my phone.
I want to be really fucking clear: there was nothing natural about what we did. It went against every single instinct a parent has. The truest statement I know about parenting is this: “The hardest part of being a parent is doing nothing.” I did it for one reason—because my son was either going to treatment, or he was going to die. But he would not die in my house, or believing that I didn’t care enough to say Stop.
We are also super fucking lucky that we got the outcome we wanted. After a week, when he realized we weren’t going to give in, he went to treatment. He went to a year-long program, every day of which was necessary. He hated us for months. We spent that year doing family counseling and attending parent meetings and learning about addiction as a family systems disease. We learned new ways of thinking and new ways of relating. We learned to share all of this openly, rather than hide, because addictions feed on silence and secrets—and because honesty and sharing is how we all stay well.
And at this moment I’m on a plane flying to visit my son. He is nine years sober. He has a wife and a job and a house and two cats. I don’t take any of that for granted. It could change tomorrow. But today is a good day.
Some people don’t like it when I say, “We got lucky.” They say, “You didn’t get lucky, you did everything exactly right.” Those people still want to believe that intentions and actions can control outcomes. But here’s the thing . . . we might have done all the same things and made all the same choices and our son might still have died. The hardest thing you will ever ask a parent to do is accept the fact that they cannot keep their child alive against their will. Not forever.
The point of boundaries isn’t to force someone to do what we want, or to punish them by shutting them out. The point of boundaries is to protect what’s inside—the family, the love, the relationships, the history—so there’s something for the person we love to come back to. The alternative is the addiction burning down everything and everyone it touches. One good thing about having had a child with cancer before dealing with addiction—the illness descriptor becomes very clear. Allowing ourselves to not see the extremity of one son’s addiction would have been like seeing another son’s tumor on the MRI and choosing not to treat it. You know what’s unnatural? Cancer treatment. The entire point is to push the body as close to the edge of disaster as you can get to destroy the disease. The same people who have called us unnatural for leaving one child on the streets would have stoned us for not injecting our other son with toxic chemo drugs.
Desperate Sister—the first thing you have to do is save yourself. Because you only get to make choices for you. That doesn’t mean you can’t or shouldn’t help your parents see options or choices. But you’ve got to find some way to live with the fact that you might not get the outcomes you want. I’m not much for recommendations, but it’s possible you (and maybe your parents) would benefit from Al-Anon. If nothing else, being in a room with people who get you and don’t judge is a reminder that none of us are entirely alone. I know that I will be carrying you all in my heart from now on.
With love,
I See You
This was incredibly moving, thank you for sharing it. 💜 It's also very well-written. I wonder if you've considered writing a book. It might help a whole lot of parents who are struggling with similar things.
🖤
Not the LW but truly, thank you for sharing this.
Woof. This sounds a lot like my family, but on a different timeline, if that makes sense. Avoidance is at the core of my family's biggest issues, and it's generational. It absolutely, without a doubt, hinders opportunities for REAL, meaningful connection. I can relate, and I am so sorry.
Last year, I checked myself into an intensive outpatient program for my mental health. I'm not positive, but I think they have similar programs for addiction. I hated it for the first few weeks, and then it started to click. I could see this type of thing being valuable for you and your brother, honestly.
The truth really can and will set you free. You just have to be brave enough to stay the course. And dust yourself off, again and again, when you have to start over again. Eventually, impossibly, even, it does get better.
Peace to you, your brother, and your family.
This hit very close to home. My brother drank himself to death, with the usual “better then worse” dance for years. He did months long rehab at the best facilities in the country. At one point he was sober for 1.5 years, and literally decided he didn’t like it. Sobriety was boring. He chose the fun of Hollywood bars and numbness of alcohol. Which is fine. It was his life to live how he wanted to. And my parents got to react how they wanted, which was mostly denial and enabling. I suggest more Al Anon for the letter-writer, to realize more fully what she’s in control of (herself only) and what she’s not (the dance the rest of her family is going to do, probs until her bro is dead). I know that sounds cold, but there’s an element of stepping back and looking at it objectively that has to happen to disengage from the family trauma. Once you’ve centered yourself you can have compassion without trying to jump in and change people (who don’t want to be changed). You can acknowledge it’s horrendously difficult and tragic and painful; but that train isn’t on your tracks. As a sister you might feel like that IS your circus, but sadly it’s not, and those monkeys are going to make their own choices. You’re not going to somehow magically show them the light *this time*. It’s a tough road, my heart goes out to you.