SUMMARY KEYWORDS
addiction recovery, family disease, clinical director, personal stories, treatment process, support groups, detachment, mental health, addiction impact, family dynamics, recovery tools, therapy sessions, education resources, community support, personal growth
00:00
Hey, everybody, welcome to the Country Road Podcast. This will be, we're coming into our second year, which is really exciting. It doesn't feel like a whole year's gone by. I think I say that every single time we do this podcast, just because it's been so much fun to get to sit at the table with Kathy and Kimberly; and talk about some of our experiences and what addiction has, the harms that addiction has caused in our lives, and the blessings that addiction causes in our lives.
I think that's a portion of this that we don't talk about often. You know, I wouldn't be here today if it wasn't, I wouldn't be here today like I am, if it wasn't for what addiction has done in my life. And so being on the other side of it, I get to talk about the positives of what has happened in my recovery, and hopefully that's what you can take away from this podcast as well. We're just going to be talking about what the family disease of alcoholism and addiction can do to not just the person that's struggling, but the person, also the family that's around the person struggling.
This isn't just something that affects one person, it affects everybody that touches the life of the addict. So, um, before I get going and before we start talking about all that good stuff, I just want to remind everybody that if you do have a loved one here at our facility, I ask that you please do not share their name in the comment section or anywhere that can be seen publicly. That's for the protection of your loved one.
And so if you are new to the podcast, welcome, if you are returning to the podcast, you will see that there's a new person sitting with us. This is Derek. Derek is the new clinical director here at Country Road. Kimberly is still with the company. She's just moved on to a bigger position, and so just a little special thank you to her. She provided so much great insight into addiction, into what it's like for the lives of the addict, and especially what it's like for the lives of the family. She has great, great personal experience, and she has just been a phenomenal example of what recovery looks like.
And Kathy is here with us again, for going on, going into the second year. I'm really excited to be here. My name is Pierce, if I haven't already said that, I'm the Director of Outreach here, and I am the one who's got the experiences as somebody who has struggled with addiction, and so I'm gonna kick it off. Let me kick it off to Derek to introduce our topic for today and kind of go into a little bit more depth.
02:54
Kathy is calling a time out.
02:56
Hold on. A, I just realized I'm outnumbered, which is not cool. But B, if we are going to put some phone numbers in the chat, once this is posted, we'll post Pierce's, mine and Wyatt, who's our admissions director. So if you have, well, if you have questions, please post them, and we will monitor that and answer them as they pop up. But if you feel you need somebody to talk to; whether it's someone needs a place to go for treatment, if you are a family member who wants somebody from the family side to speak to or the addiction side to speak to, but we'll have numbers in that chat and you please feel free to give us a call or text if you're not comfortable calling. I know actually having to talk to people is scary sometimes. So feel free to reach out to any of us when we pop those numbers in there.
03:44
Yeah, Derek, will you give us a little bit about your background before you jump into the topic?
03:48
Man, I hate questions like that. No, yeah. So I'm trying to figure out in this setting, because other podcasts that I've done on social media, I've been remote, I haven't been at a table with people. When I hosted my own podcast in my office, I just pretended it was way conversational. So I'm trying to decide, is this here? How often do I break the fourth wall and go into the audience interaction?
So it's going to be awkward for an interview. Man, I don't really know what to say. I'm a counselor. I'm the clinical director here. As of pretty, pretty quickly after the New Year rolled around, I've been here at Country Road maybe a year, little over a year before that transition, I started in the field way back in 2006, I can't talk about that without dating myself. So I try to be like I was 12.
04:44
So I started in 2006 and over the years, I have worked in numerous different settings.
04:46
I've worked in executive settings. I've worked in business and marketing settings for facilities. I've worked, obviously, in clinical settings, and that's in outpatient residential treatment like crisis care, hospitalization settings and all those types of things. And so just from a background standpoint, the majority of my career has been with addicts and alcoholics and their families. For sure, people always ask why I got started in the field, and I never really have a great answer for them. I always just kind of tell them, it's dumb luck. But I think most of us that don't have an addiction background ourselves, that do this for a living, do it from a place, because we've seen so many friends and family members struggle over the years with their own stuff, and we've been impacted by those friends and families that are struggling, that it kind of guides us into that area. So I think you get two types of people that do this clinically, professionally.
You get people who are recovering addicts and alcoholics who want to go back to school so that they can help the next person the way that they got helped. And then you have people who have just watched it wreak havoc on our communities for so long that they want to be the ones that step in and offer help. And I think that's probably my story. And then I guess we need to introduce the topic. Is that next on the agenda? Yeah? So we're going to be talking a little bit around the table this morning about the family disease of addiction. I'm trying to decide if I should tell personal stories or not. We do?
06:20
We tell the personal story, yeah, some stuff.
06:23
Mine’s real raw, though. You know, I just had, I just had a conversation. I won't, I'll keep it real vague. I just had a conversation with somebody yesterday who had been visiting someone who was very soon going to be passing away, partly as a result of long term alcoholism, but partly as a result of some other health issues. But obviously, the alcoholism doesn't help, and they're not probably going to stop drinking anytime soon. And they were having a conversation in the hallway in the hospital with this person's ex spouse, who kept saying over and over again, you know, they chose this. They're really angry and bitter, and they chose this, they chose this, and they just reminded them, appropriately and gently, like, you know, they've got a disease.
