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Understanding Teen Addiction: Family Recovery Solutions with Susan Raphael · Recovering Out Loud

0:25
I've always, I've always got a lot of my information from
0:30
podcasts, like a lot of self help, mental health, health and
0:35
fitness stuff. So I just, I wanted to find a
0:38
way to get back and I was in treatment again this this past.
0:41
So I'm almost at six months again, which?
0:43
Is congratulations. Which is a miracle.
0:44
Thank you. Where'd you go this time?
0:46
I went to a place in Aurora for treatment.
0:49
Yeah, instead of. Yeah, yeah, instead of.
0:52
I went to the States twice before that and I've since
0:55
learned that it wasn't because of the quality that they sent me
0:59
there, it was because I couldn't escape and come back home
1:02
easier. Which is which?
1:04
Is really. Valid because when I went to
1:06
this last time I did leave because I was like fed up with
1:09
the all the I don't know, I took my will back, I think, right?
1:14
It wasn't good enough for me, the treatment center, right?
1:17
Well, especially if you've been to some good ones.
1:18
That's it's tough for. Family disease.
1:20
Yeah, good for you. Yeah.
1:21
Thank you. Thanks so much, Susan, for
1:24
coming down. I appreciate it.
1:25
Yeah. You know, I was referred to your
1:30
name by a fellow member of recovery and he mentioned that,
1:36
you know, I had to have you on. And then you show up here and
1:38
I'm like, I, I know you. I've seen you before, which is
1:40
like, it's an amazing thing about recovery, right?
1:42
It is. You hang out long enough and you
1:44
start to see some familiar faces, right?
1:47
And there's that sense of community and belonging.
1:49
Yeah. Yeah, it's like I always say
1:52
it's, you know, it says in our in the in literature that we're
1:55
like the the, the surviving members of a Titanic, right.
1:59
We all have that common peril where no matter where I go, I
2:03
see people that are in recovery and I'm just, there's that like.
2:07
Yeah, so much. It doesn't have to be explained
2:09
that it's like you just. Oh, OK.
2:12
Yeah, I know what you've been through, even though I don't
2:13
know anything about you, right? I know that you've suffered to
2:17
some degree and now you have a common, a solution, right and a
2:20
way out. I just want to kick off with
2:22
this before I, I start letting you introduce yourself because
2:25
the show's not about me, even though I like to think that it
2:28
is. We talking, you know, talking
2:31
about the camaraderie in the, the community.
2:33
I was in Vancouver this past weekend for the, an
2:36
international conference. There was a bunch of Alcoholics
2:38
together, 35,000 to be exact. And I'm a little bit emotionally
2:43
hungover from it because it's a lot, right?
2:46
There's a lot of, you know, there was people there, they did
2:49
this thing where they took a bunch of names of, of people
2:53
that had 50 plus years of sobriety to go up and speak and
2:55
they pulled them out of a hat, 12 people.
2:58
They had said that there was over 200 people there with 50
3:03
plus years of sobriety. It's incredible.
3:05
Like, it blew my mind, right? And I feel like there's a point
3:08
in my sobriety where I've been pissed at that.
3:10
And I'm not like, I can't relate to these people, but you know, I
3:14
was taught in recovery to just listen for the similarities and
3:18
not the differences. And I can tell you right now,
3:21
every single person that started talking, I was like, huh, yeah,
3:23
felt that way. Yep, did that.
3:25
Wow, that helped. You know, a lot of them talked
3:28
the, the, the thing that I got from the conference.
3:30
So if there was, you know, 1 theme, overarching theme, it was
3:34
service. That was the the thing I kept
3:36
hearing over and over again that these guys and girls, these
3:40
people never stopped working with newcomers and new
3:43
Alcoholics and, and people struggling, right?
3:46
And that was powerful for me because the thing that these
3:50
conferences can do is they can make you reflect on yourself and
3:53
like, am I doing this right? Where are the gaps in my
3:55
program? Because I don't wanna go back
3:57
out there again. Like I really don't.
3:58
It's a mirror. It's a mirror.
4:00
And all the people it takes to put on a convention at that
4:03
size, right? Yeah, they're all wearing pink
4:05
shirts. There was like thousands of
4:06
them. Yeah, they stood out, right.
4:08
So, yeah, I just wanted to share that because it would, you know,
4:12
if you're listening, there's a lot of people out there that are
4:14
going through this, all ages, all ethnicities, all religions.
4:20
And it's a beautiful thing. You know, they're, they, they've
4:22
been through, somebody's been through what you've been
4:25
through, if not worse. I've found, you know, there's
4:27
somebody has gone through it and then battled through it, right?
4:30
Yeah, experts at all levels, yeah.
4:33
So I'm really excited to talk about this today.
4:36
You're in recover yourself and you've written a book, which I
4:40
love the cover of. I haven't gotten a chance to
4:43
dive into it yet because I just got it the other day, but I'm
4:45
excited to read this. My wife even said to me, she
4:48
goes, 'cause she, she always wants, she's like, you need to
4:50
have more people on that talk about the family, right?
4:52
Because she still needs help. She's been, she's been through a
4:56
lot, right? She's watched me go through a
4:58
lot of she's seen me at my high, you know, in the seven years
5:01
that I had of, of sobriety and recovery.
5:04
And then she's been through the lows and stuck by me, right?
5:06
And she, she gets a lot out of this.
5:08
So I'm excited to talk about this.
5:11
But your book is called What's Wrong with my teen, and it's
5:17
about finding and answers to teenage addiction and family
5:21
crisis. I think this is so important.
5:22
I'm so happy that we're going to talk about the same.
