pavm

I visited my boyfriend yesterday for the first time in a couple weeks. I was nervouse and excited, because it was like meeting for the first time again. It was amazing. Talking to him is like talking to a brand new person. He is more motivated and determined than I ever thought possible. He only talks in a day to day basis and never looks at the broad sense of things in fear he will get overwhelmed. Every single person I met had such great things to say about him and how he's such a positive energy around the center.

He leaves at the end of this week and will immediately go to a recovery house for the next couple of months. I know this is a good thing, despite being apart for so long, but I am scared. He sounds great and feels even better, normal he said, but I hope he keeps this clear state of mind.

I know it is completely up to him how long he stays clean and in recovery. I know I can only be a supporter on the side lines. His counselor made swo much sense on the phone the other day about his recovery. He said that I have to look at it as him running a race, and the more I try and run it with him and get in his way the more he will fall and eventually lose the race. I need to be a cheerleader on the sidelines. I am understanding that more and more everyday. Little obstacles stand in our way, but I have to let him deal with it however he can.

This next step in the process still scares me though.

EnglishGarden

You have good reason to feel uneasy about what may lie ahead. Addiction is a permanent condition, it changes the brain of the addict in permanent ways, and it is devious in its ability to lure the addict back to using.

The euphoria you describe in your partner sounds a bit like the pink cloud of early recovery. That euphoria does not last. It is often replaced with depression, anxiety, and irritability. And those emotions often trigger a return to the drug.

You will do best if you find support in completely detaching from the outcome of his rehab and sober living experience and detaching from the rollercoaster of emotions and erratic behaviors he may demonstrate in this year to come. It is a common pattern that the addict who is unstable in the first year of recovery begins to resent and to blame those closest to him for many things, most of them meaningless in the big picture but which the addict will blow out of proportion. Addiction thrives on crisis and it can find ways to create it, to trigger unease in the addict and the craving for "relief."

Whatever he does in his recovery has absolutely nothing to do with you. You cannot make him "fall", you cannot make him "lose the race." I think that is an unfair analogy. Codependents might enable addicts, but they never ever cause addicts to use or to relapse. The responsibility for that lies squarely with the addict.

I hope you will find your own support, as well as SR, so you do not get caught up in the potential chaos of an addict's first year of recovery in ways which could injure you. It is a volatile time. Take good care of yourself. Your self-esteem is always at risk when involved with someone who is as yet untrustworthy and whose brain needs quite some time to return to healthy functioning.

Ann

Now might be a good time to work on your own recovery too, perhaps find some Al-anon, Nar-anon or CoDA meetings in your area and try a few. I promise you that you will be glad you did.

Worry won't change the outcome for him and it will eventually eat you alive. Maybe just feel the joy that he is trying to get himself on a good path, and find your own good path too.

Joy feels so much better than worry. Don't lose the joy in today worrying about tomorrow. Tomorrow will unfold as it will, and if you have your own recovery in place there is nothing tomorrow can throw at you that you can't handle.

Good luck to both of you.

Hugs