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Parenting Teens in Recovery: How One Mother Turned Her Family’s Journey Into a Lifeline for Others · Conversations with Cumberland Heights

0:00
Marty Rivera.
0:02
Hey, welcome to the show.
0:04
if you wouldn't mind. To start, just introduce yourself.
0:06
Who are you?
0:07
I'm a mom
0:12
of a young man who just celebrated his fifth year of sobriety.
0:16
Congratulations. Huge.
0:18
Yeah, that's such a big deal.
0:20
Really proud of him. He's done a lot of great work.
0:22
And, I'm just absolutely passionate about sharing.
0:29
What it's like to be a parent of a youth,
0:33
especially under 18, who's challenged with substance use disorder.
0:38
And in the
0:41
the difficulty of thc,
0:45
the impact of thc and that in that situation.
0:49
High potency thc.
0:51
So I really speak a lot to that.
0:54
But I'm just I'm, I'm
0:57
grateful to be here, and I'm just passionate
1:00
about sharing our journey so that others don't walk in deer in the headlights.
1:06
And just what do I do next?
1:09
So. Totally. Yeah. So,
1:13
how did you learn about Arch Arch Academy?
1:17
Tell us about that journey of coming to understand
1:21
what was needed and what was next.
1:22
Yeah.
1:23
So, our son, began
1:28
his, his recovery intensive outpatient
1:33
experience in Atlanta.
1:36
And he was in that program,
1:40
in a program down there for,
1:44
about nine months.
1:46
45 days of that.
1:48
He was in intensive inpatient program affiliated with that program in Phoenix.
1:54
I didn't know. Yeah.
1:56
Yeah.
1:56
So, you know, we were on the roller coaster for about nine months.
2:03
Holding sobriety, letting go, sobriety, relapses.
2:07
To ultimately, he was kicked out
2:12
of his local program.
2:15
And, through our journey.
2:18
We were at the point where, at barely 17 years old,
2:23
we had to tell our
2:24
son, pack a bag and go figure it out.
2:28
Or go to intensive inpatient here, Arts Academy,
2:33
which was currently at that time, that was 2020.
2:36
So they were we dropped him off at Cumberland Heights,
2:38
and he spent his first few weeks here at Cumberland Heights.
2:41
But it was pack your bag.
2:44
Go figure it out or you go to intensive inpatient.
2:47
And we were very grateful that he chose to come here.
2:51
And so he came to Cumberland Heights.
2:53
He was here for a few weeks
2:54
and then transferred to the amazing campus that they have now.
2:58
He was there for about three months.
3:03
You know, I don't think if he had not had those nine months
3:06
in the previous program, he probably would have been there a lot longer
3:10
because he was still resistant.
3:12
But he was there for three months.
3:15
We picked him up.
3:17
In the parking lot because it was still Covid regulations.
3:22
He never got to see the the community, see
3:25
the campus until a few years later.
3:29
But picked him up and,
3:33
got him home and,
3:35
as of
3:37
March 13th of this year, he's got five years of sobriety.
3:40
Yeah.
3:41
So he's 21, 22, 22, 22.
3:46
Talk to me about.
3:47
I think it's super interesting that your son had experience.
3:50
First of all he's an adolescent.
3:52
And,
3:54
addiction treatment for an adolescent can be tricky. Yep.
3:58
Just because
4:00
we pay a lot more attention to maybe not a lot more, but
4:03
it's a different population than the adult population.
4:06
And we're paying closer attention to developmental milestones.
4:10
I know Dean Porterfield, the executive director out there, pays
4:13
really close attention to that and tries to create a milieu
4:16
for kids to grow into their differentiation,
4:20
their ability to self-directed their own life and their own recovery.
4:25
But just from a mom's perspective, you have a 17 year old.
4:31
What would you share with
4:32
other families of how you got to the place that you were giving him
4:38
a critical choice of, hey, you're either going to move
4:44
and pack a bag and figure this out
4:47
as a young adult, or you're going to go to treatment,
4:50
because that is I can't imagine that place.
4:54
Yeah.
4:55
Just a minute, because I feel like I'm going to cry because it was hard.
5:01
I mean, my son is my heart outside of my body
5:04
still to this day.
5:07
But it was it was one of the hardest things
5:08
I've done in my whole life.
5:16
It was.
5:17
It was the nine months, you know, and it was the nine months where we had,
5:22
you know, we had a a family group that, were supporting us.
5:27
I had an amazing sponsor who was supporting me and my own parent recovery.
5:32
I had a tribe of moms that were supporting me.
5:35
I had the amazing program, local program, and the counselors
5:39
there that stood beside us as we made these decisions.
5:44
And helped
5:45
us understand that we were doing the right thing for our son
5:48
by by holding our, our boundaries,
5:51
by loving him where he was.
5:55
But understanding that we weren't going to allow him
5:58
to slowly kill himself by continuing to use
6:02
tell us about his behavior at the time.