5:24
I'm happy that you wrote this. I'm really.
5:26
Excited to be here and talk about it.
5:28
Yeah, and talk with you. Yeah.
5:29
So I'm going to shut up now because I really want to hear
5:32
from you. Why don't you start off with a
5:34
little bit about your story and what brought you into recovery
5:37
to in the first place? Sure.
5:39
Well, my name is Susan Raphael and today I'm a mental health
5:43
and addiction clinician in a small private practice in
5:47
Toronto. And I've been working in this
5:50
profession for over 20 years. And it came on the back of
5:58
studying psychology when I was younger.
6:01
And I always had those questions trying to really trying to
6:04
understand myself and how I didn't feel like I fit in the
6:09
world. And academia was a easy place to
6:11
kind of hide with all my ideas and all my creativity and
6:16
curiosity. And at the same time, I had the
6:21
double life where I was going out and I was using chemicals
6:26
from a pretty young age, like 16, and drinking.
6:31
And it was all in the facilitation of going out and
6:33
having fun and dancing and back up a bit.
6:38
I had an eating disorder to start with.
6:40
So that was ever since I can remember.
6:42
I was using my body to change the way that I felt and then
6:47
using substance to change the way that I felt.
6:50
So I came into recovery in 99. I had been on Skid Row in the
6:55
downtown Lower East Side of Vancouver, homeless in shelters
7:00
for out of the better part of a year, a year and a half.
7:05
And I'm so grateful for that system and the policeman that
7:08
offered help and the policeman that were consequential and
7:14
handcuffed me and threw me in the back of a Paddy wagon and
7:17
brought me to a shelter one night because they determined I
7:20
was the problem. And I'm grateful for the
7:23
services that I had to get me eventually back on my feet.
7:27
It was family who interceded, intervened and brought me back
7:31
to Toronto. And I still drank for a couple
7:34
more years. And drugs were part of my story
7:37
in and out really in the facilitation of drinking more.
7:42
And when I couldn't do drugs anymore, I realized how much of
7:47
alcohol dependent I was. I started having seizures in and
7:51
out of hospital, emergency rooms problems, unemployable right and
7:58
took a lot of hostages and was taken hostage and etcetera,
8:01
etcetera. So all of the things that we
8:03
hear about and I had the opportunity to go to detox and
8:09
heard about a treatment center and that time I stayed in detox.
8:12
I don't know what made that time different, but I stayed and I, I
8:18
learned that I wasn't a bad person.
8:20
I was a sick person. And with all the psychology and
8:23
self knowledge I had that wasn't, that was really
8:27
comforting because I realized I felt like a bad person and I had
8:31
a lot of shame and guilt and remorse.
8:34
Like how did a nice girl like me end up on Skid Row?
8:38
There was a huge gap from where I I started to where I ended up
8:45
and I've been thankful to be sober ever since.
8:49
I've struggled with other things in 26 1/2 years but I had to get
8:55
the eating disorder in check and learn to have relationships and
8:59
but I've been grateful to have a program of recovery and be in
9:02
long term recovery since then. It's amazing.
9:06
Wow, it really is such a simple solution for such complicated
9:09
individuals who think we're so unique.
9:12
Yeah. Nobody's like me.
9:15
Yeah. Yeah, and nobody understands.
9:17
Me if you, you know, you didn't go to Skid Row, so you're not
9:20
like me, right? You didn't do this or you know
9:22
what I mean? There's all these things that
9:24
separate us and that's why, you know, looking for the
9:26
similarities I was taught was one of the best things to do
9:29
when I came in. And following some direction
9:31
without, you know, having someone take control of my life,
9:35
but following in the direction was helpful.
9:37
It gave me structure, discipline, purpose, a sense of
9:41
belonging. And, and then six months later,
9:44
I started working at the treatment center that I went to
9:47
in an administrative role. And that happened very
9:52
serendipitously. And so I started to believe, you
9:55
know, that there were things that were stronger, more
9:57
powerful than I was that were helping to direct me into into
10:01
better choices, healthier choices.
10:05
And that was a great place to be in early recovery.
10:08
And that that kind of ignited my interest in being a counselor.
10:14
I always wanted to be a counselor since I was a little
10:16
kid. I was the listener.
10:17
I was the quiet one who was listening and asking questions.
10:21
And then I was the bartender and I was listening and asking
10:23
questions over the bar. So it's a it was a dream come
10:29
true to start helping people and getting certified and getting
10:33
all the necessary things in order in order to counsel and
10:36
help others. So what made you choose the the
10:40
family path, dealing with loved ones of addicts instead of
10:45
sticking with, you know, just the addicts?
10:47
Yeah, it's a, it's a great question because when I was
10:51
deciding what I wanted to do in terms of counseling, people
10:55
would say to me that I had to choose.
10:57
I had to either be working with the family or working with the,
11:01
you know, substance use disordered individual.
11:05
And I liked both. And when I started working with
11:08
young people, I really liked working with young people.
11:12
I related to that. I related to being that teenager
11:15
in crisis 'cause I was a teen in crisis silently and I I'd meet,
11:20
I started working in an aftercare role and working with
11:26
these teenagers who would come back from treatment programs and
11:30
sometimes young adults too. I use teenager quite loosely
11:33
since the brain's still developing till we're 25 or so.
11:37
And so so that ignited my my passion for working with teens
11:42
and working with parents was more challenging for me.
11:45
Although I was a loved one myself, most of the people I was
11:48
in relationship with prior to getting into recovery had
11:52
addiction issues. So I was, I was, I understood
11:57
what it was like and I dated some in in my early days in
12:01
recovery and people that relapsed.
