Disbelief – Denial – Hurt –  Frustration – Resentment – Anger – Resignation

Are you experiencing any or all of the above emotions because someone you love has a   drug,  alcohol,  gambling or other addiction  problem?????   What do people often say when you tell them?  For example;  You are not alone;  I will pray for you;  I know so and so;  etc., etc.,.  Do these words that are meant to comfort actually help?  NO!  At the end of the day, alone at night, the weight of loss and helplessness becomes so overbearing that you feel you are drowning in a sea of despair.  The fact is you have lost a person you love.  If the person had died you would pretty much feel some or all of these emotions.  But, there is one major difference between losing someone to death versus losing them to addiction.  Death is final.  The sadness and loss is always there, but so are the memories that warm your heart.  Eventually, hopefully you are able to move on.   Losing someone to addiction never allows you to move on.  It’s like being on an emotional roller coaster.  One day you are thrown a crumb of hope and you believe the person will be okay.  The next day the hope is taken away.                Our society is sympathetic and accepting of  grief and mourning for the death of a loved one.  It allows you time to heal.    The same tolerance is not present  to help you deal with losing someone to addiction.  You are expected to go on and function normally.  Society does not view addiction as a loss.  It views it as a disease, a burden and, at times, with scorn.  The addict is the modern day leper of society.            And there YOU are,  mother, father, spouse, siblings, children and relatives of the addict.  Unless people have a loved one that is an addict,  they cannot truly understand, in the real sense, what your loss is.  Families become divided, sometimes love is lost and the ability to dream and plan for a future seems out of reach.  In a lot of cases, the addict themselves make it impossible for family members to care about them, let alone expect society to accept them.  The drugs can make them into ugly, nasty people.  Drugs strip them of their humanity and their families of their sanity.                                                             Will there ever be an end to drug abuse??  Hell no.  Drugs are big business, big money.  It’s a billion dollar industry.  Just to name a few areas that make huge profits from addictions are;  drug rehabs, drug counselors, drug companies and so on and so on!  Where is the motivation to dig deep to correct the problem????  Does it matter to anyone??                               Would like to have some feedback.  What’s your opinion?