6:04
So what would
6:06
what were you observing that led you to that decision?
6:10
Well,
6:13
it just the again,
6:15
the lack of engagement in a program, you know, it was very obvious.
6:19
And I was watching him.
6:21
I really started.
6:23
He was he had held sobriety after that inpatient program for a period of time.
6:30
But by the beginning of the year,
6:32
he he came home at Thanksgiving.
6:35
And by the beginning of that next year of 2020,
6:41
I was observing the behaviors coming back.
6:46
Lying, not being honest of where he was.
6:51
He did have a few,
6:55
relapses that we gave him the opportunity to get honest on.
7:00
We had to have some soft kicks, kick outs.
7:05
Before the major one and said, you can't live here.
7:10
Go sleep on your sponsor sofa and seem to be working.
7:15
But it was just a horrible roller coaster of, you know, relapse.
7:21
And I, I really I remember then I, it was,
7:25
they had a Monday night meeting at the local program,
7:29
and I remember that night, I just felt kind of some kind of peace.
7:36
And then my phone rings,
7:39
and I was like, what is this?
7:42
And it was his counselor saying, yeah, John, he's relapsed.
7:47
And, he
7:51
we're going to have to talk
7:52
in a few days about what his next steps are. So,
7:57
and then it just my heart dropped.
7:59
Of course.
8:00
Yeah.
8:00
My husband went and picked him up and they spent about two hours in the car
8:05
with my son explaining to him how we eat is okay.
8:09
It's natural. And you know, I'm okay.
8:12
I don't need any help.
8:13
And you know, but we know better.
8:16
We knew, we knew. So.
8:18
So you mentioned a phrase that I think is interesting
8:20
and we haven't talked much about it on, kind of in this platform.
8:24
But parent recovery, would you define that, define and describe it
8:31
for somebody that might have heard that for the first time?
8:35
Parent
8:36
recovery mirrors is a parallel process
8:41
to our child's recovery.
8:43
That's why we have Al-Anon now.
8:45
And on those other 12 step programs,
8:48
so that we can walk our own journey,
8:51
not exactly parallel to our child.
8:56
But at this we it helps us speak the same language,
9:00
because at arch and at the local program, it was a 12 step program.
9:06
So allowed us to speak the same dialog.
9:08
We were speaking the same vocabulary.
9:11
But addiction is a family disease.
9:16
And, we didn't because it can't cure it.
9:21
Can't control it.
9:24
But we can contribute to it. And,
9:28
so working our own 12 step, though I and I had started that before
9:32
John came to arch, with our local program.
9:38
I barely scratched the surface.
9:41
And it's interesting, I say, because that's why I'm here today.
9:47
When we dropped John off at arch, we had four hours to drive
9:50
driving home, and my husband and I were like,
9:52
something's got to change and it's got to be us.
9:56
John's got to do his own work.
9:57
We can't control that, but we have to do our own work.
10:02
And so we committed to digging in
10:06
to our parent program, working our 12 steps.
10:11
I came back with just a passion to work
10:14
with my sponsor, to dig in, to really dig in.
10:17
I didn't want to do surface work.
10:19
I wanted to dig in and do my work.
10:22
We had, marriage counselors.
10:25
We had, personnel, our own personal counselors.
10:28
If we weren't working, we were working on us.
10:32
And so we did that.
10:34
We did the hard work while he was at.
10:37
We were working at as hopefully as hard, if not harder than he was.
10:42
Probably not.
10:44
He did a lot of work, sure, but,
10:47
we dug in and we did our work.
10:49
And so that's what it looks like is working a 12 step program.
10:53
And I can tell you,
10:56
again, one of the reasons I'm here today is because when we got him
11:00
home, he had been home for about an hour and settled in,
11:04
and he came to us and he said, you guys have changed.
11:08
We didn't want to control him.
11:11
We weren't going to tell him
11:11
how he was going to live his life, or what his choices were going to be.
11:15
We were just going to love him and just ask that he work a program and be sober
11:20
for his mental and physical health, and that's all we wanted for him.
11:24
And as long as that was in place, everything else would fall into place.
11:28
So yeah.
11:30
So that's why I'm, I'm sitting here with you today.
11:32
So I hear what I hear through recovery lens, of course,
11:35
is a lot of step one and a lot of surrender.
11:41
Which is the spiritual principle,
11:43
one of them that's embedded within that first step.
11:46
So for a parent listening.
11:50
That is a hard process
11:54
to surrender an outcome
11:57
and be willing to take action.
12:00
If our loved one,
12:04
chooses a different way of life, right?
12:06
I mean, that's ultimately what you're talking about.
12:09
And so I don't want to put words in your mouth,
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but what I'm hearing you saying is you guys were in meetings,
12:14
you guys had your own therapists, and you were really doing real step work.
12:19
So what does that mean?
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Because I know these are simple questions, but I think they're so
12:23
valuable to ask is what does that actually mean for a parent.
