Coming Up For Air - Families Speak To Families About Addiction

When you're beyond the fatigue of burnout, you're hitting the wall. Stressors have accumulated, and your emotions feel unmanageable. Step back. Claim your emotions, but state them briefly, making it clear you're going to go take care of yourself. Ask yourself how bad things are, and how much help you need. Allow yourself the compassion and patience to take a break.

Do things feel one-way in your relationship to your loved one? Reframe it. You're taking your power back -- not to change them, but to change yourself, to grow and learn. If you're bringing your best self to the relationship, you'll inevitably change the dynamic, helping the other person heal.

Your loved one goes to treatment, and often a call follows -- a call saying the place is terrible, or the people aren't good, or for some other reason they want to come home. Your job? Hold the line. Don't be part of that conversation; don't be part of an exit plan, even if they can leave on their own. Let them be uncomfortable. Give them the message that they can handle it, and can get something good from the situation if they stick with it.

When you're dealing with difficult circumstances and the actions of others, it's important to shift focus from external to internal, to pause and check in with yourself and ask yourself what you need and want. Take your power back. We believe that taking care of yourself in this way has a positive impact on the other person. It's a demonstration of boundaries and self-care.

When it comes to hope, trust, and expectation, what's our part, and what's the part of others? Hope is ours. It's internal, doesn't damage anyone, and is loose, open, and a way to stay positive. It's also ours to accept -- to say this is how things are and soothe ourselves. What not ours? Trust. It's the other person's job to become trustworthy for themselves. Expectations, too, are theirs -- if we impose expectations on others, we set up failure.

Having expectations for others can be a difficult trap. When we have ideas about how things should go, we often try to manifest those expectations and have other people do what we want them to do. Instead, learn to manage your nervous system, to calm yourself and have tools to make requests of others. Be careful not to superimpose your expectations on others -- it might not be what they want, need, or are able to do. That needs to be okay. Learn to give people room to create their own expectations for themselves.

Alex Ribbentrop joins the Allies in Recovery hosts to discuss intergenerational trauma, substance use, the importance of family, and finding connection. Alex is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker, Qualified Supervisor, EMDR Trained Clinician, and Certified Family Trauma Professional, practicing in Virginia, Maryland, and Florida.

How do you handle that difficult time when your loved one comes home from treatment, and is back in an old environment, complete with old triggers? It can be a time of depression and anxiety. Think about reconnection -- being present and engaged, making things fun when you can, and using the CRAFT communication tools to leave doors open.

Enmeshment is a blurring of the boundaries between people. How the other person feels affects you intensely. Enmeshment is one-way -- your thoughts, feelings, and choices are about the other person's well-being. Countering enmeshment means checking in with ourselves, calming our systems down, taking pauses, and allowing the other person the dignity of their own process. You can learn to listen and make reasonable requests and develop a healthier kind of connection.

What questions should you ask, and what plans should you make if your loved one is coming home? Dominique and Kayla discuss a family's question about a new living situation.

What’s the impact of emotions on how we interact with loved ones? Learn to acknowledge, claim, and identify your emotions. Don’t discuss anything when you’re reactive. Instead, pause, check in with your feelings, and don’t take things personally. Have a strategy that’s not confrontational or accusing, but engaging. Calm your system, and engage in a way that you can feel good about. Hopefully this will reverberate with your loved one and create change over time.

When the noise dissipates and there's clarity, that's an "ah-ha moment." You can move forward in a different way. You might even find new commitment to a way of thinking or behaving that you didn't have access to before. Allies in Recovery uses CRAFT to give you the tool set for your own ah-ha moments, but also to help create the conditions for your loved one to find their own moments and possibilities for long-term change.

When you’re in the middle of crisis, feeling reactive or uncertain about what to do, use the “three questions” to helps create space and time and take the best action. What am I feeling? What can I do about it (think as broadly as possible)? What am I actually gonna do? Kayla likes to consider a fourth: What’s happening that’s making me feel this way?

Just before change happens with your loved one, things often get chaotic. Know that it's small, consistent differences over time that create such change. Learn to avoid reactivity and embrace gentle, subtle change -- starting with yourself.

We're all interconnected. The most effective way to help someone with substance use disorder is helping their family. Work on yourself and your communication as a family member, and the odds of your loved one seeking help increase dramatically. Get informed, and learn the tools -- become a transformation agent.

Treatment and recovery are not black-and-white ideas. With CRAFT, it's a matter of progress, not perfection. We want our loved ones to heal, to get their lives back. But change happens over time, and there are many ways to get there. Notice what's good, and work on the relationship. Treatment is how you engage them and help them learn what they like and enjoy it again. Be part of the joy, not a source of negativity. Be ready for when they're ready for new options.

It's important to use the AIR community and local and state organizations to help you find housing resources and be a knowledgeable advocate. Offer those resources without pressure, for when your loved one chooses to take them, but also know: having a loved one without a home is one of the most difficult and triggering experiences you may face.

AIR is an applied version of the original CRAFT research. It focuses on the family as the center of a system which also includes the AIR community, and as integral to the healing of the person with substance use disorder. You get help any time, online and in groups. AIR also focuses on cultural competency, helping you individualize the methods in a way that works for your family. CRAFT is a way of thinking and gaining openness, safety, and connection -- and you can make it your own.

Though CRAFT is often used in parent-child or other relationships, its powerful tools work extremely well for couples, too. Learn how and why that's true.

The goal of CRAFT may be getting your loved one into treatment, but no matter the possible success of treatment, CRAFT tools and communication skills are a life-long practice and process of learning about yourself and your reactions, and becoming part of your loved one's treatment. There's always more to learn.