12:03
And so I did family programming for myself.
12:06
I went to Al Anon support and and saw it.
12:10
You know, that family perspective of we can't control
12:14
it, we can't cure it, and we didn't 'cause it, right?
12:18
It's not our fault, 'cause there's so much guilt.
12:20
So eventually I sort of transitioned into wanting to
12:24
work with the family piece. And that family system is so
12:28
important. As you said in the promo
12:30
yesterday for this podcast, it's a family disease.
12:34
It's a family disorder and it's a family recovery too, for those
12:39
that choose it. And really the title of the
12:42
book, What's Wrong with My Teen? It's a hook to because perhaps
12:48
there's something wrong with everyone.
12:50
It's not just the teen. And if we're willing to
12:53
courageously look at our part in things and how we might be part
12:59
of the system, not necessarily the problem, but a system and a
13:03
family is a system and it functions with certain rules.
13:07
And sometimes they're silent rules.
13:11
People don't speak about feelings or people don't talk
13:13
about what's really going on. So I love a challenge.
13:17
And working with the parents was more of a challenge for me.
13:20
And I developed a tremendous amount of of compassion and
13:24
capacity for parents and loved ones, anxiety and guilt and kind
13:31
of miss, if you will, misplaced energy when if they put some of
13:36
that energy into their own self-care, it would actually be
13:39
better for them and probably better for their loved one.
13:45
That's a difficult shift to help people make.
13:49
Does that make sense? Yeah, absolutely.
13:51
And well said. And I mean, yeah, I'm, I'm just,
13:55
I'm just, I'm just grateful that, you know, I'm grateful
14:00
that I'm, I'm able to talk about.
14:01
I think that this is so helpful for people because I feel like
14:06
there's a lot of answers out there for people in addiction
14:09
and, and alcoholism. If you choose to go and find
14:12
them, right? There's a lot of solutions.
14:14
It's it's pretty apparent, you know, on the social media, like
14:17
there's a lot of that, right? But there's a huge gap between
14:21
my kid won't like he's fucking up my family, right?
14:25
Like, what do I do? You know, and you mentioned
14:27
working at AII recently got a job at a treatment center.
14:30
And that's something that I recently realized that I wanted
14:32
to do too. I need to stay close to to new
14:35
people. I need to stay close to
14:36
recovery. Another reason why I started
14:38
this podcast because I don't want to go back out, like I
14:40
said, right? It's not fun out there.
14:43
And so I mean, like working with, with so, OK, now, so I, I
14:52
was in Vancouver, I got a message.
14:54
I get in contact with people to get them in the treatment
14:57
center. That's my role, right, is to, to
14:59
facilitate that. And I've been getting a lot of
15:01
parents talking to a lot of parents, right?
15:03
And so this is very timely for me, right?
15:07
I got a, a super long, you know, text conversation with this,
15:11
with this mother. And I was going to read it but
15:14
it's really long. I'll, I'll, yeah, I know those.
15:18
I'm. Familiar with those?
15:19
There's. So much coming out.
15:21
Like you don't even know where to start, right?
15:22
And you know, I don't, I'm not trying to solve anything when
15:26
I'm doing this. I'm realizing that.
15:29
But she, she mentioned a lot of what I was going through with
15:32
her, with her daughter and the the psychosis and I was getting
15:36
goosebumps as I was reading it because she was telling me all
15:39
these things that her daughter was experiencing and seeing and
15:42
the paranoia and with, with crack and and cocaine, right.
15:45
And I was just like, Oh my God. Like you just feel for them,
15:48
right? You feel for them, But you do
15:50
your best to try and facilitate and get them in, right?
15:56
That's definitely the hardest thing is to, to get that shift
15:59
for, for loved ones to kind of work on themselves, right.
16:02
Yeah. How do you kind of how do you
16:03
approach that? I know that's a really, you
16:06
know, big question, but today, how do you approach that, I
16:10
guess? Well, if if you tallied all the
16:14
calls that help lines and treatment centers got, primarily
16:19
they're from loved ones. We're trying to help those that
16:22
we love and and, you know, facilitate getting them help.
16:28
So that says a lot. It says a lot about how
16:31
important the role of the family member is, because often they
16:38
do. People do go to treatment
16:39
because of family, love, support, leverage that.
16:45
You know, I would say forced, but.
16:46
Yeah, Yeah. Well, yeah.
16:47
And it's. I was forced, I'll say that.
16:49
There you go, there you go. And it's, you know, leverage can
16:54
also be leverage where it's a loving act to to support
17:00
someone. But there there are ways to
17:02
support. So I meet people where they're
17:05
at and usually. So this the book came from my
17:09
best practices. What's tried, tested and true
17:13
for most people when they come, for most parents and caregivers,
17:16
when they come to me, they, they, they struggle with what is
17:21
actually help and support and what is enabling.
17:26
And they've had terms thrown at them like they're codependent
17:31
and they're enablers. And these are not, you know,
17:34
we're all codependent. So to pathologize something that
17:38
we all experience and we all enable different things.
17:41
I enable my clients sometimes too, right?
17:44
Like we are, we're, we're softies and we care about
17:48
people. So really meeting them where
17:52
they're at and giving them some tangible tools, some things that
17:57
wherever they're at, they can work on enabling is usually a
18:02
piece of it. Understanding consequences,
18:05
understanding natural consequences and letting those
18:09
happen. And often parents will think
18:12
that that's very punitive to let a natural consequence happen.
18:16
For example, little Billy goes to school and he's forgot his
18:20
homework and mom or dad or caregiver runs to school and
18:25
brings his homework. Is Billy learning the lesson
18:29
about his responsibility for his own homework, Right.