Like, I don't think it's fair to say that they chose alcohol over you or alcohol over your children, even though it feels that way. And I think that's why this is such an important discussion for families to have early in the treatment process and early in the recovery process. It’s because it helps them understand that addiction is a disease, and I'm sure we have covered that in a different, like more in depth, in a different episode, but also that addiction is a disease that doesn't just impact the primary addict or alcoholic.
It's a disease that impacts the entire family structure in ways that create bitterness and resentment and broken family dynamics, and just like, the addict and alcoholic who doesn't get treatment for their disease of addiction, without a family getting treatment for the family disease of addiction. Those same patterns and relationships, those resentments, those inabilities to communicate, all of those things are just going to repeat themselves in other cycles, right?
I know, Cathy, that's a big part of your story, and we’ll talk about that in a little bit too. But I just think this is a really important topic.
08:16
This has to be edited out to your coffee cup. It's right next to the mic, and I think they can hear you tap it.
Okay. They need more phones.
08:26
Okay, oh man, editors, you guys are making money today.
08:39
Yeah, that's perfect.
08:40
We should get some felt.
08:47
Yeah, yeah, that's what the ones in my office were, the ones where they clip
on the table, and you can actually pull them out that way. They're directional, so they really only pick up your voice. Somebody said something about us getting a headset, and I was like, actually, that would be cool, too.
09:07
I really wanted to create one of my goals, if I was still in my practice and doing my podcast, is I wanted to have a mobile studio that was like, sportscasters, where they just had these and the little microphones and had a bag that they went in so that, like, when I went to conferences and stuff, I could just sit down with people and be like, let's talk, right? That's, I thought that would be fun.
09:27
Yeah, that's such a, that'd be so cool to have that at Country Road and then send it to Buzz Factory. Like, go, really, go to these national conferences. Yeah, sit down with folks and then compile all that well. And, like, there's
09:37
a lot of people that I wanted on my podcast that were like, Dude, I totally do your podcast. But when I did my private one for parents, helping parents, it was always zoom. When I did my private one, my rule was, if you can't come in to where I sit down and we can talk face to face, yeah, it's a no go. I'm not going to do it on Zoom. And so I had a lot of friends who are like, Dude, I totally be on your podcast, but I'm not. I can't come to Oklahoma, but it's like, I'll come to Indiana. We'll do. Yeah, you know, like when I go to on vacation, you know, and I'm driving through New Orleans, and I know somebody that wants to have a conversation, I've got my little bag, nice, yeah, that's sick.
10:10
I love that. I love that. That's another idea to take note of. Is, is getting some portable podcast equipment that we may be able to
10:19
take? Yeah, the guys at Stages of Change used to do that. They used to set up at their conferences in Texas little podcasting stations with, like, a day like at a banner that had their logo and stuff on it. They put two chairs and they have a little microphone, and they would do it
10:34
at conferences for who? For Jennifer Smith or
10:39
Bobby Okay, what's your thing? I don't want to keep
10:45
just personal
10:49
clean eyes. My
10:50
car is going to end up costing me like
10:52
3000 bucks. Jeez, man, that's a down payment on your car, I know. And
10:56
I originally, I originally got quarter for $500 but the place that I took it to, didn't know, I guess, didn't know what they were doing, and they messed up my transmission. I know all it was was a simple diagnostics, and they pulled the they didn't reattach the transmission sensor correctly. It's a shame in a cool owner, though. I guess that's a positive of it, and it'll be fully fixed. Now,
11:33
do you will you take this? Who needs to sign this? Yes, if he doesn't have it, I will
11:41
was accidentally his
11:43
certificate, accidentally stolen.
11:44
Hey, will you take two because I need to. I actually need one as well that he does never bring me. I'm just
11:57
can do. Everybody seems to do what they're supposed to.
12:02
I'm I better copyright copy correctly. It's been acting weird, has it? Yeah, it's like cutting off the
12:13
first quarter.
12:20
Okay?
12:27
All right, what's the over under that we actually get through this?
12:32
I don't know. I'm getting a little bit over it. Over it already. Cat foods is a perfect segue for you to just start talking about your experience. Okay,
12:47
ready?
12:50
Action? Sure, so. Um, no pressure. Um, no like you were talking about. It's, it really does bleed into families. Um, I can tell you, I've had multiple family members struggling with addiction, and it wasn't until my cousin blew back into town in 2019 and we kind of were off to the races with, oh, there's something wrong here. And, oh, we're heading into treatment, and I have to tell you, that alone was scary. I didn't know anything about it, but previous to kind of diving head first into him getting into recovery, I was definitely one of those people that had a lot of resentment, a lot of anger, a lot of fear. And I'll be honest, I was one of those people where I was like, What is wrong with you. Stop it. Like, don't you realize what you're doing to yourself? Don't you realize what you're doing to your family? I had no understanding of addiction. I had no understanding that it was, is, in fact, a disease, and I was definitely one of those, like, just stop. Like, behave. Why won't you? But hey, you're hurting everybody. You're hurting you're like, it just it never made sense to me why someone would continue. I don't know if lifestyle is the word, but this lifestyle seeing the destruction that it's causing to themselves and everyone around them. And then once drew got here, and we went full force into, Oh, you got something going on, and we're going to treatment and detox and all the things, and watching him in his recovery process and starting to, like, heal and get healthy, that I finally was like, Maybe I need to learn something about this myself. I also discovered how crazy I was, not all at all because of this, but it was a huge factor in not crazy. And then I finally realized I needed to kind of look into doing something for myself, getting myself to a healthier place. Because you just you don't when you're in the midst of it. Can really like talk about the roller coaster. Sir, we're all on when you're in the midst of that, you just, you're you're in survival mode all the time. You've got 100 balls in the air, you're trying to juggle, and you don't realize this is not normal, like you shouldn't. You shouldn't be scared and angry and all of the big feelings all the time. And so yeah, it wasn't until I watched him get into recovery and start getting better than I realized, oh, maybe I need to look at myself a little bit and see if I need to do some work on my end.
