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Helping An Addict


Posts: 3
Joined: December 8, 2015


Posted: December 8, 2015, 4:08 AM
My husband and I moved from New England to Las Vegas about a year and a half ago. We left behind his older brother (50 in March), his adult children and my adult children.

We found out in August that he had taken a $5,000.00 deposit to do work on a house and smoked it all in crack. We went home for a brief visit at the end of August and he looked like holy hell.

His life has only gotten worse. We offered to pay for a plane ticket out west to help him get away from his hooker girlfriend and away from the dealers he knows. It took him over a month to accept our offer but when he finally did we booked at ticket.

In the two weeks leading up to (tomorrow) the day of the flight, he's done nothing but lie, use and hurt people. I'm not even sure he's getting on that plane tomorrow and I hate to say it but part of me will be relieved if he doesn't.

My husband loves his brother and I love him too. We want to help him. I have been encouraging my very rigid husband to cut him some slack, spend some time building him up rather than putting him down and help him gain some self-confidence. WE CAN HELP HIM! Right???

Less than 12 hours to go, countless dollars for plane ticket, putting food on the credit card, enlisting people to keep us informed and keep tabs on him ... give him rides ... he is lying with the ease of a child laughing .... and when I log into his phone information (which we paid for) he was calling all of his dealers after reassuring the ride we have arranged that he was packed and ready to go in the am...

I'm now feeling maybe I've bitten off more than I can chew with this endeavor. I'm scared and nervous. I WANT to help my brother-in-law. I love him. He needs to get out of town for sure. He's burned too many people.... He doesn't know where to find the drugs here in Vegas ... and he won't for a few weeks anyway, right?

I'm scared for him ... but I'm scared for my husband and I as well. We live a quiet, peaceful life. We don't use drugs. My husband doesn't drink at all and I drink on weekends normally. It comes down to the wire. IF he makes it on that plane, have I made a huge mistake in supporting the idea that we can help him get better?


Posts: 3
Joined: December 8, 2015


Posted: December 8, 2015, 5:26 AM
I guess I should have posted this in families of addicts, I apologize. If I knew how to move it, I would.


Posts: 150
Joined: July 31, 2015


Posted: December 12, 2015, 2:14 PM
I'm going to take a wild guess and say your brother in law probably didn't get on that plane which I hope for your sake he didn't.


Letting him live with you is going to be big mistake. Just read the stories on here. You're going to find 'thing's' missing, money, jewelry. Your car, credit cards, checks may go missing. If he did get on that plane and is living with you, make sure you hide your valuables.

You or your husband can't fix him just by getting him away from his former drug dealers, or trying to talk some sense into him. It doesn't work that way with drug addicts. Drugs change a person and they're not the same people they were when they were sober. Your husbands heart is in the right place and I can understand him wanting to help his brother, but his brother has to want to get clean and if he's still contacting his drug dealers, getting clean isn't on his mind.

Good luck to you.


Posts: 22
Joined: November 26, 2015


Posted: December 12, 2015, 2:30 PM
Make the call and get to a Nar Anon or Ala Non meeting asap. Having him live with you is a big mistake. Get help for you and your husband.

Read our posts and you will see we love our family members with addictions so much but they can and will destroy if we allow it.

Good luck


Posts: 3
Joined: December 8, 2015


Posted: January 20, 2016, 6:27 AM
I apologize for not responding sooner. I have had very little privacy since he arrived.

He seems to be doing well for about ten days at a time. And only because we hold his money hostage as well as hold him hostage when we are able.

I'm angry and frustrated, as I'm sure you can all relate. Just last night I was waiting up for him until 3:00 a.m. He thinks he's come SO FAR since arriving here 45 days ago. Unfortunately, he managed to seek out crack ten days after his arrival. Astonishing to me, but I guess not so much to users or to all of you. By doing crack every ten days, he's essentially making it impossible for him to pass a drug test and get a job.

My frustration: He's rude, he's a know-it-all, he's better than everyone and we are all a******* for living a normal life in which we pay bills.

