cindirelly

Hi,

I am new here - and I desperately need a sounding board as a parent relatively new to Al-Anon and AA, and the whole thing really.

My 19-year-old daughter checked herself into 30-day inpatient treatment last spring, and has for three months after that been living in a sober-plus residence (much higher supervision and accountability than a plain sober house). In a week she is supposed to transition to a stepped-down sober house, but still one with significant rules about curfew, dating relationships, etc.

The problem is that I have been watching what seems like a backslide for the past five weeks -- she quit going to her counselor, has been lying (about the counseling, her job, other things), abruptly quit her job, has been compulsively seeking a boyfriend, isn't taking her meds regularly, etc. Her current house allows no boyfriends while in sober-plus. The new house has a rule of no relationships in the first 30 days - but now I understand she's joined a dating website and is planning to go on dates with someone (not sober) when she moves next week (she has admitted this to me and wanted to know if I told the new sober house that she didn't have a boyfriend.) Her relationship patterns have been and continue to be unhealthy - she has many, many pieces of herself left that need to be healed beyond her drinking.

I will not lie for her. I am the purse string for all of her treatment, and for the past four months I've borrowed and sacrificed everything I could to pay for her treatment. I would give absolutely anything I had in my possession up if it facilitated her getting well. BUT - as she is making these choices now, I'm feel like I have to express some boundaries to her about what I will and will not spend money on for her, and I've told her my boundary is that I will not keep paying money if she is cheating the rules, not going to counseling, and not holding down a job. While I do not want to 'threaten' her, I also do not feel like it is right to keep pouring money into treatment programs that she is not following. She is sliding back into some of the out of control behaviors that plagued her before she went to treatment, and I'm sure she has co-occurring conditions not yet fully addressed even if she is sober.

My question - my dilemma - is that I just don't know what my role is right now. I have been blunt with her about my concerns, and she has told me to get the heck out of her business - that I am wrong, why don't I have trust in her, and to let her work her own program and to go work mine.

This has been the most traumatic and painful year of my life - watching my daughter leave her family, fall apart, then finally come back for help getting into treatment. I want to help her, but not as an enabler - as a supporter. I just don't know what that means right now. As people who perhaps know Al-Anon better than I, please - I need help. I just don't know what to do.