15:33
My when I so I smoked pot for the first time when I was 12 and and it was, it was something that my friends and I did after school for fun. I could have never imagined what it would turn into by the time I was 1819, years old. You know, it turned into a lot more than just that. But what I didn't realize at the time was that drugs and alcohol were becoming my solution. They were they I always like to say drugs and alcohol weren't my problem, they were my solution, and they were a solution to a me problem, and and so over a period of time, I could no longer differentiate the truth from the false. I could no longer see that what was happening to me was completely out of my control, and and I didn't see how it was hurting my family. I could get glimpses of that, when, the when, the when the house of cards that I was building where I'd be like, you know, what I've got, I got a brand new job. I've got a place to stay. I've got, you know, my family's proud of me for getting that job. Because, God, they were just proud of me for doing the tiniest things that were positive. And so when, when that house of cards would fall, I could get a glimpse into the pain that I was causing my family, but that would immediately be overtaken by the only solution that I had, and that was to get intoxicated. And so I could see how it was hurting my family, but at the same time, it was such a powerful force in my life, I didn't intend on hurting my family with my actions. It was a consequence of the disease active in my life and and so, you know, and now that I've gotten sober, I've been able to to make a lot of that right. I think that, and I but it I hurt my family, and I heard him, I heard him for it wasn't intentional, yeah, it just wasn't. It wasn't something that I set out to do every day, was to hurt my family. It's just a lot of
17:33
the composers, yeah, yeah, yeah. One of the things, Kathy, you had said that, I think it's why. It's why long term treatment and long term, like even 90 days, I would that's long term these days, you know, with the plethora of 30 day and outpatient programs that there are. But one of the benefits of residential programming, I think, is you said that you can't see how crazy you are because you're so busy being in survival mode all the time. Residential Treatment removes the addict and alcoholic from all the distractions of life, helps them focus on themselves, but it also provides temporary relief for the family from the chaos, yeah, right. And it actually gives families an opportunity to go, oh, this is what normal functioning is like outside of the chaos of having to deal with the addiction, right? And it gives them an opportunity to begin to understand, kind of like you did. There are some things maybe that I need to change, about the way that I interact, about my boundaries, there are some resentments and anger that I need to deal with, right? To make all of this healthy, one of the things that and it's on, you know, the sheets that we've got sitting on our table, but that's really important for families to understand, and it's a metaphor that she's really often in addiction treatment, is the idea of a baby mobile, yeah, you have a baby, right? I have a brand new do they have a mobile? A mobile, yeah, like that. It's the thing that hangs over the crib that's gone. Yeah. What is it? What is it? Yeah. Is it like animal lions, lions, bears, zoo themed stuff. We talk about the family being a mobile like that, that each member of the family is autonomous. Each member of the family is different. Your mobile has a lion on it, has a bear on it. Those are different animals, but they're connected through this system that's at play, right? And so if, if the addict, or we'll use the bear, I don't know why I chose the bear. I don't know if I'm got a thing against bears. I don't know. But if that bear is shaken violently, the rest of the mobile has to move. It doesn't, it doesn't shake as violently as the bear shakes. Right? There's not as much damage to the rest of them as the bear, but everything becomes disrupted, and what the family tries to do, more than anything, is create balance and equilibrium once the bear is done doing it shaken, right? And so a lot of the dysfunction we see in families, that's poor decision making and poor boundaries, is actually. An attempt to do the right thing, which is create stability and balance, but we do that in ways that actually are counterproductive and counterintuitive to what we intend to do right? Well, I think
20:09
a lot of us fall into I did in this mode of my head's spinning, of I need to make sure everything's okay, like, I gotta stay on top of you. Are you paying your bills? Are you going to work, or just all the things I got to keep everything in order and moving. And I remember, like, once drew got here, I still couldn't shut it off. I was like, when he finally got phone calls and got to start calling me. It was feeding money for anything, feeding you enough. You don't have clothes. You came here with, like, only a few clothes. How do we get your clothes, besides a dream? But it was like 100 things in my head going, are they taking care of him? What does he need? And it was funny that that just doesn't shut off just because they go into treatment. Like, yes, you notice things are different. You notice things are calmer. But even, like after he got out of treatment, I literally started looking for things to worry about. He This is one of his favorite stories that I tell. But he got out of treatment, he moved into sober living, so I just transitioned over to, is he paying his rent at sober house? Is he going to his meetings? Um, has he ordered his meds? This new sponsor, he's got. Do we like this sponsor? Did part of we check out this? Don't do that. Did part of we check out that sponsor? Yes, we did. Don't do that, but it like you start looking for new things to worry about, because you're so used to feeling like you have to be on top of everything and making sure they're okay and doing what they need to do, and they're not in trouble, and they're not getting high or drinking or what have you like, control that, sure, no, but your entire world is that all the time, whether it's leading to a good place. For me, that's like I said, I just shifted over. Okay, we're doing better. But what if you're always waiting for that other shoe to drop? Yeah. And so the nice thing if you can get to that place and actually enjoy that the chaos has calmed down for a little bit. Hopefully, it took me two years to see how crazy I was into his sobriety. But hopefully, like you said, folks can get that little respite while their family is in treatment, however long it is to see that life is not supposed to be all the crazy. What
22:25
was the what was the straw that broke the camel's back for you, because you said two years, that's a long time to sit in your head. Well, it's much
22:36
