Vale

((Kim)) So many of us here have gone/are going through the agonies of codependency.
we come here to share our stories--and learn from others.The biggest takeaway from SR
is knowing we are not alone.For my part,as a codependent ("clean since 12/22/11"),I can
tell you that following some of the great wisdom found here hurts....but in the long run things start to get better.We wish you strength and fortitude on your long journey.
You are not alone.

outtolunch

Rehab/therapy/recovery programs are not magic bullets. At best, they are opportunities for a highly motivated addict to learn some of the tools of recovery. The addict will forever have the choice to use those tools or not.

Having read serious thousands of posts and back stories on the Substance Abuse Forums, what jumps off the page at me is how the overwhelming majority of those who achieved long term recovery did so without the benefit of rehab or therapy or other formal treatment programs. Some sought peer group support within AA or NA. Some used alternative non-12 step programs. Others have managed to do it on their own. I don't recall ever reading how anyone got and stayed clean and sober because their friends and family enabled their addiction.

Most seem to have landed in a place where either they got and stayed clean or die. And sadly, for some, they were unable to make a better choice and eventually addiction takes its toll.

Like you, I came to this place to learn how to make the addict in my life clean and sober. Posters kept yapping about my recovery. I thought they were confused- I am not addicted to anything and had no problems. I just wanted to fix my daughter and beat the beast- her addiction to heroin.

In the meantime I was well on my way to bankrupting myself financially, physically and emotionally in my quest to rescue my daughter. I was insane, at the time. I had a lot to learn.

Your choice to financially sustain your husband's addiction is your role in all of this. He has no reason to remotely consider changing anything. As you have seen, addiction is progressive. Addiction demands your guy protect and sustain it and you are the third wheel in the relationship between him and dope.

Your did not cause this.
You cannot control this.
You cannot cure this.

How does your hopeful fantasy of the man you need, want and deserve align with the man who packs up curtains and returns them to Walmart in the middle of the night- the man who freeloads off his wife's 2 jobs so he can spend his income on dope- the man who walked away from opportunities to learn new skills/tools of recovery- the man who is delusional and continuously chases the next high?

We hardcore codependents all tried to control the adict in our life. We did the " you will/ willnot... or else..." thing till we were blue in the face. This approach failed every time because we have no control over other people. We have all walked on eggshells trying to avoid saying or doing anything that would set our addicted love one off. This approach does not work because nothing we can say or do will cause an addict to stop or cause them to relapse. We are not that powerful. Our own delusions, however, protect and sustain our codependency.

Learning to value ourselves, creating healthy boundaries for ourselves and taking control of the only person we control- ourselves is the only healthy way out of this. Tough love is being tough with ourselves because we know we are worth it. I don't know you, yet I know you deserve to treat yourself better than you have been doing.

lesliej

English Garden wrote this...

"I just know that for me, if I love an active addict, I will use that love as leverage against his fatal disease of body and mind. I will walk away, because for me, staying is a form of enabling. It's how I think about addiction. I believe those closest to the addict are the ones with the most influence, the most leverage, and maybe that won't be enough to get an addict clean. But it's a fight for his life and I need to feel I have done everything I could to save him. For me, refusing to enable is the highest form of love. And I think staying in relationship with an active user is enabling.

If you don't leave him, I understand. But staying would not be my choice."

This is the point that I arrived at after two years of very very intensive work on my own recovery (6 yrs now!), 4 yrs of therapy, two intense retreats on my own issues, especially pertaining to love!) and 2 yrs of meetings, writings, reading every book I could find on codependency and addiction and SR for about 5 months now...

All that work! I am happy that I have done it. Sometimes in meetings you will hear people say that they are almost happy for the A in their life because learning to deal with it (whether they stay or go...) has taught them so much personal emotional spiritual mental growth!!

After all that work the drama went away. I was not enabling in any material way whatsoever. I had detached more and more, and no longer felt despair and anguish. What I DID feel was this...

The addiction of the man I love protects itself by being surrounded in lies and denial. Not only do the people around him either NOT know the full extent of his use (family members, fellowship friends or even his sponsors...4 different ones in 2 years) it's like a shell game. I was the constant, I knew more truth than anyone...and that is how I thought I could help. BUT the addiction even "lies" to him!!! He refuses to even acknowledge how bad it has him, lies to my face about how often he used, when I know the truth!

This last time I walked away has nothing to do with drama in MY life. It is because I love him. Something in his life may finally help him awaken. If I stayed with him it tells him that his use is acceptable to me, and it is NOT, it is not because I love him and it is destroying him.

I never saw him use. His use affected me in this way...I saw the aftermath, the feelings he had of "unworthiness", "unloveableness" and "being a loser". His drug use not only STEALS his character, integrity, life force, and spirit...it then turns the whole situation around and uses those very feelings as an excuse to use! It started to turn me into an excuse to use!! The addiction will turn everything around, twist it as an excuse to use.