18:35
Like, so it's, it's, it's helping them understand what
18:40
their role is and how they can create conditions for change and
18:46
not try to control. They're so used to controlling.
18:49
There's not a lot of guides out there for teenagers with mental
18:53
health and addictions. There's a lot of baby raising
18:57
books. There's a lot of toddler raising
18:59
books. But mental health and addiction
19:01
for teens and young adults is an area that AIDS.
19:04
It's something people don't really want to talk about the
19:06
struggles they're having with their teens.
19:08
Parents tend to talk about all the great things their kids are
19:12
doing. We all do.
19:13
We talk about the great things that are happening.
19:15
So it's it's important to meet them where they're at and then
19:19
just stay with them on their journey, not lecture them, not
19:25
reprimand them. They're already feeling so much
19:29
stress and pressure. There's pressure on parents
19:32
today like never before and there's pressure on young people
19:36
like never before. So understanding that they're
19:41
they're where they're at and trying to move them whatever
19:45
forward looks like for them in their situation.
19:50
Yeah, I, I think that that's, I mean, that was well said the the
19:53
analogy about, you know, forgetting your homework at
19:56
like, are you really giving your child life lessons and and
20:00
preparing right. And I, I understand too, that
20:03
that's a very, you know. Small example in this context as
20:07
well, but as you were talking there, just thinking about the,
20:10
the fentanyl thing, right, this fentanyl crisis, I want to ask
20:15
you how that's impacted your work now with teens and, and
20:18
parents worrying about, you know, their kids overdosing and
20:21
dying. And then like, I don't, I don't
20:24
know that there's an answer to this, but I was, so I was kicked
20:27
out of my house and that was the only way I went into treatment,
20:31
right? If that happened, that was 10
20:32
years ago. You know, if that happened
20:34
today, I don't know if my parents, it was hard for them in
20:37
the first place to do that, right?
20:39
Because they don't know what's going to happen to me, right?
20:41
But I mean, like when it comes to to, you know, kind of letting
20:47
go, how do you, how do you navigate the, the my son might
20:52
die tomorrow? Absolutely.
20:54
And I, I want to clarify, were you kicked out of your house or
20:59
was your behavior such that it didn't allow you to live in the
21:04
house? That's a.
21:05
Good way to frame it. Yeah, so.
21:07
I need perspective shifts like that.
21:08
I I never, I never tell parents to kick their kid out of the
21:12
house. However, if again, if Little
21:17
Anthony was living according to Little Anthony's rules, I don't
21:21
know how old you were 20 years ago, but, and not according to
21:26
the house rules. Was that fair?
21:28
Was that, you know, in line with the values of the family system
21:33
or were you somewhat being, being cushioned from the natural
21:37
consequences of, of your illness?
21:40
Maybe they knew, you know, So it's it's all every situation is
21:44
unique and where people are at is unique, but there's a lot of
21:48
steps between kicking someone out and asking of them some
21:55
simple kind of contributions to a system that are not, you know,
22:01
so there there's parents will go there like I'm never going to
22:05
kick my kid out. And it might be years before the
22:08
consequences help them determine that actually their their child
22:14
is choosing to live under their roof and they can die under I've
22:19
I've had people die at home as well.
22:23
But in this one pill can kill environment that we are living
22:28
in today. It is terrifying.
22:30
And, and there's, there's no easy answer.
22:36
It's a toxic, toxic supply out there.
22:40
And it's, it's very scary. So parents need to be informed,
22:46
awareness needs to be raised. And that's why I wanted my book
22:50
to be out there so that people could have the awareness so that
22:53
we're having these discussions, so that we're telling them what
22:56
to look for and, and what to be really concerned about and what
23:01
to, you know, letting go is a whole book in and of itself.
23:04
It's so difficult. Letting go is the hardest thing
23:07
anybody will ever do. And it's a process.
23:10
It's not a absolute. It's a daily reminder of what
23:15
you know, what's that cost if I don't maintain my own peace and
23:20
serenity unconditionally like. And also too like how imposing
23:26
more rules, you know, forcing doing all the controlling can
23:29
actually push addicts further away.
23:31
Absolutely. Sorry.
23:33
So looking at influence and how we can influence as opposed to
23:38
control, I know these are subtle shifts, right?
23:42
Like addiction and mental health crises are so counterintuitive
23:48
for loved ones. Because when someone's I'll, you
23:51
want to hang on, you want to help, you want to.
23:55
Support. You want to do things to soften
23:59
life for them. Those exact things make fuel
24:04
addictive behaviors and they fuel mental health challenges
24:07
too. So it's understanding that kind
24:10
of continuum with what's safe struggle and what is too much,
24:15
you know, what am I not going to allow my child to to face?
24:20
Where am I going to be that that safety net for them and and
24:26
where do I have to step back and let them struggle to find a
24:30
solution? And you know, a rock bottom too,
24:35
if you will, right? Like I, you know, I believe I
24:39
had to hit some sort of rock bottom.
24:40
It was, you know, usually financially, but there was also
24:43
an emotional thing there where I was just like looking around at
24:46
the world and, you know, like this last relapse, I came to a
24:50
point where I felt like, I felt like such an outcast from
24:53
society again, but to A to a very intense degree.
24:58
You know, I, I described this in one of my last episodes, but my
25:02
last bout this time around, hopefully, God willing today,
25:05
you know, I was in a getting kicked out of a hotel.