longer than that, clearly, but for me, it was literally just watching him get healthier, like mentally, emotionally, spiritually, and I was not I realized I was still absolutely crazy. I was still worrying about him all the time. He was giving me no reason to worry about him all the time. He was doing amazing. He's still doing amazing. But I actually started. I'd been working here by then. And I started hearing, we talk about, you know, 12 step programs here a lot. And I started hearing about, like Alan on and was like, wonder what that's all about. I don't need that, though that's for other people, but every time I turned around, somebody was it was just being mentioned, which is not a all that common thing around here, but at that time, for some reason, there was a couple of months there where every time I turned around, I saw it written somewhere, or somebody mentioned it. So I decided I would go check that out, just to rule it out, because I didn't need that. And just the more I talked like one of the awesome things about this facility is everybody who works here is like in recovery somehow, or has family or is connected somehow to somebody in recovery, if they are not themselves. And it's talked about a lot, and just being able to hear stories about folks from their addiction days and see them now, it's like, so hard for my brain to, like, connect with others the same people, but just to hear about people's recovery and talk about, like, when something, if a problem comes up between two people, here, it's handled in such a healthy way. And so just watching that amongst my coworkers, I started realizing I don't have that. I don't respond to things that way. Everybody here is so calm and just healthy, and I didn't feel that way. I even got to the point where I was going to ask the Clinical Director, Kimberly, at the time, I'm like, Can I maybe sit on in on some of the groups? Maybe I can get some side therapy that way. Didn't ask. That was not appropriate, but yeah, I just I slowly started noticing around me that everybody was so much healthier and happier, and I'm still a straight up crazy person, and should probably do something about it. Yeah, and they'll add edge. Or do you get sick and tired of being sick and tired? That's where I hit. Yeah, pretty much. Yeah. Right?
25:00
The people that are wrapped up in their addiction are the overtly unhealthy people in the family, right? They're the people that it's like, I can line people up and go, that's the one with the problem, typically, right? Yeah, partly because addiction wreaks havoc on us physically, so we don't look well. And there's lots of legal consequences, right? So there's lots of different ways that that becomes identified hands down, though. Now I don't want to say everyone, because I don't like using extremes. Most people in the family are equally as unhealthy as the identified alcoholic, erratic or worse, but in ways that are really easy to hide, right? And one of the things, because I get asked, one of the questions that I get asked probably the most from clients, is, how can you help me if you've never had an alcohol or drug problem, which is totally reasonable question, right? Yeah, I get it. One of the ways I answer that is, just because somebody hasn't had an alcohol or drug problem doesn't mean that they haven't dealt with the plethora of things that you've dealt with in your life. And just look for outlets in different ways that are just equally as unhealthy, right? And so I had a had a staff meeting once years ago the treatment center that I worked at that was for high school females. And I don't know if people outside the industry know this, but in staff meetings, what we do is just talk about you.
26:35
And so we're sitting around. It's terrible to reflect on because I'm like, What is wrong with us? But we're sitting in this room. There's like five counselors and all staff room. There's like 12 people in this room, and we're kind of debating about what this 16 year old girl's problem is, right? And, you know, we've got people chiming in like, Oh, she's got a methamphetamine addiction. That's her problem. We got other people chiming in, no, her problem is an eating disorder, and now her problems family and plotting. Everybody's just kind of throwing stuff in the mix, right? This was a pretty unhealthy 1716, year honor. I can't remember exactly how she was, but at some point, our seasoned veteran, she's still in the field. She's fantastic lady. Karen Mannix, I don't know if you guys know her or not, kind of chimes in, and she was like, you know, there, guys, there's only one disease. And I was a young counselor, so I was like, yes, Karen, educate us, and the room kind of goes quiet. She said, said there's only one disease. I'm not okay with myself, and I took a lot away from that, right? Because what she was saying is, it doesn't matter if somebody's got a methamphetamine addiction or an eating disorder or a food related issue or pornography related issue or a shopping related issue or a co dependency related issue, that so much of all of those things that we struggle with is rooted in some place where we're just not okay with who we are. We've got to figure that out, right? Yeah, and every family member has that problem, right? That's why this is a family disease. And so while the addict and alcoholic is getting help, each family member has to do their diligence to get themselves healthy in whatever way they can, or that person is stepping out of treatment back into the same incredibly dysfunctional environment. And that's probably not the easiest way to maintain recovery is to step back into a family that's all
28:23
jacked up. The common misconception I had for so long was that it was something that I could change by myself, on my own, and through multiple treatment episodes, I got smashed, you know, because I thought, I really thought, if I just dedicate my life to doing the right thing, if I dedicate my life to staying sober, I'm going to be able to stay sober. Because I just I know I can share willpower. Share willpower. But it didn't work like that. It didn't work like that. I think the longest amount of survival I was ever able to hold together on my own was two weeks, and that was not white knuckle fist clenched. I'm at home sitting on a couch watching movies all day long, doing nothing productive. And so when he, when I, when the when the problem got removed, the what on the outside looks like the problem was removed, there was still so much sickness going on, I think I got worse. Yeah, really, I didn't have that that proper, that that coping mechanism that I was using for so many years, once that disappeared, where am I at? You know, I'm not getting better and, and so, you know that that, over time, kind of smashed that idea that I'd be able to do it on my own. And I don't know what that looked like for for you, Kathy, but, well, I
29:38
was literally, well, Derek was talking. I was thinking about, you know, I've been to a number of different speaker meetings, at like, 12 step programs and listening. I remember the like, almost fell out of my chair the first one I went to because I was listening to somebody tell their story that was in recovery from addiction, and hearing him talk a. Out one of his biggest issues is just he was not comfortable in his own skin. And I was like, like, what y'all? What is that? What he just, I like everything he said, outside of the drugs or alcohol aspect of it, like I related to completely. And it was so weird to me because, like, you said, like, we just find a different way to deal with that which we're not really dealing with it, but it's a way of I don't want to deal with those thoughts in my head or the feelings I'm having, so I find some way to avoid them and numer on them and focus elsewhere. So I don't have to think about those things or feel those things, because they're not fun at all. Once. You sorry phones are blowing up today.