The recovering addicts on this site will tell you...there is NOT an excuse to use. As much as I will tell you as a recovering alcoholic that there is NOT an excuse to drink.

If I love someone I will not sit and witness their demise, I will not listen to their excuses. If I do then I am "contributing" to their addiction because I am listening to their lies and excuses. (I call "Contributing" the 4th C). Using Crack is completely and totally UNACCEPTABLE to me, and it is not acceptable not because of finances or disappearing or all of the other completely annoying and frustrating aspects of it...it is NOT acceptable because it is killing his spirit. If I stay there...somehow the fekking crack molecule gets a hold of my love and fuels his excuses.

sorry for the rant...still, I think it might be some E, S & H

lesliej

PS...out to lunch brings up a good point...I got sober without professional help. I just went to meetings with a solid desire to get sober. Others do the same thing with their drug addiction. My ex got "professional" help over a dozen times. He has seared into his brain the recovery road map of mpls/stpaul and I tell you what, it is a major road map.

He actually "uses" the resources of recovery to "survive" his addiction. When he gets kicked out of one sober house he knows which one to move into next. I have personally seen him use two different sober houses twice now! If the big book was burned tomorrow he could rewrite it word for word.

Professional help can assist and guide an addict. BUT it is not THE requirement, the requirement comes from inside.

outtolunch

I once resembled that remark. Addiction knows no fury like a mother's love for and need to protect her child and all that.

I was mistaken. Heck, one crazy night I went so far as to tie my adult daughter to me with rope to prevent her from stealing from me and bolting out the door to score. Did I mention, I was insane at the time and was darn near capable of any action that I thought would fix my daughter.

Looking back, I see how much of this was my own ego. I thought I had power over other people and forgot the concept of free will. More importantly, I did not realize dope had rewired my daughter's brain and caused her to be equally capable of any action to protect and sustain addiction.

I have no first hand experience with drugs. I have however, come to my own conclusion that an addict feels the need for drugs, especially the hard core stuff like opiates, cocaine/ derivitives and crystal meth, no different than my need for air.

laurie6781

(((((Kim)))))

Nothing and I do mean NOTHING you do or don't do will get him clean or make him OD. What you are doing now, is PROLONGING his continued use of his DOC. He!! if I had had his living situation, and at one time I did, I would have continued my drinking and using also.

You leaving or not leaving is your choice. Your cutting off all your 'help' and INSISTING he pay HIS SHARE of the rent, utilities, insurance, gas and groceries, as one of your boundaries:

"I cannot live with someone who does not pay their equal share."

Is only fair to you and a part of an individual's 'normal responsibilities.

Another boundary:

"I cannot and will not live with someone in active addiction."

etc

These boundaries are for you. It is his choice to either meet your boundaries or not, and if he does not, then there is the door and he better not let it hit him in the butt on the way out.

This would be putting the responsibility of his addiction and the consequences of his using back on him where it belongs. Right now he has NO CONSEQUENCES. He has a roof over his head, hot and cold running water, electricity, food in the refrig and gas in the car. And ....................................... he spends all his money on his DOC. He is living the addicts DREAM.

And you are being drained of all your resources, and I don't just mean financially. Please get "Co Dependent No More" by Melodie Beattie (Amazon has it rather cheap, lol)

Post here as often as you need to, we are open 24/7.

We do care. We do understand. Many of us here have gone through what you are going through with, parents, roommates, spouses, so's, children and siblings. It is never easy. It takes some of us longer than others to finally see that the only person we can change is ourselves.

You can do this, and remember, now that you have joiner here you have all of us walking with you in spirit.

Love and hugs,

KuanYin

While he is in active addiction, he absolutely will not pay an electric bill or water bill or anything else that takes money away from his drugs. My AS is currently living in a house where the electricity has been shut off due to non-payment, and just recently the water was shut off. Yet he still comes up with money for his methadone clinic and for extra drugs.

Certainly if he is driving, he may suffer negative consequences. If the car is yours, I'd take the keys away. I used to sleep with my car keys when I lived in the house with my AS, otherwise he'd take my car at night to go score while I was sleeping. Had he wrecked it (and God forbid, killed someone) he was not covered on my auto insurance policy, so what a mess that would have been. Oh and nevermind the fact that his license was suspended.

Probably one way his use will escalate is if he has more money or resources available to him. When less money is available, he gets angry. He is behaving like a two-year old and getting away with it. And he knows it.

YearForMe

When I read the part in Kuan's post about taking the car keys away.....

The first thing I thought was.....sleeping with them in your underwear.
And I LOL'ed.

None of this is funny...but, it still helps to keep a sense of humor.