12:26
What is the actual process of step work really look like for you.
12:29
Or has it looked like for you? Is it look like today?
12:32
It's from
12:35
my understanding and having conversations with John.
12:39
It's very similar to his.
12:41
I go to meetings every week.
12:44
More than one if needed.
12:49
But my programs, my program, his his, his.
12:51
Yeah.
12:52
But I have to keep doing it every day.
12:55
And what I learned and working my own program is
12:59
I had my own
13:03
disorders that I had to address my, defects.
13:08
Right.
13:09
And I barely scratched the surface.
13:12
I'll be working on
13:15
working through those every single day of my life.
13:19
It's not going to change.
13:21
I needed my own recovery.
13:23
I needed to heal from my generational issues,
13:28
my family of origin issues, and by healing
13:31
through those, I was able to
13:35
release of some of them, and heal every day.
13:39
But it's it's still today.
13:42
I have my meetings.
13:44
I have to continue to work on me
13:47
and and heal from that, just like
13:50
John has to do his work.
13:52
The amazing thing is, is that
13:56
we can talk openly and honestly about it.
13:59
We can share in a loving way and not own each other stuff.
14:03
Yeah.
14:04
it was there a particular reason why you and your husband,
14:07
gravitated towards or chose a program that identifies itself
14:12
as as, participating in a 12 step tradition?
14:15
And I'll, I'll, I'll release a caveat for anybody listening,
14:19
because what that doesn't mean
14:21
is that all the work that happens in our programs is 12 step centered, right?
14:25
Really what that means is that we celebrate our tradition and the history
14:30
of 12 step culture that we believe that participation, a 12 step culture
14:35
post-treatment and within treatment is such a valuable resource
14:39
for anybody that chooses our programs or anybody that struggling with addiction
14:43
for them to use to kind of what I would say is regain what's been lost,
14:48
maybe just a a very brief, small definition of recovery.
14:53
So, so why a 12 step program?
14:55
It was the what was used, the tool that was used in the local program.
15:01
And an I had, in
15:04
since we were accustomed to that.
15:08
He mainly ended up at arch,
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because we, we had two options.
15:14
It was here or Hazelden in Minnesota, and,
15:20
I, there's no way I was sending a model way that far away.
15:25
So we love Hazelden. Super cold. Yeah.
15:28
Absolutely, absolutely.
15:29
But, you know, it was it was location.
15:33
It wasn't specifically on that 12 step,
15:39
part of it. Sure.
15:40
But it definitely if it
15:43
if that wasn't part of it, I probably would have
15:48
reconsidered.
15:49
Because that was his that was part of his toolkit
15:52
already, and he had already worked through that.
15:55
So reintroducing some other tool, plus I've,
16:00
I had in my personal journey found great relief in that.
16:05
So I felt that
16:07
that was just the right place for him to be and the right tool for him.
16:11
So five years and zooming out, what have you noticed that's changed
16:17
with your son?
16:18
I mean, you've talked about yourself and your husband in your family,
16:21
and I can only imagine just in terms of my own personal experience
16:24
of being in recovery and my family talking very similar to you,
16:29
how helpful that is to have the shared experience and shared language
16:32
and to be like really transparent, shared boundaries.
16:36
Kind of shared understanding of what's acceptable
16:40
and what's not acceptable.
16:45
How would you describe his
16:46
changed five years from 17 to 22 is such a critical time
16:51
period for anybody.
16:54
I got clean and sober at 20, so I can kind of identify
16:57
with your son and probably a lot of ways having to grow up, but.
17:01
But how would you describe his change process over the last five years?
17:06
Nothing less than miraculous.
17:11
And he did it.
17:12
He did it all himself.
17:14
Every step of the way.
17:18
Our last decision
17:19
for John was him coming here.
17:22
It was basically setting that boundary.
17:24
Right?
17:25
Stays, work a program, stay sober.
17:29
And when he got home, that was the boundaries.
17:31
Work a program, stay sober.
17:35
Fill up your time with working,
17:36
going to school and being of service done.
17:40
He made from that point forward, he made all the choices himself.
17:45
He went to turn to IOP.
17:47
He did another IOP when he got back home, and as soon as IOP was over,
17:52
it was time for school to start,
17:53
and he said he wanted to go back to school and finish his senior year.
17:57
Which was online.
17:59
So luckily that was a very comfortable approach for him.
18:02
And so he graduated from high school
18:07
and he had thought about
18:10
going to to school, but he ended up having to have some type of surgery.
18:16
But he made those decisions if he wasn't going to school.
18:21
He was working full time and supporting himself.
18:25
We always said, you have a place to lay your head and food in the refrigerator.
18:30
If you choose to be,
18:32
if you choose to work, then you're working and supporting yourself.
18:36
But if you're going to go to school will help you.
18:38
And we just set, you know, some parameters around that.
18:41
You know, and he took it and ran. Yeah.
18:44
And he's has five years sober.