30:50
Yeah, once,
30:52
once, and I'm not gonna speak for you, but I imagine your experience is the same once I actually got in to a program and started working and facing those things and having somebody to kind of walk through that with me, dealing with them, working through them, you come out on the other side of that, just feeling better and about yourself and realizing you're stronger than you thought You were. You could handle things in a better way than you thought you could. You learn ways to deal with things where you're not just diverting over, you know, to somewhere else, white knuckling in, yes, yeah, because that whole willpower thing does nothing
31:35
sure does now, where have you found the power was that? Like, where have you found that, like, it's been, has been the most, where have you found the most healing? You think
31:47
it's good question. I'm not sure I understand. Like,
31:54
the most recovery, yeah, the just
31:57
the program I'm working because, like, I said it, I don't like talking about the feelings, because they're not fun and they hurt sometimes, and if I start crying, I'll be so mad at you. But having somebody to like, the cool thing about the program I'm in is you get this, like, mentor, and you slowly work through this program together. You start out slow. You take it one step at a time. You develop that relationship and that trust with each other, where you then realize, okay, I can trust this person. And, you know, tell them all my crazy tell them all my feelings. I hate you so much right now. So yeah, like, you develop that trust, because I can tell you, like, I'm always I could probably use some therapy, if I'm being totally honest. Also company, yeah, no offense, though, but thinking that, the thought of going into a total stranger's office and going, here's all my stuff, no,
32:58
actually feels really good.
33:02
That's right here. But also I'm like, I don't know you from Adam and, yeah, nobody super Yeah, yeah. And so the thought of even doing that in this program, I think that's part of what kept me from going for so long, because just
33:14
the fear, oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
33:17
Um, having said that, walking in scariest things I've ever done, but walking in and realizing all these people, you know, in these meetings I go to, they've all been through the same things I've been through, or worse, they've experienced the same things I've experienced. They've had those same thoughts, all the bad ones that we don't like to admit. And they get it like they totally get it. And the woman who's been walking me through this program for the last two years, um, we're the same kind of crazy, which is fantastic. She totally understands me. She called she catches me on stuff before I even do it or say it, which is awesome, um, but I realized I can trust her with all of my stuff, she never judges me. She still loves me, even for all my insanity, and there's plenty of it, trust me, but just having that person that I know isn't a person outside of everything else that I can call and talk to you about any of this stuff has just been I hate you so much right now.
34:18
No, I love what you've got to say.
34:19
Yeah, one of the things, and you illustrate it really beautifully, Kathy, is that all of our problems, no matter what they are, one of the things they do is they lie to us and try to convince us that we're the only person. Oh, yeah, that's feeling that way or dealing with that. And certainly we experience an active addiction. Nobody else is struggling like I can't tell anybody about this. I have to hide it. But I think the families go through a lot of that too. Nobody else has the crazy thoughts about like, I mean, I've even talked to family members who it's like, man, well, my spouse was drinking. I at times thought, man, it would. It would be better if they would just die in a drunk driving accident. Oh, why? My life would actually improve, right? Yeah, and we we hear that in our own heads and think, man, how messed up is that. I can't tell anyone else that I had this thought, right? But the great thing about support groups, whether they're Al Anon or AA or NA or the plethora celebrate or cover, the plethora of support groups that are out there, is they immediately put you in an environment with a community of people who also have felt that way, right? And it alleviates that sense of aloneness, right? And elevates that sense of community, yes,
35:29
well, and also, like, God willing, if you're going to a meeting, that is solution based, because we're both well aware that there are many that are not Yeah, but if you're going to one, that's not just people sitting around and complaining about their lives and what's going on, if you're going to one where it's people talking about, yes, here's something I've been through or I've dealt with, but this is how this program has helped me handle it in a healthier way. Um, not let it affect me and my feelings and my brain, because our brains are mean sometimes, but if you have one that you can see, like, I can tell you, one of the weirdest things when I first walked in was hearing all these people laughing. And I was like, clearly I'm in the wrong place, because I'm looking for
36:16
the misery. Yes, exactly like, what are all these people laughing
36:19
about. And then I realized, like, as the meeting got going, the first one I went to, it was, yeah, they've all been through the same stuff, but it's funny that the whole car accident, because, literally, the first two meetings I went to, someone shared about, like, the plan they had for their spouse, yeah, to murder them. And it was down to, here's how I'm going to do it. You're going to get away with it. Here's what I'm wearing to the funeral. Yeah. And I thought, Where have I come? Luckily, they didn't do it. You
36:50
thought, I'm not I'm not yelling over the plan.