My husband is "at the end of his rope" every time his brother goes out and uses but the next day both of them pretend nothing happened. I got four hours' sleep last night and had to sign into work (I work from home) while the BIL laid around the house all day napping and yawning and making rude comments.

Also, he is eating us out of house and home!!! I have never seen another human being eat as much as him. He lived on ramen noodles for a year and a half and now NOTHING is good enough for him. He hates the seasoning I put on steak, he hates pasta because it fills him up too fast, he hates chunk light tuna and will only eat solid white .... the list goes on and on ...

Negative, negative, negative. We are all a******* for paying our bills ...

I just don't understand how ANYONE can live in the disgust he did for so long and then bash EVERYTHING about our food, our home, our ideals, our morals....

He generates more laundry by himself in three days than my husband and I do all week. When we call him on it, he says, well she coupons, so all this s*** is free. Well couponing is amazing and I do get a lot of things for free but .... no, not FREE, especially not to you. He wears a shirt for four hours and throws it in the laundry.

The holier than thou attitude, and nothing being good enough for a homeless, NEGATIVE, MEAN, UNEMPLOYED, NEEDY person is wearing me down.

I suggest jobs, he nods his head and ignores. I tell him by the time he gets an interview in this city, he will be clean. He has YET to apply for a job. He literally does NOTHING but lay around and complain or take off to go have "some beers" because he's "bored".

OMG, I'm calm, patient and lecture him without yelling. I suggest and show him NA meetings, I offer to take him ....

I would rather put him on a plane back to VT than cut him loose on the streets of Vegas but I don't know how many more apologies I can take. They are all sincere at the time, I'm sure. I am admittedly not equipped to help him. The EASE with which he lies is astonishing ... and while I recognize it, my husband does not.

I've rearranged my entire house, and my entire lifestyle and I'm feeling like it's completely pointless. And I KNOW the addiction is speaking when he's being a complete d*** but I'm at a loss.


Posts: 3
Joined: December 8, 2015


Posted: January 20, 2016, 6:31 AM
And PS, I am looking into Nar-Anon. I am trying to get him into NA which he swears he will but ... I see no effort on any front. Plane ticket back to face the problems in New England is my guess, the next step.


Posts: 1906
Joined: October 23, 2011


Posted: January 20, 2016, 9:20 AM
Al-Anon and Nar-Anon will help you discover why you bought him the ticket to live with you in the first place.

They will introduce you to The Serenity Prayer:
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
The courage to change the things I can,
And the wisdom to know the difference.


--------------------
Serenity Prayer
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
The courage to change the things I can,
And the wisdom to know the difference.


Free copy of AA's Big Book on-line: http://www.aa.org/pages/en_US/alcoh...olics-anonymous

Free copy of NA's Big Book on-line:
Copy & Paste coastalcarolinaarea.org/literature/books/b_t.pdf


AA's HOW IT WORKS:
Copy & paste www.aa.org/assets/en_US/p-10_howitworks.pdf


NA's HOW IT WORKS:
http://www.na.org/admin/include/spa...0it%20Works.pdf


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--- driven by a hundred forms of fear, self-delusion, self-seeking, and self-pity.

---there are those too who suffer from grave emotional and mental disorders but many of them do recover if they have the capacity to be honest.

... I need AA more than it needs me.

--- I fight recovery tooth and nail....
I'm not used to being sane, it just doesn't seem natural.


...... According to the great spiritual teachers, ignorance does not result from what we don’t know; ignorance results from what we think we do know.

---Some think that 2+2=5 and believe it.
Some know that 2+2=4 and can't stand it.


--- I didn't have a very happy childhood
but I sure am having a long one !


---Dry since 1989
working daily on getting/staying SOBER.


---If you want to drink, that's your business
...If you want to quit, that's AA's business.


... Tell me, I'll forget;
... Show me, I'll remember;
... Engage me, I'll understand.


---Most problems are psychological.
Most solutions are spiritual .


"If we try to change our ego with the help of our ego, we only have a better-disguised ego."
--Richard Rohr


WWBWD (What Would Bill W. Do)
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