How To Avoid Mistakes In The Treatment Of Alcoholic Or Drug Addict - The Quality Of Life

2023 Author: Oswald Adamson | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-11-27 12:13

If there is a dependent person in the house, this is not only his personal grief, but also the problem of the whole family. The close people of an alcoholic or a drug addict have a very difficult time. Scandals, threats, pleas for forgiveness, promises that "no more", breakdowns. What can be done? How to behave? How to avoid mistakes? And is there a chance for recovery?

Insidious companion

Almost every addicted person has a faithful companion - a codependent. Most often it is a wife or mother who lives in the name of the healing of her husband or son. Such a painful symbiosis makes both of them mark time, not helping, but even aggravating the situation.

How much easier self-sacrifice is self-realization

Eric Hoffer

Signs of codependency

• You feel guilty, angry, irritable towards the patient.
• Justify drug use by problems at work, bad company, etc.
• Say “he will die without me”, “I have to save him,” fear that he will go to jail or commit suicide.
• You threaten him with divorce, the police, but do nothing.
• You are trying to hide the dependence of a loved one, to minimize the consequences of the use of psychoactive substances.
• Give up your personal life, hobbies and leisure.

“I spent ten years on my alcoholic husband. During this time, I can only remember hard drinking and tense waiting in between. Narcologists, medicine men, all sorts of ceremonies … Nothing helped. Ten years of life by! - crying at the reception of the psychologist Larissa.

Why do they endure? Pulling your relative out of the swamp is fraught with many bonuses: you can feel your need and even superiority. A codependent person, like a dependent person, runs away from reality, from anxiety, from fear for his life, status, reputation, he is very afraid of loneliness.

All life is a struggle with drugs and futile attempts to remake a neighbor. Codependents want to control the situation, try to coerce, manipulate. But during this war, even control over their own lives is lost. Their own health and career are crumbling, relationships with other family members, friends and colleagues suffer.

Start with yourself

It is important to understand that no one can make a choice for the drinking person. It is he who is free to dispose of his life as he pleases. You can only wait for him to ask for help.

If you find yourself showing signs of codependency, be sure to see a psychotherapist. Your illness is no less serious. Try doing a little exercise right now that will remind you of what is in your life besides the struggle.

An exercise

• 1. Take a piece of paper and write a detailed answer to the question "Who am I?" For example, “I am a person, personality, woman, mother, daughter, sister, friend, experienced teacher, musician, artist, lover of good books, excellent cook…”.
• 2. On the second sheet, write all your achievements. Finished school, learned to knit, sew, drive a car, learned a foreign language, stopped biting their nails … they could find codependency in themselves. Perfectly! After all, not everyone is able to admit this! Do you see the potential in you? Now call a specialist and make an appointment.

Survival rules

It would be a mistake to think that drunkenness and drug use are temporary and everything will work out when … spring comes, a job is found, a child is born, and your favorite football team wins.

Both alcoholism and drug addiction are chronic diseases. The goal of any treatment will be to achieve sustained remission. There are no “former” ones here.

• Collect as much information as possible. He who is forewarned is armed.
• Do not self-medicate. Only specialists can help: a narcologist and a psychotherapist.
• Do not hide the truth from others, so that they do not lend to your relative and do not call "a beer". Let them contact you if they meet him in an inadequate state.
• Dependent people are talented manipulators. Don't fall for blackmail. Remain firm, even if your loved one is threatening suicide. It is scary, but even worse is to kill him with your own hands, sponsoring the purchase of "poison".
• Work together. Within the family, clear rules of conduct should be stipulated. If someone from the family begins to secretly "feed" the addict, he will "get high" further.
• In cases of inappropriate behavior, theft, violence, call drug treatment specialists and / or contact the police. Having complaints, statements, witnesses will help you protect yourself and your children.
• Be mindful of your own needs and desires. Relax, meet friends, do what you love, and don't forget to take care of other family members.
• Start to lead a sober lifestyle with the whole family, give up feasts with alcohol. This way you will not provoke your loved one.
• Do not try to make the addict's life easier. Don't lie, don't cover up. Let him be responsible for his actions. Expelled from the institute? Lost a good job? Got to the police? How did he want? These are natural consequences.

Dangerous neighbors

The State Duma is preparing a bill on the compulsory medical examination and treatment of alcoholics and drug addicts who have committed administrative or criminal offenses.

