Hey Dixied (((BigHugs))) .... you are not alone in this. Lots of moms on this board.
Both my kids are addicts - daughter is 21 and sober, son is 23 and not.
Both attended Oxford houses following their rehabs. Son was successful for 18 months. Daughter made it about 6 weeks.
Daughter did a total of 4 rehabs... and a recovery house and an Oxford House. Son did one rehab and one Oxford house.
It takes what it takes... there is no predicting "when" or even "how long" they will get/stay sober.
The night before my daughter got clean, she used...it was a terrible relapse that hurt me very much. Nothing I said, nothing I did, nothing at ALL could reach through those dead eyes. She had made her decision and even if I COULD have physically restrained her... eventually she was going back to the drug house. But you know what? It was her last time - except I never knew it. There were no signs, her sobriety came out of the blue, in her own time for her own reasons. Not mine.
My kids never stopped loving me. They never will.
Their addiction hated me. Their addiction hated my boundaries and did everything in its power to manipulate and force their way around them. But they never stopped loving me... nor me loving them.
Our kids are still in there - no matter how buried in the active addiction. I keep them separate from the addiction... and that is why I believe that:
What we do is not who we are.
There was a mom at my kids first rehab. My kid was 17 and so full of herself. This other mom had a newly sober daughter in tow - the twin to the son that was in rehab ... for the 4th time. She was the sweetest woman, and she reminded me of myself a little - she was exceptionally tall and had the best posture (I was envious). I remember that it took a lot of convincing on the part of her family before she would agree to "go through this again".
She was 80 years old - her twins were 47 years old. Yet her son laughed and joked with the others in the group (a mix of teens and adults) as though they were all the same age... sigh. Part of that "arrested devleopment" thing, and the "charm" of an alcoholic/addict.
I remember thinking - "Oh dear God, please don't let me be that woman... please."
What I know today is that I had to take every step I took in recovery to get to where I am today.
I had to grow up in an alcoholic home.... become alcoholic myself... marry an alcoholic... get dry with him... have two children... and have both those children develop alcoholism before *I* took even one step in recovery.
Once I got to the point where I was totally and completly out of ideas... once I realized that there really was nothing I could DO to cause, control or cure the addiction - that was when I first began to Let Go and realize what they mean in Alanon by "powerless".
Alanon face to face meetings saved my life. No exaggeration.
I wish you the best.
O