Navigating the Storm: Dealing With Loved Ones Battling Addiction

Written by: Meredith Speir-Cavalier

Addiction is one of the most beautiful and painful journeys that a person can through. I have been through the good, the bad, and the ugly over the past sixteen years in my own personal journey of recovery. I am so incredibly grateful that I put the drugs down and found a life worth living. Since 2009, I have not found it necessary to use any substances and trust me, I have been through some tough times.

I’ve been on both sides of addiction and for many years had a front row seat and watched loved ones battle their own addictions. This is an absolutely heart wrenching situation. Addiction is not only difficult for the one battling it, but for everyone who loves the person that is using. Addiction is a slow heartbreaking storm that can turn your life upside down, multiple times. When a loved one is caught it the grips of addiction, it feels like watching them drown while standing helplessly on the shore. I’ve been there. If you are there, you are not alone. There were so many times that I felt as if I was standing on the shore, watching my loved one drown, and begging God for the storm to end and for my loved one to stop using.  

How do we navigate the storm?

How do we deal with our loved one that is struggling?

How do we heal our wounded souls? 

What do we do if our loved on will not stop using?

Here are some tips that have worked for me when I have navigated the storm with loved ones. Have I done these things perfectly over the years when my loved one struggled? Absolutely not! But if you have someone if your life that you love and is using struggling with addiction, I encourage you to keep reading.

1.        Set Boundaries While Keeping an Open Heart

This sounds impossible, right? One of the most difficult lessons I continue to learn in life, is the importance of boundaries. It feels counterintuitive to set limits with someone that you love and care about, especially when they are struggling, doesn’t it? But boundaries are not punishment, they protect you and your well-being. It’s an acceptance and understanding that I cannot pour from an empty cup. Boundaries are love for you and your loved one. Boundaries draw a line that says, “I love you and care about you, but I will not enable your self-destruction.”

2.        Find Support in Another Person

You cannot do this alone. You just can’t! It has important for me over the years to have at least one person that I can confide in about the challenges with loved ones that are using. I must find at least one person that I can get vulnerable with and confide in. Support groups, therapy, and communities of humans who have walked this same road, can be lifelines for dealing with a loved one battling addiction. If you are reading this right now and you feel alone, I can assure you that you are not alone and there are people that are able and willing to help.

3.        Encourage Treatment, But Don’t Force It

Your loved one that is using, might need treatment and professional help. You can offer resources, express concern, and encourage professional help but here is the tricky thing about addiction. Getting help and finding recovery is ultimately everyone’s choice. You cannot force your loved one to get treatment. In my personal experience, ultimatums do not work. Boundaries for the loved one work but placing ultimatums on our loved ones that is caught up in the disease of addiction demanding treatment, just do not work if the person themselves has not hit rock bottom.

4.        Heal Yourself, Take Care of You      

Watching your loved one struggle, can consume your life. It can shake you to your core and leave you feeling hopeless, lonely, and confused. Find your coping skills and take care of YOU. Seek therapy, take a walk, journal, breathe, or pick up that phone that feels so heavy at times and tell someone exactly how you are feeling. You have the power to take care of you. You deserve to take care of you. 

Loving someone with an addiction is hard. Really hard. You cannot change them or fix them. You can walk beside them with courage, compassion, and care for your own soul. Healing is possible. Recovery is possible. And your story, and theirs, is still be written.