25:08
And I just remember, I remember very vividly sitting in the
25:11
lobby of the hotel waiting to get kicked out because I
25:13
couldn't afford it anymore. And you know, I'd run out of
25:16
money. Like I said, had a whole shit
25:18
load of drugs still on me. But I had no desire to continue
25:21
on anymore because I was sitting in the the lobby of this hotel
25:24
and watching people just kind of walk by and live their life.
25:28
Day-to-day people used to call them day people when?
25:30
I was. Using.
25:31
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I hated those guys when I came
25:34
out of after hours clubs and I was just like, man, like I used
25:38
to be like that. I used to be just going like
25:40
having normal problems and, you know, dealing with normal
25:43
things. And my life has just become this
25:46
like how do I get to the next drug?
25:47
How do I get to the next drink? How do I, you know, survive
25:50
today? And so I I had to get to that.
25:52
And so again, I got How did you frame it again instead of
25:56
getting kicked out? I wasn't living in accordance to
25:58
the house rules. Yeah, I like your it was, it was
26:00
about your behaviors and and that they were actually treating
26:05
you probably a little bit with kit gloves because nobody else
26:08
would have been able to live in the house at 23 doing the things
26:11
you were doing perhaps. No, you're right.
26:13
Possibly. I like.
26:14
Yeah, you're right. And so that happened again, this
26:16
time with my wife. You know, she we were going to
26:18
counselling and she did the same thing right Where she politely
26:22
asked me that you can't live under this roof while doing
26:25
these behaviors. Right.
26:27
So it's a choice and words matter.
26:31
And I have a lot of scripts in my book because words choices
26:35
matter and tone matters. And at the same time, we all
26:39
make mistakes. So if, if a parent says
26:41
something, if if anybody says something that's not
26:44
appropriate, just say own it. Sorry I made a mistake, messed
26:49
up. This is new to me.
26:51
I don't know what I'm doing right, Right.
26:53
Like it is like I've never dealt.
26:54
With there's no, there, there is no manual other than mine, No
26:59
for, for, for doing this stuff, but having some humility that
27:02
parents don't have to have all the answers.
27:05
And they, it's so these are they're, they're subtle shifts.
27:10
But when parents start to get these shifts, I can see it like,
27:14
and they'll come back to a session and all of a sudden it's
27:17
like the penny has dropped. And I'm thinking what?
27:20
What did I say? What did I do?
27:22
It was like you have shifted and we can't explain how, but it's
27:27
like things are sinking in for them where they start to say no
27:31
to their child or start to stop financially supporting 1 aspect.
27:36
And it doesn't have to be this all or nothing, right?
27:39
Like just stop supporting 1 aspect of their lifestyle.
27:43
You don't have to cut them off. It doesn't have to be this tough
27:47
love. But frankly, love is firm.
27:50
Your wife, what she had to do was loving and and it was, it
27:55
was firm too. It was like you have a choice.
27:57
If you want to stay here, you can't be using it.
28:01
So yeah. Yeah, yeah.
28:04
And you know, I remember to her thing, 'cause she had some more
28:07
knowledge about 12 step by this point, her thing too was like,
28:11
you need to, to go to meetings and you know, you not only do
28:16
you need to not use here, right? But to your point, you know, you
28:20
need to also partake in the recovery community because
28:23
that's what works for you. And she was right, right.
28:25
Like that. I found that that's the only
28:26
thing that worked for me. Therapy and then this, this sort
28:29
of 12 step recovery. I, I always say this, it's not
28:33
for everybody. It's not the same thing.
28:34
I get some Flack sometimes, right?
28:38
But not everyone has a good experience with it and that's
28:39
fine right there. There's many paths of the.
28:41
Recovery, there are many paths, more so than there were ten
28:45
years ago, than there were 26 years ago.
28:48
And there's medications that can assist with the right, you know,
28:53
facilitation, the right doctors, addiction doctors.
28:56
And there are many, many tools today that will will sort of
29:01
soften the path to recovery for people.
29:06
You mentioned, you know, the the scripts in your book and I love
29:09
doing this where, you know, I haven't gotten a chance to start
29:12
reading it yet, but I'm excited to because as my wife pointed
29:17
out to me that she's like this can really help you, you know,
29:19
and really help you understand your parents and like their
29:23
perspective. So I truly believe that this is
29:27
not just for a parent with a teen.
29:29
Like I think everyone that deals with addiction can benefit from
29:32
this. And I've already realized that
29:34
by what I do is I flip open the first page and that's the page I
29:37
was meant to read this morning. So I'll read it now and then I
29:40
want to hear, you know, your kind of feedback on it.
29:42
But so I, I flipped open and it was consistent and purposeful.
29:47
Validation helps to build relationships.
29:49
You are telling someone that they are important and the
29:51
relationship with you matters. So to your point, I'm not just
29:54
taking someone out, right Examples.
29:56
And I love this examples of validating statements, right?
29:59
So like things I can actually use in my life, right?
30:01
One, this must be difficult for you.
30:03
I believe in you. Tell me more about blank dot dot
30:06
dot, right. What do you need from me us
30:09
right now? I'm proud of you or you can be
30:11
proud of yourself. I love you.
30:13
We know this time period circumstance is difficult for
30:16
you. How can we make it easier?
30:18
We care about you and what is happening to you.
30:20
It's no wonder you feel this way.
30:22
A personal favorite of yours. Yeah, no.
30:24
Wonder you feel this way. I am we are sorry for what
30:27
happened to you and I am we are so glad you are here.