18:48
He was working full time.
18:50
He was a manager at a, hardware store.
18:55
About a year ago.
18:57
And about this time last year, he made the decision
19:01
that he wanted to be an addiction counselor himself.
19:04
Very cool.
19:05
Yeah.
19:06
So he's now an addiction counselor and loves his life.
19:10
Is just filled with joy.
19:13
And, he's just
19:16
happy.
19:17
I really love what you said.
19:18
We should like, should write that down.
19:20
Honestly.
19:20
Like, that was the last decision we made for him.
19:24
Like, that's a powerful.
19:26
I have two children.
19:28
They're babies.
19:29
They're nine and six.
19:30
But the mindset of allowing them to step into their own adulthood
19:35
and their own autonomy, can be really hard even at,
19:39
even at that age of trying to fix, manage and control
19:43
our perceived,
19:47
challenges that our children face.
19:49
Does that make sense? Oh, yeah. Absolutely.
19:51
That's why that's especially kind of just moving to think about where he's been.
19:57
And, and and I will say this too, there's a lot of families that, that,
20:02
you know, their loved one don't have the opportunity to experience recovery,
20:07
you know, which is tragic.
20:09
It is absolutely.
20:10
Or families that continue in their own
20:12
recovery journey and the loved one chooses not to.
20:16
And how challenging that can be.
20:18
You know, I certainly can't imagine.
20:20
Okay Marty, let me ask you this.
20:22
If you as you talk to parents these days, you know, neighbor calls you or whoever,
20:27
what do you tell them to look for in a treatment center?
20:30
Definitely 12 step.
20:31
Yeah.
20:32
I just, you know, that's a really amazing framework.
20:36
Yeah.
20:36
It's available pretty much anywhere, any time.
20:41
So, you know, in terms of community meetings, I think.
20:46
Yes. Yeah.
20:47
But really a place
20:52
that's going to allow them long term and a longer term option.
20:57
Because as my experience in talking with parents
21:01
who have put their kid hurt their children into programs,
21:05
shorter term
21:07
programs typically don't suffice.
21:10
You end up returning to the same behaviors.
21:13
It just there's not enough time there.
21:15
So looking for a place that, can keep them for,
21:19
you know, an extended period of time, at least 90 days at the least.
21:24
Is usually what I encourage parents to do.
21:28
Other than that, you know, a parent engagement program.
21:33
Absolutely. To. Right.
21:35
So hopefully they have something, you know,
21:39
that can help bring them in and work in collaborating on building
21:44
those family relationships back up before they return home.
21:48
Yeah.
21:50
That's, that can be tricky, too,
21:52
because there's a difference between family support and a family program.
21:56
You know, in terms of a structured come for a weekend or come for a couple
21:59
days, learn about the disease of addiction and, and shared language.
22:03
Right.
22:03
You know and do some work together
22:05
maybe some multifamily groups versus this is sort of an aftercare lead.
22:11
Parent
22:13
autonomous to the program connection
22:16
point for parents to stay connected with one another.
22:19
And to learn from one another. Yes.
22:21
And to receive hope from one another or receive suggestions from one another.
22:27
Talk about your role and those groups with our academy.
22:31
Yeah. So, I'm leading the witness.
22:33
Thank you.
22:35
So I was so eternally grateful.
22:40
Yeah. For what?
22:42
Our arts academy, given our family,
22:45
as well as the
22:48
the local program that we were we participated in,
22:52
and they had a very strong parent support group.
22:55
It it wasn't required, but on Thursday nights,
22:59
we all had a meeting on the same night that the kids had a meeting.
23:03
And, it just was it was life changing for us.
23:07
And so I wanted to bring that to our academy.
23:11
And so I talked with Dean and Cole for a long period of time,
23:17
maybe for about a year, to really hash out what this was going to look like.
23:22
And, what, a few years ago,
23:29
They gave me the green light and said, let's figure it out.
23:32
Let's do it.
23:34
And so, in January of 2022, I believe, I,
23:42
hosted my first zoom meeting for parents whose children were in charge
23:48
and in we've gone from there
23:51
and we've grown, the programing, it was just every other Monday night.
23:57
It's now every Monday night
24:01
we have,
24:04
I've started parent helped parents start their first three steps.
24:07
So working with them steps one through three, if that's what they want to do.
24:12
So I've offered that for a three month
24:15
period, or however long it took.
24:19
We have a Saturday morning meeting, and it's just kind of an open
24:23
dialog of parents dealing with challenges.
24:27
And it's not based on a topic. It's just
24:31
I'm struggling with this.
24:33
Can a veteran parent help me?
24:35
So we've been doing that.
24:37
In place of that, right now, we're doing a book club
24:40
on the parallel process by Christy Polytech, which was,
24:44
a great resource that I had used in my recovery.
24:48
And, in the last,
24:51
year or so, I've added a steering committee of parents
24:56
to help drive the programing and to lead meetings.
