Hello everyone,
This is my first post to this here, even though I joined a few weeks ago. I have been struggling with my thoughts, and have even written out what I wanted to say, only to feel that I'm not effectively getting my message across, get tired, frustrated, and delete it all. Tonight, I am attempting at writing this and sticking to it... Please forgive me if I jump from one thought to the next.... and I warn you, I'm sure this will be long....
I am 25 yrs old and come from a dysfunctional family. My father has always suffered from alcoholism, drug abuse and mental illness (mostly clinical depression), my mother is a recovering alcoholic and has been sober for almost 14 years! My father's longest time being clean and sober in my lifetime was for about 9 years. He attended AA meetings daily for years. He "fell off the wagon" in 2003, and literally at the time, blamed me for it. His downward spiral started with alcohol, and progressed to cocaine (although I didn't find out about the cocaine until only recently). Things were bad at the end of 2003 and for the first few months of 2004, but they picked up again. He got charged with several DUI's and other offenses, and it seemed that he hit rock bottom. He stopped drinking and returned to his normal behaviour (at least what we were used to), which was severe depression... he began taking his prescriptions and prescribed, and even attended appts. with a psychatrist and self-help meetings. Then, something changed this summer....
He became hyper and talkitive... he was taking an interest in things, learning new things, getting EXCITED about things... I actually thought he was getting better!!!! I remember asking him if his Dr. switched his meds again because it seemed this time that they were actually working! Him and my mom (who are still married, and were living together) started talking about renovating the house, selling it, and moving into an apartment. They met with a contractor, and agreed on plans to renovate the kitchen and possibly expand the bathroom. This is when things started to get crazy. My dad took it into his own hands to do all of the demolition work on his own "to save money", which made sense in a way - why pay someone to knock out cupboards when you can do it yourself? But he took it 10 steps further. My mom would come home from work to find a wall torn down. The next day, another wall would be torn down.One day he took a chainsaw to the couch and cut it into pieces. He justified this by saying he couldn't take it out all in one piece, and that he wanted to get a new one anyway. He began to say that the reno plans had changed, and he is going to do a complete rebuild of the inside of the house. He had decided that he is going to change the floor plan of the house and make the entire interior brand new again, and that he was going to do it all himself. When this all began, is when we could definitely see the attitude change and knew that "something was up". He wasn't himself - he was up all night, wouldn't eat, wouldn't sleep, and had such grand ideas. Despite all of the red flags and warnings, despite his erratic and sometimes explosive behaviour, my mom agreed to apply for a loan from the bank (yes, all of this demo was done BEFORE securing the funds to renovate). Everything financial is in my moms name: the mortgage, the loan, the credit cards; all due to bankruptcies my dad has had, the most recent one being from his "episode" back in 2004. She agreed to get the loan because there was already damage done to the house, and they'd need the money anyway to repair it. I begged and pleaded for her to take control of the finances, since it was all under her name, but in her defense, my dad is a very confrontational, strong, big, intimidating man. He is the type of man that gets things done: that gets his way. He would not let my mom have ANY say in anything that was being done to the house. He refused to make a budget or a detailed plan of what needed to get done and how. He just continued tearing down walls, taking out windows, you name it, it's been destroyed... He brought a few different contractors to the house a few times, but I think it was all to humour my mom, and a way of making it look legitimate so that she would give him some of the money from the loan. He's had several run-ins with the police: he's been taking cabs and not paying for them, not paying people back, writing bad cheques... I've spoken to the police several times, not understanding why there isn't ANYTHING they can do. They just tell me that even though my mom is the only one financially responsible for the house, it is still considered half of my dad's because they are married. He is destroying his own property. They know about the drug use, but as many of you probably know, they can't arrest someone for being an addict. He did spend a portion of the money on building supplies (which he has since returned to the store to get money back) and hiring labour workers from temp. agencies to help him with demo clean-up... but he took I would estimate, a good $11,000 or more from my mom, masked it as legitimate renovation expenses, and spent it on his habit. All in the past 3 months.
My dad has torn the house down from the inside. There is no ceiling (only the roof), there are no walls, there are no cupboards, doors, bathroom, sink, counter tops, etc... It literally looks like a delapidated house. There has been no rebuild done on the inside other than new windows that were finally delivered and put in. My mom has now moved out into her own apartment. My dad has sent himself to the hospital at least 6 times this month because he thinks he overdosed. He is open with his addiction now, and pleads with me and my mom to forgive him, everytime he thinks he is laying on his death bed. Every other family member will not talk to him. He has burned bridges with the few friends he had.
What I am struggling with, and why I am turning to this group, is that (and I know this might sound arrogant, or maybe just naieve), I think I am emotionally handling this pretty well... I am not taking his behaviour personally, because I know this is not my dad. This is my dad facing an addiction, and not taking the steps to overcome it. I am not mad at him, because I understand how addiction is an illness. I don't hold on to his empty promises and I don't believe his lies. I am able to look at this situation and feel sorry for him, and KNOW that there is nothing that I can do to help him. I know that he needs to be the one to step foot through the door and get treatment. I'm not able to go to detox for him; it has to be his choice. I've even prepared myself, through the many times he's convinced himself that he's dying, that he might not make it to even see Christmas this year... I guess throughout my lifetime, as hard as this is to admit, I've become used to his detachment from the family - whether its been because of addiction, alcoholism or depression. Or maybe it is because I grew up in a dysfunctional family, I had no choice but to grow up quick, suck it up and take care of myself. What's making this very hard on me is seeing my mom struggle to deal with this. She's strong in the sense that she's been through and survived alot in her life. Her weakness is a sense of denial I get from her: she half-heartdly believes my dad when he tells her he's going to get clean, and every time he breaks that promise, it breaks her down a little bit more. I guess you could say I've assumed the caregiver role for her... I take it upon myself to "counsel" her, and encourage her that she can get through this. I'm not complaining, I WANT to help my mom feel better, but it hurts to see her so sad, and it's exhausting at times, to worry about her AND my dad simutaneously. I fear for them both; my dad for obvious reasons, and my mom because she has high blood pressure and I'm worried about her having a heart attack... It's very hard to hear my dad talk the way he does: he has such grand delusions and talks about doing things that he just couldn't afford to do. He has no money, he owes money through the nose, he's not taking care of his health (has diabetes and hepatitis c) and yet he's talking like he's a king with loads of riches just waiting for him. I've become pretty good at staying firm: I don't enable him in terms of lending him money, giving him rides, etc... I figure that "helping him" in those ways are only going to make this lifestyle of his comfortable, and that is the last thing that I want to do. I would do anything if it meant getting him out of this lifestyle alive and on the road to recovery. I plan to attend my first FA meeting next Wed.... I'm not sure what to expect from it, and am wondering how I would apply the 12 steps to myself, as I feel that *I* am not the one that needs to recover... Maybe that sounds a little rude of me? But I don't dwell on the past, I'm not blaming myself, I don't feel angry and I'm not sure which wrongs I can admit to..... But I am hoping that I can oversee that, and that an FA meeting would be useful for me, because so far, I am the only one that is giving myself any support...
thank you so much for reading this insanely long post, but it feels nice to finally release some of it. Thanks.
Edited to add: I know recovery is a verrry long process, and that there is a good chance that my dad will not be going into any time soon (at least I'm not getting my hopes up...) but the situation with the house is an immediate problem.... my mom, while she no longer lives there, cannot get him to leave the house. The mortgage isn't being paid on time (if at all). He continues to demolish and destroy parts of the house, with no end in sight.... what else can be done at this point in time!??!