36:55
And I remember, I've never had that plan, but I had the other thoughts, if things would just be easier if this happened, and
37:02
people don't realize that that's pretty normal when you're in a place of, like, dark misery related to addiction. Yeah, I sound any different than people who have been in active addiction, who have had thoughts like, it would be easier if I just overdosed? Yeah,
37:16
I've heard drew several you guys make that comment several times, like, sometimes I just wish I wouldn't wake up like life would be easier, or I can tell that's where my life is headed, yeah, and unfortunately, it's not going to be today. It's going to take 1015, 20 years. So we all have one version of it or another. But you
37:36
touched on something that, that that I had spoken about just at the beginning of the podcast, where, you know, generally, we come into recovery in a really dark place, but after a while, we understand why that room is so joyous. And we spoke about the fellowship you know, in addiction, you are alone. The family is alone, like Derek said, it's just it is a lonely place to be if you are struggling with addiction, or if you've got a family member, that is because your addiction does lie to you. It says nobody's gonna understand what I'm going through. Also, if I, if I tell anybody, they're not gonna what's our What's some of our biggest fears? Uh, people aren't gonna love me. People are gonna judge me. I'm going to be outcasted. I'm not going to have any more friends. If my friends understood, if my friends knew what was happening, that they would judge our entire family, we'd be outcasted. Those are the lies that the addiction will tell us. And then the addict is the version of it is nobody loves you. So you know, it's all this. It's a lot of the same fears that we struggle with. But when we come in and we will even start mingling with some other folks that have been there. Wow, does that change. It smashes the it's, you know, for me, it took a while. It took a while. And I think what, I think, what really, really laid the foundation for me to get sober was sitting across the table from another alcoholic and openly, just laying it all out there. Yeah, all the nasty things that I've done, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, just laying it down on the table for everybody to see. I didn't realize how freeing that was at the time, but there was no other person that I could talk to about those things other than another person who has been through the exact same things. And that's what these fellowships are made up. They're all made they are. They're made up entirely of people who have gone through the same exact things. And so, you know, addiction has given me a life that I that I only could have dreamed of. And that's a weird thing to say, I think, I think, but the flip side of it is it's really recovery from the addiction that's going to mean just the life that I just the life that I couldn't have imagined, and maybe I couldn't have gotten there before that, and because the fellowship really is what I'm so grateful for today. Yeah,
39:50
I think when people make it individual, addicts or alcoholics and family members, my experience has been for the people that have. Been able to find long term healthy recovery, they are far healthier and far more resilient than a random sampling of people on the street would be, right? Because they found a solution, and family members find a solution in place, and people that they can confide in and in community and they learn that, like, Hey, it's okay. Like, we don't have to take life quite so seriously, but we also have to, like, make sure that we're not going down those deep, dark rabbit holes by ourselves. Yeah,
40:29
it gives us, it gives us another solution. Gives us a solution to life that maybe we wouldn't have had before. Yeah, you know, a way to process the the shame, the guilt that we feel, and everybody, everybody goes through those feelings. That's a very common universal feeling, absolutely shame, yeah? Guilt, resentment, anger, yeah, self pity. Those are really common human emotions. We just have been given an opportunity to practice some different tools that help us walk through those maybe a little bit differently than somebody that hasn't had the experience, you know,
41:02
yeah, yeah. I honestly think the entire world could benefit from probably those tools.
41:08
Yeah. Well, it's, you know, it's, what's funny about that is for somebody who's never had a problem, well, it's funny. I always have to catch myself. There is certainly a difference between being alcoholic and having a problem with alcohol. Problem with alcohol, right? Like, I went to college in Stillwater, so, oh yeah, yeah, I know what it's like to, like drink too much in class one semester, right? But for somebody who's never been like an alcoholic and who's never been able to make those behavioral changes and need help with it, right? I love the big book of AA like it is so full of rich, healthy things that I would use it when I had my private practice, which was really only about 30% substance abuse work and about 70% just people coming in off the streets, because they were not off the streets, but calling me for home and needing needing therapy for depression or anxiety or family related stuff. I did a lot of marriage counseling for those couple years because it was post COVID. Oh, yeah, I routinely drew on things from the 12 step program that people were not familiar with, right? Because they had never like. If you don't go to an AA meeting, you're never going to be handed that book, and you're never most people aren't just going to like for hobby reading go. I think I'm going to read Alcoholics Anonymous vacation, yeah. But if there's so much just healthy things in there that could benefit anybody like I think everybody should probably read it. If you're a family member of an addict or alcoholic, you should absolutely read it as a as a way to educate yourself about the process and about what they may be experiencing. So, yeah, there's
42:50
a dedicated chapter in that to family members.
