My brother’s been in and out of jail and rehab for years. Meth and opioids. We’re not close, but he was a great kid annoying younger brother before I went to college. Then he started drugs and kept doing them into his 30s.
He made it to 6 months sober for the first time in 20 years, as of last month. He was in a transitional care facility and it was going well. I was so very proud of him.
He took a trip to visit his mom and he backslid majorly. She found him totally out of it on the side of the road. She took him home. He tried to stab her bathrobe and nightgown with a knife because he thought they were intruders.
Then he
spoiler
attempted suicide
and she took him to the hospital.
He’s… ok… now. He’s back at stage 1 of the transitional care facility. No phone or Internet. Working his way back to 1 month. The facility is lovely and patient, from what I hear.
It’s all really hard for everyone. From my point of view, I get news filtered through my mom and we don’t have a great relationship, so I don’t 100% trust what she tells me and it’s always stressful to hear from her. He’s several states away.
I’ve started writing him postcards again, like I did when he was in jail. Postcards are nice because I run out of things to say with a weekly letter, but can always fill up a postcard. The most important thing is to let him know I’m thinking of him.
That instability can be really stressful. I can relate so much when you said you were proud and hopeful for him, and then something happens. That anxiety of praying nothing goes wrong because it’s happened too many times. I’m so glad he is in a good facility though; that is not always possible for people.
It sounds like you are already starting this but I highly encourage you to do frequent therapy sessions. That stress can really weigh on a person. Even being around those situations can cause secondary trauma that need support to process.
Do what is best for your situation, but I think having a more direct relationship is better. From the experience with my mom, the filtering is usually only in her best interest, not mine. You and your sibling are allowed to have your own adult relationship.
I think your post card idea is so cool. Keep us updated on how it goes. Keep your good supports close. And take time off or drop responsibilities as you need to. I learned the hard way that those heavy life stressors require a lot of extra time throughout the day, and keeping responsibilities to a minimum helps.
Thanks :)
I definitely want to have a more direct relationship with him if I can. Before he lost his phone (and phone privileges) we texted, and that was good. Hopefully we’ll be back to texting once he’s up a stage in treatment :)
I wish he had an email address or something, but his online presence has always been spotty. He’s has a string of email addresses that aged like milk (think killadope69@yahoo and you’ll be close) that he’s abandoned. I’m tempted to sign him up for a generic firstname.lastname@gmail account, but that might be overbearing on my part.
I hope he gets to that point soon. He is fortunate to have you in his life. That normalcy of talking to someone close can be a huge difference.
Personally I would not set up an email for him unless you ask him first or he asks you. It would be with good intentions, but I think supporting people with addiction includes helping them do their responsibilities, not do it for them, otherwise it can be enabling.
Re: email. True. And it’s a bit selfish of me to want to
pushpull him into using email, without his buy-in. I can suggest it (“hey, I checked and blah addresses are available. Might be nice to have a polite email address to give to your aunts. They’re great and send care packages with candy.”) But I shouldn’t do it for him.I don’t think it’s selfish at all. But yeah maybe make the suggestion and let him decide, or ask him if it’s okay for you to update them about his situation.