25:00
So it's not the Marty show.
25:02
It's now, it's now the arch parent tribe, and I'm just.
25:07
I'm just part of the tribe.
25:09
And, there's some amazing parents that are leading it,
25:13
and help driving the programing and being of support to the other parents.
25:18
And, you know, we started out, I think, with like four parents,
25:23
we have, eight on our super private Facebook group.
25:29
We have 80, almost 90 parents on that.
25:33
We have an average attendance of approximately 10 to 15 parents every meeting.
25:39
And these are parents whose kids have left,
25:42
and parents,
25:46
who have, who are current.
25:49
We try to get parents involved as quickly as possible
25:52
to start their healing process as soon as possible.
25:55
Well, I want to give you a lot of credit because,
25:57
you know, for, I mean, I work here, I have a bias.
26:01
I went to treatment here. I think you did that.
26:03
You know,
26:06
I think our programs are amazing and life changing.
26:09
And, I'm so, so proud.
26:12
Of what the transformation that arch has gone through.
26:14
You know, a little bit more history.
26:16
I love history, but, you know, we started treating adolescents
26:19
here in 1985 on our River road adult campus.
26:23
But it was and we did great work.
26:25
But it wasn't until the transformation for that program, more recently,
26:30
took place in 2020, because we opened that campus actually in April 1st
26:35
of 2020,
26:36
which there was a lot going on in that time period, if we all remember.
26:39
But when that happened, it allowed that program
26:42
to grow a new set of legs.
26:46
From I mean, everything changed.
26:48
But the thing I'll call out is just the length of engagement
26:51
where instead of kids maybe participating in a more standard adult
26:55
28 to 35 day residential experience,
26:59
you know, we were inviting kids to stay for six months.
27:03
You know, just depending on where they were
27:05
and then drop down to a lower level of care.
27:07
But you, and your parent group has,
27:12
you know,
27:14
unpaid volunteers have,
27:23
Gosh,
27:24
without y'all, our academy wouldn't be the same.
27:27
Oh. Thank you.
27:28
You know, and I think, I think Dean and the whole team, Laura,
27:33
everybody out there shares that sentiment because
27:37
that piece, at
27:37
least in this time period, wasn't, wasn't present.
27:41
And it took, a passionate, patient,
27:44
persistent, parent like you that created sort of the space for other parents
27:49
to come and ask just any question, you know, the the you know, be careful.
27:56
My language, the crazy questions or or the confusing questions,
28:01
you know, just to have that place where they could be with their own peers.
28:05
And if we didn't have that, we would it would, it would be a disservice.
28:09
So I like that you said it's an important part of making a treatment decision.
28:12
Like is there something available?
28:14
Is there other people that you can talk to?
28:16
Because, for anybody in any family that's struggling with addiction,
28:20
it's super important.
28:21
So thank you so much because all the way from Georgia,
28:25
you have maintained this
28:26
for the half a decade now, you know, and,
28:30
and and we just simply wouldn't be where we are without, you know, thank you.
28:35
It's, it's just a passion.
28:38
And I just, I just want to pay it forward to
28:43
to others because it it changed my life.
28:47
It changed our family.
28:48
And I just want other families to have that peace, joy and serenity.
28:53
Yeah.
28:55
So I, you know,
28:57
I want to hear about what you're doing now because I learned something new
29:00
when you were here.
29:01
You were meeting with the technology team near my office, and I was like,
29:05
just, you know, Chris, who's who's our one of our generalists here.
29:08
And you told me that you're now a contractor.
29:11
Yes. You're now on staff, and I see do you have your lanyard?
29:15
No, I don't have a I didn't I don't have an ID.
29:18
Okay, okay. Maybe next chip. Okay, okay.
29:20
Oh. What are you doing now? Tell me that because I have no idea.
29:23
Yeah. So,
29:27
Sam, finding it or
29:29
founding the parent tribe.
29:32
My passion just grew for parent coaching
29:36
and and helping parents find themselves out of that.
29:40
That whole.
29:41
So my passion just grew, and I found myself
29:47
just spending a lot of time talking
29:49
to parents, a lot of time on the phone.
29:53
Adding extra zoom meetings here on there.
29:56
I've seen you spend time volunteering here.
29:58
Yeah. Yeah.
30:00
And I'm just so passionate about it.
30:02
And I'm just like, that's what I want to do.
30:05
That's what I want to do with my life from now on.
30:08
I've had multiple careers
30:11
in urban revitalization
30:15
and, most recently the past
30:19
ten years I've been in corporate strategic sourcing.
30:25
But I was just like, it's
30:27
time for me to to fill my cup on a regular basis.
30:31
And in doing this, this work, and if it flies, great.
30:33
Otherwise, hopefully I can just help some parents.
30:37
Yeah.
30:37
So, I decided to become a parent coach and start my own parent coaching company.
30:44
And received my certified parent
30:50
specialist or peer specialist parent, from the state of Georgia.
