Expert: Rebos - 10/7/2007

Question
Our son, until college on a football scholarship, was one of those rascally but perfect children much like his sister.  Once he began college, it was one alcoholic incident after another. He is so charismatic, he thought he could charm his probation officer which landed him in jail for 4 months.  He is out now and has decided that he does not want to follow our rules so has left our home.  After 4 weeks (we have never gone longer than a day between speaking), we have found that he is hanging out
with former jail friends and not working but still drinking.  He has contact us but we have received court summons for November 28th that I am sure knows about and I can't figure out what it is but fear it is another DUI.  Should we let him experience these consequences, he has not contacted us.  My heart is broken but don't know what to do.  I am afraid if we do not help him, he will continue this downward spiral.

Answer


Good morning Ginger and thank you for your question.

I know from first hand experience as to what you are going through and I feel your pain. Your son appears to be one of those poor souls who cannot get honest with his situation. It will take an act of Providence for your son to grab onto that moment of truth, before he starts to act in a sane manner. As you know (first hand) alcoholism is a family disease that affects everyone that is near and dear to an alcoholic. However, it accomplishes nothing for you to not hold your son responsible for his irresponsible actions. You, and your other family members, do not want to become “enablers”. When you enable your son in a sense you are giving him “permission” to continue ingesting his drug of choice. Of course you realize that with the group that your son is now running with, there is a good chance that he is also involved with hard street drugs! Whether or not you try to help your son out of his present court problem, if he is not ready to stop drinking there is nothing that you do or don’t do that will make him stop. You are totally powerless over your son’s drinking!

I would suggest that you (and any of your concerned family) start to attend Al-Anon meetings. At Alanon you will learn how to live with having an alcoholic son in your life, learn the truth about the disease of alcoholism, stop being an enabler and learn to detach from his alcoholism with love. Just because you go to Alanon doesn’t mean that your son will stop drinking, but your chances for not making mistakes in your relationship with your son will be cut down tremendously. In order for you to get on with your life and live with any peace of mind you must learn to help yourself. At Alanon you will meet people who also have an alcoholic in their lives, and that their own lives have become unmanageable as a result of it. However, they have found a way out of their dilemma. Alcoholism is a disease that affects everyone who comes into contact an alcoholic. Alcoholics are not bad people they are very sick people who need help, but THEY MUST BE HELD RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR ACTIONS! If you do not have your local Alanon number call toll-free: 1-888-425-2666 (United States) or 1-800-443-4525 (Canada). If you go to Alanon you will find that your problem is not quite as unique as you may think.

I can’t tell you what to do when you go to court, but remember that your son is an addict who will lie to you to protect his right to drink and or drug. It’s not that he will purposely lie to you, but he will lie to himself because he can’t believe that drinking is a problem for him in spite of where he is today! Alcoholism is a disease of denial.

I realize that I have not helped you with your decision, but if I have done anything I hope that I have convinced you to go to Alanon. Thank you, Rebos.