42:54
Yeah, I have one to wives. Yeah,
42:56
that's, and that's, that's the one yeah to the wives and the family afterwards, those two chapters are like you say, just rich in information with what it's like to be,
43:09
to be a family member. I used to open all my family therapy sessions like if it was the first time somebody was coming in for marriage and family therapy, even for non alcoholics, with a quote from that chapter right where it says, when two people sit down and begin to, and this isn't word for word, but begin to unload their own stuff about what they're bringing to the table, it lays a healthy foundation for discussion, and it has to be done without resentment, without fear. And couples were like, What are you reading that from? And I'm like, oh, that's anonymous. Are you not calling? But my book is chock full of like, like, quotes and lines and stuff like that. Well, hey, I've done I've been in the field for so long that I've had to familiarize myself with it. But I very quickly found out that, like, Man, I really like this book. It's got some good
43:56
stuff. Is really relatable, just across so many I don't know what
44:02
the word is. Well, yeah, when you, when you look down through the 12 steps, like, I really think that the the main contributors are to that book were really well read in, like, some old school, like, philosophical foundations, because there's so much crossover that it's like, I don't know if they were, they definitely, probably weren't reinventing the wheels. They were like, Hey, these are things that we've learned and read, that guys wrote 500 1000 years ago, that we need to now break addicts, alcoholics. But when you look back through those 12 steps, it's like, it makes a lot of sense for everybody, except where your faults are and that you've got problems, like, understand you don't have any control. Take an inventory of your strengths and defects, share those with somebody like, like, all of that stuff just makes good sense. Yeah, people harm,
44:49
write them on a list and make amends. Yeah, make amends to Yeah, and then watch somebody else do it because yeah,
44:54
like, it's like, all of that stuff outside of the drug and alcohol related stuff, just seem. Like really healthy ways to build community and to live, you know, get together with a group of people regularly talk about your stuff. Yeah, that makes sense
45:09
to me. Yeah, take the face off of it, and you look a little bit deeper into it. Yeah, yeah, for sure.
45:16
I don't know how much time, how much time,
45:19
probably 10 minutes. Yeah, weird,
45:21
yeah, we had a few more interruptions. I had a list that I wanted to share because, I mean, the hope is that families are watching this. Yeah, who are have loved ones in any one of our several treatment centers. So I just made a short list, like, if I could tell family, if I could tell the family members of everybody I was working with. Here are things that you should do while your loved one is in treatment. It's like the short list, right? One is is get some education about the disease of addiction and alcoholism. Things like this are a great place to start. YouTube is a phenomenal resource. Like you can do, you can get on Google, you can get on YouTube and watch all different kinds of educational videos about addiction. There's a documentary that you can probably purchase on Amazon fairly inexpensively, called pleasures unwoven. That's a fantastic documentary that just is about the brain disease of addiction. It's not super boring, and it's got really good information in it. So find some education. Go to some open AA meetings, go to smoking aa speaker meetings, get the book, read some of that stuff. But don't stop there. Like that's like the first step of what you should be doing while your loved ones here. You also need to dive into your own 12 step. Work through some sort of support group that's designed for family members. Celebrate Recovery has components to that. Al Anon actually would is a great one to start with. Check out some meetings there. Learn about what your own stuff is and what you're bringing to the table in a dysfunctional family. After that, I think everybody should be working with their own therapist while their family member is in treatment. You know, it seems, I don't want to say unfair. It seems like a shitty deal to say you're going to treatment for 90 days. I'm going to hang out here and rest and relax, right, right? Like I get it, the person that has the primary drug alcohol, she has to go to treatment, but while they're gone, is a great opportunity for you to engage in therapy with a therapist that's local in your city. Wherever the treatment center is that you're working with should be able to connect you with those right? So start working with them. Go talk to them about what stress has been like. Talk to them about what addictions done in the family, and start unpacking and unloading that stuff. And then find some sort of mentorship. And if that is done through the whatever 12 step outlet you're going to that's great, but if it's not, there are still some other availabilities out there. A lot of people don't even know this, the Partnership for Drug Free America. I can't remember. They've changed their name like eight times, Drug free.org It's a website used to be called the Partnership for drug free kids, and then I think it's now just called the partnership, but nobody knows what that means. It's real modern, real, real, modern, Drug free.org they actually do like, free parent mentors for parents who have children, addict, alcoholics, any age. They don't have to be like young kids, like they do free mentoring. They'll pair you up with a parent mentor that's been trained by their program, and you get like seven phone calls with them, which is really just a great way to hear somebody else's story, share some of your story and have somebody go, here's what you need to do, go to an Alamo meeting. Go find therapist, right? But those programs are out there. There's another book organization called parents helping parents. It's a great place to meet other parents or other family members who are dealing with this. So don't just think I'm going to send my family member to treatment. They're going to get better and come home and I don't really have any skin in the game. You know, it's not going to work out well, I
48:48
think that's easy to think, because a lot of us on this side of it get into this mindset of, they're the bad one, they're the one messing up, they're the one breaking laws, they're the one doing X, Y, Z, and I'm the one who's been here this whole time, keeping the ship afloat, covering for you, with your boss, covering for you, with the rest of the family, making sure the entire world doesn't know what's going on. So it's easy to get in that position as the family member of think I I'm the martyr. I'm doing all the fantastic things and making sure everything's all right, and you're the bad one. And so why do I need I literally came up for a family therapy session with Drew and I remember on my way out the door, his therapist said you might want to look into Ellen on and I just kind of smiled at her and spent the 30 minutes driving home. I'm not going to say the words I said, but you don't know me, lady, I've spent an hour with you. You don't know what you're talking about. I don't need that. I didn't do anything I didn't do anything wrong. Why do I have to go to meetings? That's where my head no, and again, it took me two years to realize not that I did anything wrong. But no, I needed some meetings so