30:55
So I applied for that and, working very close
30:59
to getting my credentialing as a certified parent coach.
31:02
Through a, an organization.
31:05
And, started equanimity parent coaching.
31:08
And I offer, I offer working through a program.
31:14
It's not a 12 step program, but it's a, it is a 12 week
31:19
parent coaching program, to help parents.
31:22
It's it aligns very closely to 12 step.
31:25
It's all about peeling back the layers of who we are and understanding
31:29
what makes us tick so we can be better parents for our
31:32
our youth, whether they're challenged with substances or neurodivergent.
31:38
Just helping parents figure out what makes them tick
31:42
and how they can respond in a more positive manner.
31:45
So it's a 12 week program.
31:46
I offer a 12 week program
31:48
or just online or just coaching sessions if they're struggling.
31:52
And then I'm also offering if there's other organizations
31:56
that are similar to, to our academy that would be interested
32:01
in creating their own type of ground roots parent support group.
32:05
How do people get in contact with you if they're curious?
32:08
Marty, equanimity coaching, parent coaching.com.
32:12
Perfect. Yeah. Perfect.
32:14
Where do you hope that this goes?
32:15
What are you hoping to accomplish? Healing.
32:20
Serenity for parents.
32:23
Yeah.
32:25
This is not about
32:28
making it a huge corporate, you know?
32:32
It's it's just it's a it's a passion project.
32:35
Yeah.
32:35
It's just getting the word out there
32:39
and helping parents and letting them know that they're not alone.
32:42
Do you think that parents of adolescents, who are experiencing addiction.
32:47
I was just curious.
32:48
Your thoughts, like, what are the similarities with those people?
32:53
Like, so we know their kids share similar problems
32:58
addiction, comorbidities, neuro divergence of some kind,
33:02
which we probably all have a little bit.
33:07
What would you say?
33:09
Do the parents have common
33:11
problems and issues and what would those be?
33:15
Yeah, I mean, I you know what I'm saying?
33:17
Like, oh, you know, above like a, an inability to surrender,
33:22
you know, over and above, kind of getting out of the way
33:25
and then being willing for their child to fail
33:28
because that would be the most difficult thing for me is letting my child fail.
33:33
Yeah.
33:34
It's interesting you bring that up because it comes up quite a bit.
33:39
Part of what I'm doing with our academy is that I.
33:42
Come on, I come to, the family day.
33:45
Day two of the family day.
33:48
And I share our journey.
33:50
And when I'm done, the parents are sitting there going, that's us.
33:54
Yep. That's my kid.
33:55
That's my kid.
33:56
Yeah, right.
33:56
Yep. And,
34:00
And when I meet with parents, it's.
34:02
We all are very similar.
34:05
We're Type-A parents, right?
34:08
We are the type A's, where the doers were the a number one
34:13
mom and jurors, you know, from her, from a mom, from a mom perspective.
34:18
You know, we are you know, we're excellent employees.
34:23
We strive in our in our roles.
34:26
You know, we're high performers and,
34:30
we drive that.
34:32
We drive it for our kids rate.
34:35
We we we pay, we we clear the path for them
34:40
to have everything that we never had.
34:45
And, you know,
34:49
is it a bad way to be?
34:51
Absolutely not.
34:53
That's just we we just are loving.
34:55
Loving our kids, but loving them to death.
34:58
Right.
34:59
And so you know, it's.
35:03
Yeah.
35:03
And you know in some, some areas it could be that
35:07
there were wanting them to live that are unlived lives of course.
35:12
Right.
35:13
And there's nothing wrong with that.
35:16
We're not bad people at all.
35:18
We're we love our kids.
35:21
And when we and, you know, when our kids are in program,
35:24
that's just another example of how much we love our kids.
35:27
We're getting them the help that they need. Yeah.
35:29
But we have to let go and get the help that we need.
35:33
That's what I was I was going to kind of highlight, like for any parent.
35:36
Like what? We're not saying is that parents caused addiction.
35:39
Absolutely not.
35:41
Because there's a lot of I love that word too.
35:43
And the second one today. Momager.
35:45
Because there's a lot of managers, you know, there's a lot of parents
35:48
that are involved and love to clear the way.
35:50
And assist and, you know, help our loved ones,
35:53
even if it's not your child helping your your your, your brother, your,
35:57
you know, your wife, whoever it is, succeed.
36:00
Be happy, joyous and free.
36:02
Be a healthy, productive member of society and whatever that means for them.
36:05
And, and and many of those individuals don't experience addiction.
36:08
So I don't think you or I has any explanation as to why
36:11
certain kids and certain people experience addiction under those same
36:17
like elements, and others don't.
36:19
But it is interesting that you call that out as just a common factor.
36:25
You know, of families in particular with adolescents.
36:30
You know, and I hear that a lot from our clinicians too, of just
36:34
sometimes having to direct families to cool it.
