Are You Enabling the Addiction in Your Family?

It’s easy to get caught in unhealthy relationship patterns. They often come out of love and protection. We want to make sure that we are loved and that others are loved too. However, like most unhealthy patterns, enabling might be doing more harm than good. This article will explore what enabling is and what to do if you find yourself enabling the addiction of someone you love. 

Enabling is a pattern of helping a loved one with the things that he or she should be responsible for, particularly having to do with poor choices or behavior. For instance, if your husband is an alcoholic and calls out sick a lot, you might be enabling if you call your husband’s employer to cover up for him. Or you might be enabling if you give your addicted loved one money. Or you might enable your friend or family member if you repair something that he or she broke while high on drugs. In other words, you’re indirectly participating in the poor choices of your loved one and enabling his or her behavior.

As mentioned above, enabling is a pattern that comes out of love and protection. If you believe you are enabling an addiction, don’t be so hard on yourself. You might first recognize that you are doing it because you love that person. However, the next step is to learn how to change the way you relate. In fact, one of the most powerful ways you can help a family member who is struggling with an addiction is to do just that. You might begin by learning about enabling and codependent relationships. This will help you recognize any unhealthy ways that you may be participating in the relationship. For example, you might learn that codependent relationships are those in which two people believe they need each other in order to survive or feel better about themselves. Codependency can develop out a belief in needing someone else in order to feel powerful. Enabling a member of your family might be related to a feeling that you need them in order to feel good about yourself. Learning about these kinds of dynamics can help you respond differently to someone you love.

In fact, there are many healthy ways to respond to someone with an addiction without getting caught up in enabling them. For instance, another aspect of codependency is focusing too heavily on the needs of the other. Those who tend to fall into codependent relationships tend to believe that their own happiness is dependent upon making the other person happy. It’s common in codependency to ignore your own needs in order to please someone else. However, this can undermine a person’s own sense of power. And when someone does not believe in their own power to create change in their lives, they won’t take the steps they need for growth and healing. Enabling only perpetuates a person’s belief in powerlessness.

If you find that you’re enabling a friend or family member, seek professional help. Doing so can support both you and the ones you love.

The Benefits of Going to An Alcoholics Anonymous Meeting

There is a reason why the 12-step model has lasted this long, why it's become so popular around the world, and why it's helped millions of people get sober. There is a wisdom behind the 12-step model and strength in the Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) community. Someone hoping to get sober (or avoid relapse) can rely upon the inspiration, motivation, and support that an AA meeting can provide for alcohol addiction recovery.

If you're new to AA, here are some benefits you might gain from attending one of their meetings:

Community - An accepting community is essential for continued sobriety. For many, once they realize that they are not alone in the alcohol or drug recovery process, there’s hope. There's hope that it's possible to get sober, especially when at each meeting there are many others who have gotten sober and having maintained their sobriety for years. Furthermore, belonging to a group can heal that sense of separation, from others and from yourself. Being with others who are in recovery can provide you with a listening ear, honest feedback, and therapeutic experiences. In other words, relating to the stories of others can be incredibly healing for learning about yourself. Recovering addicts can support one another by sharing personal stories and providing a level of support that family and friends who are not on the same path cannot. It's common for AA meetings to be incredibly welcoming. Everyone there knows what it's like to be at the beginning of recovery. It's a tender place to be. Furthermore, many recovery addicts don't ever lose that tenderness and vulnerability to relapse and having to start all over again. Having a community that is embracing and accepting can be the pivotal piece to one's recovery.

Structure and Guidance - At each meeting, members are reminded of the 12 steps. These are a set of guidelines that can not only help a person end an addiction but also help him or her create a new lifestyle that does not include substance use. Each of the 12-steps have proven to be a path towards creating a great life change. When those who want to stay sober continue to practice the 12 steps on a daily basis, they can eventually find sobriety.

Support - Both structure and a community of people can be supportive in and of themselves. However, attending AA meetings comes with other forms of support. For instance, it's common practice for members to have a sponsor. A sponsor is someone who has more sobriety and who can serve as a mentor. Also, today, the AA community makes books, apps, online forums, and chat rooms available to its members. There are many ways that an AA member can get support if he or she looked for it.

New Friendships - From within the community that AA provides, it's possible for a recovering addict to form new friendships with others based upon sobriety. Instead of spending time with those who are also addicts, a person new to sobriety can find men and women to spend time with who are making sobriety a priority in their lives.

If you or someone you know is hoping to get sober, attending an AA meeting can provide hope, support, and guidance.

Moderate Drinking Means Responsible Drinking

Everyone has a different relationship to drugs and alcohol. There are some who can have a drink with dinner, enjoy the relaxation, and not think about alcohol for the rest of the evening. And there are others who have an addictive relationship with alcohol, who know that if they have a drink they will want another and another and another. For those who have a risky relationship with alcohol, or who have experienced an addiction in the past, they may want to consider Moderation Management. 

Moderation Management is a program that encourages men and women to take responsibility for their own drinking habits, whether that means drinking in moderation or abstaining entirely. In fact, Moderation Management (MM) is an organization, similar to Alcoholics Anonymous that provides an alternative to the 12-step path of sobriety. They offer peer-run support groups for those who would like to reduce their alcohol consumption or achieve controlled drinking. Moderation Management was founded by Audrey Kishline in 1994.

But what exactly does drinking moderately mean? Of course, it could be defined differently by different people, and if one is not careful, it can be defined too widely and contribute to addiction or relapse. According to experts at DrinkLink Moderate Drinking Programs, an organization promoting moderate and controlled drinking, moderate drinking is light, responsible drinking that is suited to the occasion. This type of drinking should not cause harm to oneself or to anyone else.

If someone is drinking and they continue to have hangovers, get into fights, call in sick to work, and/or become ill, then he or she is not drinking moderately. It is obviously causing harm to oneself and to others. Furthermore, if a person is embarrassed by the amount of drinking they are doing, or if their friends and family are making comments one’s drinking, then this too may be an indication that there is too much alcohol consumption. Lastly, if a person is experiencing any health, social, legal, financial, or occupational issues due to drinking, then this might be a sign that the amount of alcohol consumed is too much and too frequent.

The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) defines excessive or binge drinking as a pattern of drinking that raises one’s blood alcohol levels to 0.08. This level usually occurs after 4 drinks for females and after 5 drinks for males in about two hours. In the U.S., one drink is considered to be 12 ounces of beer, 5 ounces of wine, or 1½ ounces of hard liquor, such as gin or whiskey. Each of these proportions delivers about 12 to 14 grams of alcohol.

To be safe, the NIAAA recommends males avoid drinking no more than 4 drinks in a day or no more than 14 drinks per week.  Females should avoid drinking no more than 3 drinks in a day or no more than 7 drinks per week.

If you feel that you are having trouble with the amount and frequency of your alcohol consumption, contact a mental health provider today. Doing so may prevent an addiction or provide the right support for an addiction that might already be in place.