Husband New to Rehab - Please Share Your Stories If You Have Gone Through This
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Join Date: Oct 2012
Location: North Carolina
Posts: 261
Husband New to Rehab - Please Share Your Stories If You Have Gone Through This
What should I expect from my husband who has recently gone to rehab? I understand that this is not going to be easy, but can people who have dealt with this situation please share their stories? How did you feel? How did your husband react to being gone from you? Was there a lot of emotional roller coaster rides on behalf of the addict?
Thank you in advance for your comments.
YG
Thank you in advance for your comments.
YG
Member
Join Date: Nov 2012
Posts: 1,618
my guy is in rehab right now for 6 months. I honestly expect this to be a time of "neglect". I say this in a positive way. He has written one letter to me and one to the children in this month. In our situation, it is very much like he has entered into a time of seclusion from the outside world to really just focus on himself and god. I am attending a friends and family day on Sunday. I do not believe I will be seeing him, but will be meeting with the leaders there to learn visitation and day pass rules and expectations. The facility offers many group meetings for wives to offer support called Al-anon and Nar-anon, and all visitors are highly encouraged to go. It is a terrible emotional roller coaster for me. I imagine, more for him. He fears I will have an affair, and is jealous that I am free. It is a long road to recovery. He isn't even far enough along to really know if he is in it or not. It is very lonely to love an addict. When using the drug comes first. no exceptions. when in recovery the program comes first. no exceptions. Therefore, IMHO... I will never ever have that place in his time and activities that I crave. How do I find peace with this? I keep myself busy, I hang out with my friends, I throw myself into charity work and my HP. Every night when I get lonely and cry for him to come home, I force myself to remember the nights I spent in tears on my knees praying for god to deliver our family when he was out using, and then I thank him that as of today, this moment, he is clean, safe, warm and bathed. The children do not have a user in thier home, I am not being lied to and manipulated anymore. My jewelry is safe again and even though I miss him and wish it wasn't this way, today, he is ok. even though he is so very far from me.
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Join Date: May 2012
Posts: 1,927
My husband went into a non-12 step rehab for 3 months to recover from his opiate addiction. He used some other drugs also; coke and Xanax (benzo) but pain meds were his primary drug. Before he went in he did a detox. His rehab was in another state. I started posting here on SR after he had went into rehab. My biggest fear when he first went in was that he would leave treatment. It was scary for him, and even though he was in a nice place, which most would consider plushy no doubt… it was still stressful for him, and he still had to follow rules, and do things on a schedule.
We had been separated before he went into rehab, so I didn’t have to suffer the initial withdrawals of his being away from home because that had already happened. But at the same time, I had made the decision to stand by him during recovery, and I wanted to try to restore our marriage if things all worked out. So that brought a lot of confusion as to how do I do this? And what are my roles and responsibilities to support his recovery.
While he was in treatment I tried to carry on with my life as normal as possible. After the first week, my husband was allowed to have his cellphone, a laptop. He wasn’t supposed to use them except certain hours when he was not in active treatment. So we did communicate. The treatment he received was primarily intensive private therapy with about three different psychiatrist/psychologist that worked on different aspects of addiction and recovery. They also had group sessions, and individual and group activities.
So I had the sad conversations where he was unhappy and wanted to leave. I just tried to encourage him to stay, that in the end it would be worthwhile & remind him the people there knew what they were doing. I had conversations where he was obviously only thinking about his needs, because he felt sorry for himself. I had him ask me to bring him things. Most of the time I did, and no I don’t think it was enabling, or at least not in the form that I cared about. It wasn’t enabling his drug use, and my husband was more a functional user; he held down a job, paid bills, he was already living life as an adult and knew how to be responsible; he just had a drug problem. So for me, I felt no need to deny him of simple things, or just things he wanted to make his stay there more comfortable. If the things he wanted had been a burden on me then I would have reconsidered. My husband was even able to have his credit cards and order stuff online and have it delivered, so his rehab put no value on patients having to do without, or making them feel humbled or deprived. That has nothing to do with recovery from drugs IMO anyway. All just personal choice, sometimes based on ones philosophy.
Where he did rehab, they had a strong program for family. I was assigned my own therapist. I worked with her in person when I went to visit my husband; usually every weekend – or every other weekend in the beginning. I took our son to visit him also. I also worked with the therapist when I was at home, thanks to technology… she helped me a lot & I am so grateful for her. My husband had to authorize for me to speak with his doctors but he did that upon admission, and so I would talk to them when I went to visit also. They would update me. A few times they called me at home, or before a visit so I knew what to expect, especially in the beginning when he had a lot of emotional fluctuations. Yes his emotions were up and down, and I think this is common, and also has to do with the type of addiction and how it affects the brain chemistry.