Lyudmila SEVERINA, candidate of psychological sciences:

“Methods of treating alcoholics and drug addicts by court decision are widespread in the world. Those persons who, against the background of alcohol abuse, begin to show signs of a mental disorder, which poses a danger to others, should be forcibly admitted to the hospital. If the compulsory treatment bill is passed, it could potentially help a large number of Russians. But the most important thing in solving this problem, in my opinion, is the culture of society and the creation of a competent system of measures for the treatment, rehabilitation and socialization of patients with alcoholism and drug addiction, which is still absent in the country”.

Guzel GAFINA, psychiatrist:

“Currently I work in Switzerland. It is not alcoholism that is compulsorily treated here, but a condition caused by alcohol consumption. If the patient is inadequate, he is taken out of this state, treatment is offered. But if a person says “thank you” and wants to go home, no one is forcibly holding him back. It doesn't make sense. The patient must be motivated. Offenders are punished in accordance with the current law."

Honestly and tough

Very often patients deny their addiction. “Well, what kind of alcoholic? Everybody drinks, and I drink. " Until a person realizes that he has real problems, your attempts to "save" him will go down the drain. Try to list all the methods you have already used. Did it help? No! So why repeat what doesn't work?

All you have to do at this stage is to return the sick person responsibility for his life and finally pay attention to your own. Your only tool is rigidity.

This means that you do not have drunken conversations, do not give a bottle, do not feed, do not pay his debts, call the police if necessary. You can't gossip. You must keep all your promises. Said you won't give any more money? Not a penny more! Did you say that you won't let you spend the night home "high"? Let him sleep on the street. They blurted out that you will file for divorce after another glass - serve! Only in this way will you be taken seriously.

Down with alcohol

According to Rosstat and WHO, Russians have begun to drink less and alcohol in our country is clearly losing ground. The volume of alcohol sales in Russia in terms of pure alcohol fell from 2014 to 2016 by 10.7%

This is confirmed by other figures. So, in 2016, the indicator of alcohol consumption in terms of absolute alcohol per capita per year decreased by 0.2 liters in relation to 2015 and amounted to 10.3 liters. These 0.2 liters of alcohol, for which a decrease is noted, are equivalent to 0.5 liters of vodka or 5 liters of beer with a strength of 4%.

“When there was not a single friend left who was ready to borrow me a bottle of vodka, I suddenly realized that I really needed the help of doctors,” says A. S.

It is the absence of your pity and the objective problems associated with this that will make your loved one wake up and make attempts at treatment. When he himself wants to be treated, he can get free help at the state drug treatment clinic at the place of registration. You can also go to any private clinic. The methods are not fundamentally different: removal of withdrawal symptoms, detoxification of the body, vitamins and psychotherapy.

New Horizons

The treatment was started. Booze, bottles, syringes are gone from his life. The body was treated in the hospital … And the soul was torn to shreds. Now a loved one, as in the tale of a goldfish, stands at a broken trough. Only now he began to understand what he had done, how he sank. And what does a person want in such a state? Right! Forget it!

Codependency pushes the heroic wife or mother into fatal mistakes. She has suffered and endured so much that now she wants recognition and repentance. She comes in and starts cutting. And her loved one needs something to fill the void that the drug or alcohol left behind. Longing, boredom, inaction again push you to return to oblivion. All this pressure becomes irresistible, and it breaks down.

“Why are you sitting there so displeased? I'm everything to you, and you can't even talk to me normally! I drank all the brains! You can't leave alone at home. I suppose you'll run back to your homies. They are already waiting in the yard,”says the mother. And my head is buzzing. The face is swollen. Looking at yourself is sickening. Well, I got up and went … to those same homies,”says L. P.

Finally, at home, peace and quiet. No smell of fumes and shifting eyes. The worst is over, life has started from scratch. This is where the most important and longest part of recovery begins.

Psychotherapy during this period is aimed at solving problems that have become a trigger for addiction, to relieve anxiety, increase self-esteem, and teach self-control skills. That huge space that used to be filled with alcohol or drugs needs to be filled with something. And this is required, perhaps, by the whole family.

Take a walk, travel, visit interesting places, master new or remember abandoned hobbies. Let the world show its colors, open its doors, facets that had previously remained unclaimed or unnoticed.

Sport is one of the most effective remedies for a possible breakdown. Moderate physical activity has a beneficial effect on the whole body, improves mood, relieves nervous tension. Playing sports helps to re-believe in yourself, to feel what you are capable of, and it is useful to spend time.

The addict needs to see that he “can too”.

Let him get a job, help around the house, etc.

Now it is popular among the “former” to start blogs in which they tell how they managed to cope with their illness, give advice, answer questions, inspiring thousands of people with their example. They are not hiding, they are not ashamed, they have become successful, and they have something to be proud of.