36:39
You know when the treatment process begins of like
36:42
hey we've, we've your son, your daughter, they're safe.
36:46
We have them.
36:47
This is when you should expect to hear from us.
36:49
This is what we're going to need from you.
36:51
And luckily I'm not, an active clinician on those teams because I can imagine
36:56
that to be such a challenge with folks who might be frustrated by that.
37:02
Yes, absolutely.
37:03
I, that's oh, I do,
37:07
I we hear it on a regular basis on a Saturday morning meetings.
37:11
I was told, you know, I can't talk to my kid for ten days, right?
37:16
It's okay. They're in a safe place, right?
37:19
They're getting the the love and the support that they need.
37:22
And and they're okay.
37:26
Yeah.
37:26
And you're going to be okay.
37:28
Yeah. But.
37:29
Yeah. It's hard.
37:30
You know, we've we we are there.
37:33
We wake them up.
37:34
We clear the path for them. Right?
37:37
We we set up the.
37:39
They say they want to do something and we've got a we've got a whole,
37:44
you know, plan on how to make that happen for you.
37:48
Right. Yeah.
37:50
The other thing that, is
37:52
kind of interesting, not just in terms of treatment today
37:54
and what we know about effective treatment in the United States today is,
37:58
you know,
38:01
treatment
38:02
is just the first step in the healing process.
38:06
You know, like when you leave treatment,
38:09
whatever level of care, however age you are
38:11
and whatever your experience like that's just the beginning.
38:14
You know some people might perceive that and it's like oh like that's
38:17
not what I expected.
38:19
You know wait a minute.
38:21
This is a professional treatment program. You guys. They should be.
38:23
Well healed by the time they come home.
38:26
We shouldn't have these issues. Right.
38:28
Only to kind of realize like oh no
38:31
wait, this is asking me to dive deep.
38:34
You know, when they come home,
38:37
I'll tell you every story, because I don't know if you know this.
38:39
I'm a marriage family therapist by training. Oh,
38:43
and one of the things I really loved,
38:47
when I was in practice and through school,
38:51
was learning because we're systems thinkers.
38:54
You know, it's how we're trained is to think systemically.
38:55
And we always were taught that families are like a thermostat.
39:00
And,
39:02
when a member of the family leaves.
39:07
Right.
39:07
That changes the temperature of this family system.
39:10
Oh yeah.
39:11
And they're in treatment and they're in a healthy place and what have you.
39:14
And everybody's kind of the temperature kind of decreases a little bit.
39:17
But the second that person comes back into the normal
39:22
day to day, that temperature.
39:24
And it's not anybody's intentional, but because we're homeostatic, right.
39:29
We like those baselines.
39:31
We will very naturally go back to 78 degrees.
39:34
What it was before.
39:35
The example for somebody to reflect on is this.
39:38
If you happen to go home, let's say you're college student
39:41
or whatever age you are, and you go home and you visit your family on Thanksgiving
39:46
or the, the, the holidays of any kind,
39:51
and you start to notice that you're acting differently
39:55
and you start to notice that you're sort of receding
39:58
back into how you acted when you were 14.
40:02
And your mom starts to act this way and your dad
40:05
and everybody that's homeostasis, that's getting drug back into those
40:09
old roles, those old rules of your family system.
40:13
And there's you could be, you could have all the greatest intentions.
40:17
But I always tell folks,
40:19
even when you're not experiencing addiction, just be aware of that.
40:21
You know.
40:21
And I remember reflecting like, I'm an adult,
40:23
like I got a couple years of recovery. Like I'm so,
40:26
you know, I'm, I'm doing work.
40:27
And when I go back home, I am 16 again.
40:29
And I act out emotionally in those very same ways.
40:34
And I can imagine families,
40:38
without the language,
40:41
without the community.
40:49
You know,
40:52
That would be a really scary place to be without that information,
40:56
without that guidance, you know, on what should we do
40:59
next and how should we,
41:02
how can we be able to sort of grow together?
41:05
Does that make sense?
41:06
No. Absolutely.
41:08
Absolutely.
41:09
And again you know it's back to.
41:14
Our our child can will continue to work or program the rest of their lives.
41:19
And we will need to do the same.
41:22
Do we have to go every week or every day or. No.
41:26
But we have to continue to do our work
41:29
or we will relapse back into our old behaviors.
41:33
Yeah. Yeah.
41:35
And it's interesting you mentioned that, you know,
41:37
John was just home for a visit, a few weeks ago.
41:41
And, it I think I'm
41:44
not saying that I'm I've got this covered.
41:48
I appreciate that, but what I,
41:51
I was prepared that he was home
41:54
and I had no expectations
41:57
of the amount of time that he would spend with us.
42:01
It was just like, you know, if you're just going to come
42:04
and lay your head on the pillow and I see you walk in and out, that's awesome.
42:08
You know, I get to see you.
42:09
I get to have
42:10
I got to spend more time with him than I even thought I was going to.