My husbands rehab valued family participation, and since they knew we were both of the mind that we wanted to restore our marriage; after he was stable ( about 6-7 weeks ) they asked about my participating in marriage counseling with him through the rehab. They felt this was a healing process for him, as well as for me. So to do this, I relocated near his rehab for about 6 weeks. We did marriage counseling 2x week, and I had my sessions in person then twice a week. He did all his own stuff except when we had joint sessions. The last couple weeks he was in rehab, he came and stayed with me at the place I rented and he did outpatient through the rehab.
They also had him do shorter sessions in therapy with other family members that wanted to participate; the goal was that when he left rehab, he wasn’t going home to an unstable environment where there were still all these hurt feelings, anger, issues that were going to be avoided, or bubbling up. It was more like peace was restored, and he knew where he stood with everyone, and he could then step back into his life… except without drugs.
After rehab, he still works with a therapist locally once a week. He has been clean 10 months now, back to work, helping care for our son, living at home, being a wonderful, loving husband. We still have some issues of course, but they are small now compared to what we have endured, and we are working them out. We still do marriage counseling one a month.
I still have a therapist but I haven’t been to see her in a while cause things are ok with me. Im back to my work, my son, life. I feel closer to my husband for all we have been through, but at the same time I also feel stronger as an individual and I think I can handle whatever might come next.
May be more than you asked for… but you asked what “our experiences” were like. That was mine.
We had been separated before he went into rehab, so I didn’t have to suffer the initial withdrawals of his being away from home because that had already happened. But at the same time, I had made the decision to stand by him during recovery, and I wanted to try to restore our marriage if things all worked out. So that brought a lot of confusion as to how do I do this? And what are my roles and responsibilities to support his recovery.
While he was in treatment I tried to carry on with my life as normal as possible. After the first week, my husband was allowed to have his cellphone, a laptop. He wasn’t supposed to use them except certain hours when he was not in active treatment. So we did communicate. The treatment he received was primarily intensive private therapy with about three different psychiatrist/psychologist that worked on different aspects of addiction and recovery. They also had group sessions, and individual and group activities.
So I had the sad conversations where he was unhappy and wanted to leave. I just tried to encourage him to stay, that in the end it would be worthwhile & remind him the people there knew what they were doing. I had conversations where he was obviously only thinking about his needs, because he felt sorry for himself. I had him ask me to bring him things. Most of the time I did, and no I don’t think it was enabling, or at least not in the form that I cared about. It wasn’t enabling his drug use, and my husband was more a functional user; he held down a job, paid bills, he was already living life as an adult and knew how to be responsible; he just had a drug problem. So for me, I felt no need to deny him of simple things, or just things he wanted to make his stay there more comfortable. If the things he wanted had been a burden on me then I would have reconsidered. My husband was even able to have his credit cards and order stuff online and have it delivered, so his rehab put no value on patients having to do without, or making them feel humbled or deprived. That has nothing to do with recovery from drugs IMO anyway. All just personal choice, sometimes based on ones philosophy.
Where he did rehab, they had a strong program for family. I was assigned my own therapist. I worked with her in person when I went to visit my husband; usually every weekend – or every other weekend in the beginning. I took our son to visit him also. I also worked with the therapist when I was at home, thanks to technology… she helped me a lot & I am so grateful for her. My husband had to authorize for me to speak with his doctors but he did that upon admission, and so I would talk to them when I went to visit also. They would update me. A few times they called me at home, or before a visit so I knew what to expect, especially in the beginning when he had a lot of emotional fluctuations. Yes his emotions were up and down, and I think this is common, and also has to do with the type of addiction and how it affects the brain chemistry.
My husbands rehab valued family participation, and since they knew we were both of the mind that we wanted to restore our marriage; after he was stable ( about 6-7 weeks ) they asked about my participating in marriage counseling with him through the rehab. They felt this was a healing process for him, as well as for me. So to do this, I relocated near his rehab for about 6 weeks. We did marriage counseling 2x week, and I had my sessions in person then twice a week. He did all his own stuff except when we had joint sessions. The last couple weeks he was in rehab, he came and stayed with me at the place I rented and he did outpatient through the rehab.
They also had him do shorter sessions in therapy with other family members that wanted to participate; the goal was that when he left rehab, he wasn’t going home to an unstable environment where there were still all these hurt feelings, anger, issues that were going to be avoided, or bubbling up. It was more like peace was restored, and he knew where he stood with everyone, and he could then step back into his life… except without drugs.
After rehab, he still works with a therapist locally once a week. He has been clean 10 months now, back to work, helping care for our son, living at home, being a wonderful, loving husband. We still have some issues of course, but they are small now compared to what we have endured, and we are working them out. We still do marriage counseling one a month.
I still have a therapist but I haven’t been to see her in a while cause things are ok with me. Im back to my work, my son, life. I feel closer to my husband for all we have been through, but at the same time I also feel stronger as an individual and I think I can handle whatever might come next.
May be more than you asked for… but you asked what “our experiences” were like. That was mine.
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