Hello PerhapsLove, and welcome to SR!
I don't think any of us parents of alcoholics/addicts ever dreamed or hope our kids would turn out that way, and I completely understand your heartache.
The alcoholic/addict in my life is my 33-year-old daughter.
She has been in an adolescent treatment center, drug rehab (she got kicked out of there quickly for non-participation), just got out of jail before Christmas for the umpteenth time. She has lost custody of both her children, gotten her daughter back, and lost custody of her late last year when she went back to jail.
She is a convicted felon. She is unemployable. She lives like a nomad, going from place to place, where people eventually get fed up with her and kick her out. She is morbidly obese, and has chronic obstructive pulmonary disease from smoking pot/cigarettes for years. She sells some of her xanax prescription every month to buy cigarettes.
I spent many years immersed in her addiction because of my two grandchildren. I begged, pleaded, demanded, tried my best to manipulate her into seeking recovery. None of it worked. I found myself standing at the precipice of relapse myself (I am a long-term recovering alcoholic/addict), and knew I could not continue on the way that I was. I was lost in her disease.
What has helped me immensely are Alanon, the book "Codependent No More" by Melody Beattie, and individual therapy for myself.
I know today that God has a plan for her just as he has had for me. No matter how "ugly" things may look in her life, I just don't know what may be a blessing in disguise. I stay out of the way.
I hit my bottom in addiction/alcoholism when I found myself sitting on the edge of a bed in a squalid dealer's house, 109 pounds on a 6' frame, pregnant, weak, and preparing that syringe with the drug of choice, crystal meth. I did not get high from the drug. I went straight to raw screaming pain inside that is hard to describe.
It wasn't until that moment that I finally cried out to God and said I couldn't live that way anymore.
I was also married to an alcoholic/addict at the time, and that marriage was a catalyst in helping me reach bottom. That man never did get recovery, and was buried at 47 from complications due to AIDS. I will always be grateful for that marriage because it helped me find recovery. That probably doesn't make sense to you, but it was a strangely wrapped gift in my life.
So, I don't try to "judge" what may be strangely wrapped gifts in my daughter's life. She has a higher power just as I do, and I stay out of the way of his work in her life.
We have limited contact. She gets no money or shelter from me. I made the mistake of temporarily taking her in about eight years ago after she had done a lengthy sentence on drug-related charges. Never again.
I sleep well at night knowing I have placed her in God's loving hands. I wish the same for you.
Hugs from one momma to another!