42:13
Yeah. But I knew that he had
42:17
he had other priorities and other things he wanted to do.
42:20
And I had absolutely no expectation of him being there
42:24
and making me feel great and appreciated it, because that's me.
42:29
That's my work. It's not his work.
42:32
You're also reminding me of my own parents,
42:35
and in a good way.
42:36
You know, and one of the things that they they do have their own program
42:40
and I've continued in that over 15 years.
42:44
And one of the things they talk about often,
42:46
if given the opportunity, is that they had to develop their own life.
42:51
Yeah.
42:52
And how worried they were that.
43:00
They had to let go.
43:02
They had to surrender.
43:03
Yes. You know, and their life wasn't their kid's life.
43:07
That's what I'm trying to say. Yeah.
43:08
You know their life wasn't their loved one's life.
43:10
And how much of a struggle that was and still probably can be
43:16
you know just like it's a struggle for somebody in recovery
43:20
you know as in any shape or form.
43:22
But you know if you experience addiction yourself, like,
43:25
there are good moments and there are hard moments.
43:27
You know, and are we going to choose to,
43:31
use the resources that we've been taught to use
43:34
to negotiate and move through life because I,
43:38
you know, like your son, 17 years old, getting clean
43:41
and sober like a lot of life is going to show up for him. Yes.
43:45
You know, just
43:47
getting clean and sober. Yep.
43:49
You know, losing a job, failing in a relationship, not doing well in school.
43:55
Whatever those things are.
43:57
And that's the work of recovery.
43:59
Really? Yes.
44:00
You know, is
44:02
I mean, not to it's very going to treatment is very scary and very hard.
44:06
I'm not trying to take anything away from that.
44:07
But gosh, living in a,
44:10
in a state of, of surrender and,
44:14
and working to develop a relationship with a higher power through community.
44:19
Is just a lifelong process.
44:21
It is. It is.
44:22
And speaking of surrender,
44:27
I didn't surrender on the day he came home.
44:30
Oh, yeah.
44:33
Yeah. Yeah.
44:34
You know, and it was I, I remember the day it was,
44:39
I think he is about a month shy of his two years of sobriety.
44:43
Yeah.
44:44
And I just I was still trying
44:49
to control and
44:52
I at luckily I had my tribal moms
44:56
that instead of going and trying to
45:02
impact John and influence him.
45:05
I reached out to them and like, this is driving me nuts.
45:09
You know, and talking it through it with them.
45:12
You know, it's again, I felt a trigger.
45:14
And instead of taking that trigger out on my son, who nine times
45:18
out of ten didn't have anything to do with him in the first place.
45:22
Right.
45:23
And talking that through them, with them
45:26
and then, you know, get it out of my system and moving on.
45:29
But finally I was just like, why do I keep doing this?
45:33
And I just was sick and tired of being sick and tired.
45:37
Yeah. And I was just I was done. Yeah.
45:40
And I just slowly, over a few months
45:43
or few few months after that, it was just like, I've got my tools.
45:47
I know what I need to do,
45:49
and I've just got to keep making that next right decision for me
45:53
and and quit allowing those triggers to impact anyone else but me.
45:58
Because it's not it doesn't have anything to do with anybody else.
46:01
Yeah. It's all about what's in here.
46:04
Yeah.
46:04
So, yeah.
46:05
So it's not. I don't want to.
46:08
I don't talk this talk like I got it right because I sure don't.
46:13
It's it's a lifetime journey. Yeah.
46:16
And so.
46:17
And just have to keep doing that.
46:18
Well, I'm so thankful that you came.
46:21
I'm. I'm grateful that you were willing to share your story
46:23
and to be present with us and be authentic.
46:26
And I think we should think about
46:27
maybe seeing if we can get other families on here.
46:30
Maybe like a family, podcast itself, like, you know what I mean?
46:35
And maybe even maybe stepping out into my story and
46:37
and just letting you guys talk about your shared experience.
46:41
But I just want to, again, thank you so much.
46:43
Like, I really do mean that, Marty.
46:45
Like, it's so important for folks to have access.
46:50
It's it's you know, you take it or leave it you know here's the zoom link.
46:53
Here's the phone number.
46:54
Here's the meeting space.
46:56
But you have created a unique atmosphere of recovery for parents.
47:02
And we're just so,
47:06
we're in debt to you for making that happen,
47:09
you know, and, it just excited kind of where this goes next.
47:13
So if you're interested in learning more about Marty
47:16
or her coaching services, we're going to link all that in the video.
47:20
We post this this is on Spotify.
47:23
Apple Podcasts and YouTube actually.
47:25
And on our website you can find all that.
47:28
And just as always, link, comment,
47:32
like, subscribe, do all those things that really makes an impact.
47:35
Not for our organizations necessarily, but for parents
47:38
that are looking for resources or trying to learn about what
47:41
treatment is really like.
47:42
That's why we're here. So thanks for watching.