30:30
That might be hard for somebody to you're right now that the
30:34
addict in their life is screwing up, you know, the family
30:38
dynamic, whatever you're doing this thing like you can feel
30:41
very victimized right when when your son or daughter or loved
30:44
one is using. So I've completely taken it out
30:46
of context. So do you want to add some
30:47
context to that? Like when do we when do we
30:49
enter? When do we start to kind of
30:51
start doing these validating statements?
30:53
Anytime, anytime it's we're, we're all great at pointing out
30:56
the things that aren't going well.
30:58
And it's human nature, we tend to say 10 negatives before we
31:05
say a positive. So being mindful that validating
31:09
is important for for the developing mind of a teenager,
31:15
the love language is words of affirmation.
31:18
They want their parents to support them, yet so parents
31:24
struggle with validating because they feel that it's condoning
31:28
behavior. So and give an example, it's,
31:34
you know, maybe a kid comes home with a with a report card and,
31:44
and maybe they've passed some courses, maybe they've failed
31:47
some. So rather than just saying you
31:50
failed, what's wrong with you to to balance it with now I see
31:56
there's some positives here and there's some room for
32:00
improvement. Do you want to talk about it
32:02
right? I'm never good at these on the
32:05
spot examples, but there's always a place for validating
32:09
statements. And if you can't validate, then
32:11
take a step back then that then deal with the feelings that are
32:16
getting in the way of that. Like if you're feeling angry and
32:20
resentful or harmed that you're maybe your, your teenager has
32:25
stayed out all night again and you're frustrated and you're in
32:29
all that. So that's a time to go to a
32:31
meeting or call Susan or call Anthony and, and have someone to
32:35
chat with and to deescalate and, and to tend to your own feelings
32:40
so that you can come back to a place of compassion where you
32:44
can validate. And then the bit about
32:47
condoning, like you can say, I understand why you might be
32:54
smoking weed because all your friends are.
32:57
I really get that this is a time where where a lot of young
33:01
people your age are doing such things and it's not allowed in
33:06
this house. So how are we going to deal with
33:08
that? So you can validate, you can
33:11
support, you can understand without condoning a behavior.
33:16
So they're really operating in two different realms.
33:20
But parents can, can confuse that and think that if I say, Oh
33:24
yeah, all your friends are smoking weed, that somehow
33:26
that's giving you permission to go and smoke weed or that I'm,
33:31
I'm, you know, desensitizing you to it.
33:35
Or they'll say, just don't hang around with those friends,
33:38
'cause I know they want, they want to think that it's always
33:42
the peers, the other peers. We all do.
33:45
We want to think that there's some other influence that it's
33:48
not. So does that make sense?
33:51
Like. The validating and I didn't
33:52
raise you this way right or this isn't the person the man woman,
33:56
girl, whatever I I raised you to be so it must be everybody else
34:00
right that. Actually.
34:02
That leads me into my next question because my parents, I
34:05
think, went through a bit of this too.
34:06
Is the denial right? The denial of my my son can't be
34:10
smoking Max. Like we didn't.
34:11
There's no way he's, you know, snoring coke.
34:14
We didn't raise him. No one in the family.
34:16
Like what? How did this even happen?
34:17
None of his friends even do it. How did he get into this?
34:20
Do you deal with a lot of denial and how do you approach that
34:23
with parents? Yes, lots of denial and lots of
34:30
parents come in feeling a lot of guilt and responsibility for
34:39
behaviors that really don't have anything to do with them per SE.
34:44
So we know that addiction is a biopsychosocial condition,
34:50
mental health issues. Similarly, drugs and alcohol can
34:55
exacerbate mental health symptoms.
35:00
Parents also, and I talked about this in my book, Will will come
35:03
from the perspective that it's mental health and it's not an
35:06
addiction. Somehow in their frame of mind,
35:12
addiction is, you know, we know it has a lot more stigma and is
35:18
not as accepted as perhaps having a mental health issue.
35:23
So, yeah, parents come in with a lot of denial and yeah, I'll,
35:30
I'll just validate that they're there.
35:32
They're you're here. I I got a call from a reference
35:36
this week as someone who had seen me perhaps a couple of
35:39
years ago. They came to see you a couple of
35:40
years ago. OK.
35:41
So they're back. Great.
35:43
Good for them. What's what's changed in the
35:46
couple of years? Like would have been great if
35:49
they had stayed. They didn't.
35:51
That's OK, they're here now. Just like I didn't get sober the
35:55
very first time I went to detox. Sadly there were multiple
36:00
visits. So there's a lot of denials.
36:02
There's a lot of rationalizing that he's using or she's using
36:08
because of their anxiety. And while that may be the case,
36:12
now we have 2 problems because we've got substance induced
36:17
anxiety plus whatever anxiety was there before.
36:20
So it, it doesn't really matter how we got to where we're at
36:24
today. From today on, we're going to
36:28
start on a path of a new solution, a new plan.
36:34
And, but I'll listen to all of that.
36:36
I'll listen to how they feel. It's not their child that it's
36:41
the peer group. I'll help.
36:44
I'll help them understand how to kind of balance that out a bit
36:49
without, you know, calling them out.
36:51
It's like I'm I'm very gentle. Yeah, yeah.
36:56
And I'm sure as you start to get to know clients like my
36:58
therapist, yeah, you start to call them out.
37:01
And she, my, mine doesn't leave. You know, Paulie's the best.
37:03
She doesn't leave anything on the table.
37:05
No, don't unturned she'll. Call me on all my shit.
37:07
Some of them might even be tossed, yeah.
37:11
Yeah, yeah, tossed them exactly. Usually people come to their own
37:15
understanding and, and I kind of just hope get them there.