49:51
I can remember countless times being in family therapy sessions, especially when I worked with adolescents. Right? Families would come out to the treatment center to do their first family therapy. Session, and they would leave, and I would literally look at their child and go, I get it. I would totally do drugs too, if that was
50:15
we're on the same page now, yeah,
50:19
maybe you've been telling the truth all this time. Can you imagine what it would be like to be now, where you're at, how far you've come, being a fly on the wall in that room? You play,
50:29
yeah, yeah. She
50:30
had no idea, yeah. It's amazing. I get, I really, I, you know, I've got loved ones that struggle with addiction, but I primarily, I really, know I talked about one that struggled so much I could, you could have never talked me into me having a problem until I was ready to accept the fact that I had a problem that. And that's just like, that's like, like, the one on one of this, you know, yeah, I could never have been convinced that what I had was a problem on top of that, even furthermore, okay, maybe I do have a problem. Honestly, you can't use the drugs that I was using and not realize at some point or another, this isn't right. I've been told all my life that I shouldn't use these. Yeah, I'm using them. There's obviously a problem. But you're not going to get offensive to the fact that I can't stop on my own. Yeah, that's a whole nother layer. Or, you know, the peel back from the onion, or I can handle it. I can handle it. The
51:24
good news, though, is the families do the things that are on the short list. They can do all of that, even if their loved one is unconvinced they have a problem or unwilling to engage in treatment related services, and it's only going to make the family healthier. Like families all the time, like, I don't know what to do. My family was doing this. That's what I know. What to do. You need to work on your stuff. Yeah, if that's all you can do, because you don't have any control your your family didn't have any control over you, or you had been sober a long time before you were right. Um, but they have control over what they do, and they can still get the education, find some support groups, work with their own therapists, so that at least they're the healthiest they can be, in spite of what might be happening with the attic or at all. That's a
52:05
that's a great point. That's a great point. Well, that's one of the hardest things just to come to accept as a family member, is like a your family member being an addict is not your fault. You didn't cause it. Like you can't control what they're doing. You can't control what's happening to them. You have control over yourself how much you participate, because we absolutely participate. I may not be in the car with you going to your dealer to get your drugs, but did I get some family
52:27
members do well, I'm not shaming those family members. If they've done that, then I've heard that story. Oh, sure,
52:32
you'll be safe. Yeah,
52:35
that's it. I
52:36
can protect you. I will drink with you so I can keep an eye on how much you're drinking. Yeah.
52:40
And on this side of the table, that seems so illogical. Oh, but when you're stuck in the when you're in the throes of it, it makes total sense. It's like the parents who are like, oh, you know, if they're going to have a graduation party and all the high school kids are going to are going to drink, I'd at least want them to do it at my house that way I know if they're being safe or not, right? Like, yeah, on our side of the table. That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard in my life. Yeah, on their side of the table, as a parent who's co dependent trying to protect their child from a DUI or a wreck, it probably makes total sense,
53:09
yeah, but it's super unhealthy, yeah, if I keep going through your pockets and taking out, like, whatever I find in there, well, clearly the problem is all because I took it out of your pockets, it's not like, we'll get more then we don't think about that part. But yeah, you just you don't realize the harm you're causing to yourself and to your loved one, and that you're continuing to put yourself in these positions. And I like, I remember being told we throw this word detachment around a lot in the program I work. We're also not great at explaining what we mean by things. And so my mind went, Well, if somebody's hurting me, if somebody's behavior, their words, whatever have you, are hurting me, then I will just detach from them. And my mind went, they need to go away. Like, I'm done with you. You go away. And I remember talking to my mentor like, this is something I'm considering with this person. Because, oh, and she's like, Honey, that's, that's not detachment, that's amputation. There's a difference. And when we talk about detachment, it's, it's literally just learning to not let other people's words, behaviors and what have you affect you. Like learning that I had no control over somebody else's behavior. I can't make you do or not do something. Why am I letting what you're doing bring down my thoughts, my feelings, my entire day, weeks on end, sometimes, but that was the hardest part of just accepting that I I don't have to spend all my time worrying about what you're doing, how you're feeling, what you're engaging in, because all that's doing is hurting me, and it really has nothing to do with me, because I, in the end, I can't stop you or help you. Honestly, you have to want to help yourself and get the help all of my don't I love you enough? Haven't I done enough for you? You know none of that works. All that does is pile more guilt on you, give you more of a reason to use drugs. I. And make me feel terrible, because clearly I'm doing something wrong, because everything I'm doing is not working and making you get sober, because, you know, I have all that power, yeah, but yeah, just trying to accept that I don't have that is one of the hardest parts. But
55:16
it is willing, being willing to accept that maybe I don't know really what's going on. Maybe I do need help. Maybe I need to reach out to somebody that can be the hardest, the hardest thing to do. Yeah, the hardest thing to do. And Kathy not touched on her earlier, you know, if, if anything we have said this evening relates at all, and you no idea what the next step is. That's why we're here. Yeah, that's why we're here. Yeah, we are here to bridge that gap for you. And so I really hope that if, if you've related tonight, that that you can work up that courage to just pick up the phone and just shoot a text. Just shoot a text. Another thing, another great thing to do, like Derek said, maybe, maybe you don't want to talk to anybody about it yet, but you want to do a little bit of exploring. YouTube is a great one. Yeah, picking out some literature, some Al Anon literature. Those are great, great places to start. But thanks, Eric, you brought a lot of good stuff to the table. Man,
56:16
it was fun to be here. Man, yeah, I'm
56:18
really to come back. Yeah, you're gonna be here with us for the whole
56:23
I think you mean you have to come
56:27
back. I think, I think we're gonna get a lot of good, lot of good conversations. Awesome. Well, thanks for tuning in, everybody, and we'll see you next time bye.