Dear Meli,
My brother lost his husband about five years ago. Prior to his husband’s death, my brother had been sober for fifteen years. However, the death of his spouse proved too much to bear, and my brother went off the wagon. He would get sober again for a few weeks, but then fall off again. It was really hard to see him during this time. He was often drunk, and I found it hard to communicate with him. It was pretty heartbreaking. I recently got a call from him, and he says that he’s back in meetings and has been sober for about a month. This is obviously great news. And yet, I feel like I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop. Especially because he went on and off the wagon so many times over the last five years. I feel like I should be happy for him, but I’m mostly just scared. Am I crazy?
Skeptical Sibling
Dear Skeptical,
Gosh. I’m so sorry to hear about your brother’s challenges. And the pain and conflict those have created for you as well!
Addiction is such a difficult thing. As a recovering addict, I can tell you it’s excruciating to be active in one’s addiction.
As a family member and friend of people suffering from addiction, I sympathize with your challenges, too! Unfortunately, as they say, addiction takes hostages. Two of those hostages are trust and faith.
It is not at all surprising that you’d feel a little gun-shy about your brother’s sobriety. Actually, I’d say that’s a very healthy stance!
Not only has he shown that his sobriety doesn’t always “stick,” you almost certainly have some PTSD from his previous relapses! It is excruciating to watch someone we love make choices we know will lead to their eventual suffering or demise. There is no way around the difficulty of that. But when you add to that, watching someone who is doing well and you see them choose to let the wellness and good works go? The worst!
You don’t have to share your lack of faith, or your concerns, or your grief with him. But it’s healthy to question the odds. Because the odds are stacked against addicts, in general. It’s a harsh truth, but the stats all say this is true.
He’s also got grieving to go through. The grieving that he drowned when he started drinking again has been waiting for him to be able to fully feel. He will need extra love for that, in addition to the challenging experience of living the rest of his life sober, one day at a time!
It’s also healthy for you to take care of yourself in all the ways you know how. Including exploring possible ways to more fully understand and handle your own PTSD. This could go far in allowing you to stand witness to celebrating his current success, without bypassing or sharing your own fears, or acting out (on him or yourself) from your own PTSD.
As you do your own work around your previous disappointments and pain, you’ll become a clearer channel of love. As you return to this clearer place, you’ll be able to more easily love and support him.
I wish you all the very best in your journey – with your sweet self – and with him!
Blessings and Love to you in all you do!
In Joy,
Melissa
What is your experience with addiction and relapse – yourself or others? Share your comments below!
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Your advice is so right on and tender-hearted. I’ve been witness to sugar addiction in diabetics many times. My younger sister, actually died from it and it was a slow and extremely debilitating death.
I tried to save her with advice, support, etc. and realized that I couldn’t. Any comments I made only made her project her problems on to me. Thank you for holding all of us, who have been hostages to addiction, even when it’s not ours, in the heart of love and forgiveness.
Oh my goodness, Tracy! How heartbreaking!
I agree that the tenderness and trauma of addiction is real, for everyone connected to the user! It is one of the most challenging and excruciating things I experience in my life.
Coming up on my 35-years Clean Birthday! Made me realize, just now, as I write this…I certainly blessed my own life with my choices. but I also blessed – or maybe un-cursed (?) – countless others.
I wouldn’t be writing to you right now, replying to this Dear Meli blog, for instance! And I wouldn’t be doing so from our SoCal/AZ Spring Into Joy 2024 Tour! Because I wouldn’t be doing any of this, if I were still alive at all.
I am deeply grateful for the miracle of sobriety, and now – because of this reply to you and the realization it brought me (thank you very much!) – also for the miracle being so good for so many! What a lovely, lovely thing!
Big Love and Overflowing Gratitude for you. 🥰
The timing of Mel’s message and Tracy’s comments are nothing short of divine interventions for me. Thank you both for sharing your heartfelt, honest, and pure words. You walk the talk and I am grateful.
Awww, Cheryl, that’s wonderful! So pleased to hear these were helpful for you! Big hugs and Love to you. Blessings, Melissa
It is not unusual for people in addiction to drugs or alcohol to take many trys before it sticks. But it is important for those around them not to lose hope. We never know when a person is going to hit their bottom. It took me many fits and starts before I hit my ultimate bottom. I found AA at 18, but at the time, old timers told me I was too young to be an alcoholic and that they had spilled more beer than I had drunk. That was all I needed to go out and “research” for another about 10 years. But today, by the Grace of God I am 46 yrs sober. It is so important to aline yourself with people in recovery, if you are to get the support that you need. Even if the family isn’t supportive. Love you both, Look forward to seeing you on the 27th.
Hi Gail,
Thank you for this reminder and encouragement to keep up the hope for our beloveds who are struggling. Good points, for sure!
I’m SO sorry to hear about the old timers you met when you were 18!!! Makes me wanna go back and have a talk with them! 😋 But I know they were just a perfect part of your journey somehow…but still. OY!
And! CONGRATULATIONS and THANK YOU for your years of sober living! I had a piano teacher in college who, in our final meeting over lunch, reminded me that EVERY time someone is playing or singing music (even rehearsing alone in their own room), they are sending the healing vibrations of music into the ethers…and creating a healing vibration for others. This is what I think of whenever I encounter another “sober family member!” Every day you have lived your life sober has been a blessing to the consciousness of humanity! That’s 46 years of blessings now! So we all thank you!
How fun that we’ll see you this weekend! Seal Beach, here we come!
Thank you for your thoughts and comments. Grateful for the conversation. 🥰