37:18
And it's not like I have some, you know, amazing ability to
37:23
understand. I just like I've I've heard it
37:25
before. Their exit strategy might be
37:28
slightly different, but I've generally heard their concern or
37:33
and that's why it was helpful to write what I wrote because I
37:36
knew where parents get stuck and I know where I get stuck as a
37:40
loved one. I'm still in it too.
37:43
It's. Like you said, it's a daily.
37:45
It's a daily, yeah. It's a daily, daily maintenance.
37:50
What where where do you see people getting stuck the most,
37:52
would you say? Like, what's the common place
37:55
that people just can't get over? Sometimes it's enabling versus
38:01
supporting and commonly it is letting go.
38:06
I mean, I, I tend to not even say letting go until we're well
38:10
into our relationship because it sounds kind of wooy wooy.
38:14
But I will teach them how to let go.
38:17
We, we come at it through the back door.
38:20
I'll teach them how to stand up for themselves, which is also
38:25
letting go how to put their own Peace of Mind first, how to do
38:30
their own work so that they're modeling that to their children,
38:35
which is super beneficial. Tell if you're if you're
38:39
listening to this and you're going to therapy or you're going
38:42
to Al Anon or you're going to families for addiction recovery
38:47
or you're going to hope, which is another parent support.
38:50
They're they're amazing and I'm happy to provide resources.
38:53
Yeah, I'm going to link those. I've never heard of them.
38:55
I'm going to link those in the show notes.
38:56
And Sunnybrook Family Navigation Project is a wonderful resource
39:00
for for families and most of them have generated out of
39:04
parents and loved ones who have created services because they
39:09
realized there was such a gap in the system.
39:12
But if, if you're, you know, I lost my train of thought there,
39:17
But if you're going to those like that, you need to be doing
39:20
that for yourself and, and working.
39:24
And, and that's a, that's the toughest shift, I think for.
39:28
And again, it doesn't have to be this, your, your adolescence
39:31
brain isn't developed. So they're thinking very much in
39:34
black and white. I would encourage parents and
39:38
and caregivers to think in the Gray area.
39:41
You're not kicking them out. Maybe you're setting a curfew,
39:45
See where it goes. Try it for a month or two.
39:49
Try it for a week or two. Maybe it crashes and burns, but
39:53
you're not kicking them out. You're just inching towards a
39:56
little bit more of a guideline that you can live with because
40:00
you've got to put your head on the pillow at the end of the
40:02
day, right? You're working.
40:03
Parents are working hard. And if I've learned anything
40:07
that's not happening at all right when like the you're not
40:10
getting. Sleep sometimes, Sometimes, so
40:13
often parents are not getting a good night's sleep because
40:17
they're so worried and the pressure or they're maybe
40:20
they're their child is on the streets or couch surfing or or
40:25
whatever. And they're still not, you know,
40:28
they're still not getting a good night's sleep.
40:29
So, so to put some energy into getting support for themselves
40:35
so that they can have a a broader capacity to deal with
40:39
the crisis that's still that they're still in.
40:44
Does that happen a lot? Do you, do you find that clients
40:47
come in like I don't even know where my kid is, right?
40:49
Like where do you go from that point?
40:51
Because I had a parent reach out to me and was like, I haven't
40:53
seen my kid in four years. Like he's like in his 20s and
40:56
what do I do? Like what do I do right?
40:58
Is there like system set up to do to deal with that?
41:00
I don't know if you know the answer to that or or maybe just
41:03
you can talk about your experience with.
41:04
Well, a lot, a lot of times some parents will want to cut off a
41:08
cell phone, for example, if they are, if that's something they're
41:11
providing. And, and I always think it's,
41:13
it's helpful for people to have a way to connect.
41:19
And, and if, if you're in that early stage of crisis to tell
41:24
your loved ones that, look, I'm, you're always going to have, I'm
41:29
always going to respond to your communications.
41:33
It might not be in the middle of the night because I put my sleep
41:37
first. I will always be there for you
41:41
at, you know, at some at a level that honors my own Peace of Mind
41:46
and serenity. So to have some of these, it'll
41:49
always be here for you. And it, it might be, I might
41:53
have to take a step back because, because I love you too
41:58
much to, to keep on messing up or whatever the case is.
42:02
But to maintain connection at at a level that you can, that you
42:08
can live with. It doesn't mean you're enabling.
42:11
It doesn't mean you're fueling behaviors that are, that are not
42:17
healthy. It means you're staying
42:18
connected at any cost. So for someone who's not
42:21
connected with their child, that is, I mean, that's terribly
42:25
scary. They, they usually do show up or
42:28
surface if it's a temporary kind of thing, if it's a matter of
42:32
years, I mean, there's, there's a lot of grief and loss work
42:36
there to be done. There's a lot of like.
42:39
How are you doing with that? How are you OK if you haven't?
42:43
You don't know where your child is.
42:45
I. Mean this yeah to this woman had
42:48
she was in a place of acceptance I think because she was very
42:52
common like I could just kind of feel it in in her tone and there
42:56
was there was some work that was she was telling me she was
42:58
senior therapist. So there was definitely some
43:00
work done there. And I think that she probably
43:03
had come a long way because I don't imagine that to be easy at
43:06
all, right? Someone comes into, you know, to
43:12
see you or is dealing with, reaches out to you, is dealing
43:16
with a loved one of an addict and doesn't know what to do.
43:20
Where do where do they start? Where do where do you start
43:23
people on this journey? Like what's step one, really?
43:28
What? What is their goal?
43:30
What do they want? Are they invested in getting
43:34
their loved one into treatment? What are I'll ask them what the
43:38
behaviors and symptoms and, and my book outlines that that that
43:42
they're dealing with on a daily basis are.
43:44
Maybe it's phone calls in the middle of the night, maybe their
43:48
loved ones living with them and they're dealing with verbal
43:51
abuse or other behavior that they're they're struggling with.
43:57
So what to look for? First of all to.
43:59
See. Yeah, See where they're at with,
44:02
with kind of the day-to-day what the parents or loved one is
44:06
dealing with. I kind of take stock of that.
44:09
And then where, where are the levers of influence?
44:12
So if they're struggling and their young person has the keys
44:18
to the car and the parents are insuring the car, well, there's
44:23
a lever of influence. Are the parents comfortable
44:25
being completely liable in a case where a young person might
44:31
be substance involved or have mental health issues that would
44:36
result in an accident? Am I OK?
44:39
Yeah. So.
44:42
So where are the levers of influence?
44:44
And. And.
44:44
Oh, well. And most will say I couldn't
44:47
possibly do that. They're using the car to go to
44:49
their job. OK.
44:51
All right. So, you know, does it concern
44:54
you that they're that you're liable for that?
44:58
And, and, and where, where are you prepared to make a change
45:03
and start with kind of the lowest hanging fruit.
45:06
We're not going to kick out right away, but maybe they've
45:10
got enough money to be drinking and using.
45:12
Maybe they could contribute to the household either through
45:16
some monetary or maybe they could contribute to their cell
45:19
phone bill. Maybe there's some more skin in
45:23
the game they can have to to to show some responsibility.
45:29
Does that make sense? Like to kind of have those where
45:32
where are the levers of influence?
45:33
Because family have much more leverage than they are in touch
45:38
with. By the time they come and reach
45:41
out for help, they're feeling very powerless.
45:43
They're feeling like they have 0 control.
45:46
And in a sense they do. They don't have control over
45:50
their young person, but they do have control over some things.
45:54
So it's like lining them up with what they have control.
45:58
They don't have control over the disease of addiction or mental
46:00
health. They definitely don't have
46:02
control over that. What do they have control over?
46:05
OK, Are they funding it? Are they, you know, are they
46:08
giving money? Are they supporting driver
46:12
drivers insurance or? Providing a place to use the
46:15
drugs and alcohol. Yeah, yeah.
46:16
So where, where are they prepared to maybe and just
46:19
pointing those things out will give them a sense even if
46:22
they're not ready. And again, I'm not telling them
46:25
this is what they need to do. We're establishing where they
46:28
feel like they have a little bit of influence.
46:31
And the loving relationship is a big one.
46:34
It's bigger than parents give acknowledge their children want
46:40
a connection with the parents. They don't really want to be
46:44
pissing them off and harming them and causing the in fact,
46:48
that can fuel a lot of the guilt, shame and remorse in a
46:52
loved ones in in the young person's life.
46:56
So, yeah, having having that, having a kind of taking stock
47:03
and having those tough inventories of where, where am I
47:08
supporting recovery and where am I?
47:10
And they can always, people can always start doing something for
47:13
themselves. Going to a, you know, their low
47:17
barrier support group where it doesn't cost a lot of money, but
47:21
they can go online even or listen to a podcast.
47:24
There's great podcasts out there and yours is one of those to to
47:30
get some support and on their own terms.
47:32
Yeah. Yeah, that's, that's great.
47:35
Thank you. I, I, I think I'm going to have
47:39
to have you back on because we're going to have to wrap it
47:42
up here. But I, I could go on forever
47:44
about this. Let's close with this because I
47:46
always close my podcast with this.
47:47
But if you could say something to the struggling mom, dad,
47:51
loved one of an addict right now, what would you say?
47:55
I would say there is a solution and you're looking at 2
47:58
solutions here. And you know, I've worked with
48:02
young people that have been in my life for a long, long, long,
48:08
long time. And maybe they've come in and
48:10
out of abstinence, but there's so much more to recovery than
48:15
abstinence. And I love that I've been able
48:19
to introduce them to a solution that they've come back to for
48:23
and, and may take with them for the rest of their life in a way
48:26
that suits them. So recovery is possible, and
48:30
there's always hope. Always.
48:33
Yeah. Thanks so much.
48:35
Susan. Your books on Amazon?
48:37
Where? Where else is it?
48:38
Available. It's it's available everywhere
48:40
books are sold. And if it's not, ask for it,
48:42
please. And you can ask for it at your
48:44
library. It's got an e-book available.
48:48
Nice. So yeah.
48:50
And it's even on sale because it's Amazon Prime Days.
48:52
Love it. Oh yeah.
48:53
Good call. Yeah, it is.
48:55
Yeah. Thanks.
48:56
So. Much.
48:56
But if you want to buy Canadian, it's at Indigo and Book City if
49:00
you ask for it. And yeah.
49:02
I love it. I'm, I'm looking forward to
49:04
reading this and I think we need to continue this conversation on
49:09
not just on this podcast, but like out in the world, right,
49:12
because a lot. Of absolutely, yeah.
49:14
It's about raising awareness and having the tough conversations
49:17
and and learning new ways to new tools and ways to cope.
49:22
And there is a solution. Thanks very much for having me.
49:25
I really enjoyed this I. Appreciate it, thanks for
49:28
listening. Please help us grow the channel
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and like, share and subscribe for more content.
49:33
The discussions and stories shared on this podcast are for
49:36
informational and motivational purposes only.
49:39
This content is not a substitute for professional medical advice,
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addiction treatment, or therapy. If you or someone you know is
49:46
struggling with addiction, please consult A licensed
49:48
physician, addiction specialist, or mental health professional.
49:52
You are no longer alone.