three keys to a positive approach for parenting a child misusing drugs or alcohol; courage, confidence, and compassion, with Brenda Zane
Host: Brenda Zane, brenda@brendazane.com
Instagram: @the.stream.community
The Stream Community: a positive, health-focused online space for moms of kids experimenting with or addicted to drugs or alcohol
Free ebook: “HINDSIGHT: 3 Things I Wish I Knew When My Son Was Addicted to Drugs, by Brenda Zane. Download here
Want my weekly email for support during this difficult time? Click here to request it
Are you a dad? Find out more about our soon-to-launch men's community here
Podcast support from:
This episode is supported by The Stream. You might be wondering who else is listening to this podcast and dealing with the same kinds of issues you are. You may also want to go beyond the podcast and dive deeper into the subjects with other moms who get it.
The Stream is the place where all of that happens. It’s a modern, online space where moms who have kids struggling with substance use and addiction issues focus on their own health, wellness, and sanity. There’s no judgment, and no drama (it's not on Facebook), and our community is based on positive thinking and learning CRAFT skills. We have weekly events, a book club, yoga classes, workshops, expert guest speakers, and supportive conversations.
Being a member of The Stream gives you an even deeper connection beyond the podcast where you get to interact with amazing moms and me every day. So if you'd like to hang out with us after the episodes, you can learn more and join us at www.thestreamcommunity.com. The first two weeks are always free to see if it’s the right support for you, so there’s no risk. We hope to see you soon.
About this episode:
Research has shown that a positive, non-confrontational approach to helping our kids make positive changes in their lives is the most effective when they’re misusing substances. In this episode, I share three keys to shifting your words, actions, and mindset in a more positive direction using courage, confidence, and compassion. I also share a tip for those times when you revert to old, confrontational ways to help keep things moving in a positive direction.
-
Speakers: Brenda Zane
Hello and welcome. You are listening to Hopestream. If you're parenting a teen or young adult child, who's experimenting with drugs and alcohol or who's in active addiction, currently in a treatment program or in those early stages of recovery. You're in the right place. I am Brenda Zane, your host, and a mom who has been there. So just take a minute to exhale. No, you're in really good company. And this is your place to soak up some support and understanding and really great information. You can learn more about me and the work I do to serve parents like you at www.Brendazane.com.
I am back with a solo episode this week. It feels like it's been forever. So it's always nice to just share some things that are on my mind and my heart with you. To me, it kind of feels like we get to sneak off to a cool little coffee shop somewhere and just chat about what's going on. Share some ideas about how to handle the rough stuff and just have a little bit of time to decompress. With no one else in the conversation. So I hope that you also feel like this is your time. I'm sure you're walking or driving or cooking, or maybe you're on a bike or something on a hike. The important thing is that you are here. You're tuned in to get new and different ideas and perspectives when it comes to your son or daughter's current situation. And that is truly commendable.
I want to do [00:01:30] something just a little different today as an experiment. Which, you know, I love experiments. And that is to spend one a minute. Just one. Breathing. Giving your nervous system, a quick break. And giving you a minute, literally to be inwardly focused. If that just feels too out there for you, you can always tap the little fast-forward button.
But I would encourage you to go with me on this experiment. And just see what comes up for you.
So, whatever you're doing. Just stop. And commit the next 60 seconds of your entire life. 60 seconds. To be still. To take a really full, deep breath.
To let the to-do list for the day slip away.
Just let it go.
Just breathe.
Know that you're exactly where you need to be today. At this very moment.
Enjoy. Quiet.
And then take one final deep breath.
As deep as you possibly can.
And then let it all out.
[00:03:00] Okay, one minute. Just notice if anything feels different and know that you could always take one minute 60 seconds for yourself, if that felt good.
Well, I was thinking about what we should chat about today. Three words kept repeating in my head. And when that happens, I pretty much know someone needs to hear those words. So I'm going to share today about what I believe are three keys to a positive approach to helping your child make healthy changes.
And those are courage, confidence, and compassion. It's funny that these are the words that came to me today because when I was in the thick of it, I don't believe I had much, if any of these. I was pretty much the opposite in every way. I was fearful. I was unsure. And I think I was fairly insensitive for a long time to what my son was actually dealing with.
I would say the majority of the time I was not handling things the way I would handle them. Now, if I was going to start over. Which I certainly don't want to do, but I feel it's important to call these out so that you can show up in a different way than I did.
And I truly believe if you can show up even 50% of the time with a decent amount of courage, confidence, and compassion. You have a really good chance of making positive differences. And by the way, [00:04:30] Don't worry about the other 50% of the time when you bomb out, because I am also going to give you a tool for those instances.
Courage
But let's start with courage. Whenever I hear the word courage. I automatically think of the lion from the wizard of Oz. Which by the way is still an all time. Favorite of mine. The root of the word, courage is cor C O U R, which is the Latin word for heart.
In its original form. The word meant to speak one's mind while telling all one's heart. So courage is an inside job. It's all about the heart. And it is about action. And if there's anyone on the planet who is capable of firing up an acting from their heart, it is a parent for sure.
If you remember in the movie, The lion is given a medal of courage by the wizard. But the metal is just an outside symbol. And we know that it won't really help him develop the inner strength that he needs to be braver. And in today's world. We also can put up all kinds of signs and symbols in our offices or cars or homes that remind us to be more courageous.
Tell us all kinds of things. Ultimately though it comes down to our core, our heart. And a willingness to face our fears. [00:06:00] Courage requires us to look deep within our soul to be uncomfortable, which I have talked about quite a bit. And to make a heart decision. This might not be the timer place for a mind decision, mainly I believe because what may be going on in your home or with your child probably is not making any logical sense.
And I know for a fact it doesn't follow any kind of sensible pattern. And if you're here listening, I'm guessing your life is requiring a heroic amount of courage just to get through breakfast on some days.
So given that, and the reality you're living from one day to the next, how do you unearth the courage? To get out of bed and face. What can feel. Like a stark and surreal existence.
Well one way is to leave it in your subconscious and just live in denial. I think a lot of us do this as parents, when we are new to the whole substance use scene, we don't really know what our kids are doing. And we certainly don't truly want to know what they're doing. We can't believe our child would be involved with something like this. And we either consciously or subconsciously say.
Oh, he or she can't really be doing that. It's probably a phase. It's probably not that bad. They'll get over this. And in that case, courage isn't really required because we're pretending that we don't need it.
[00:07:30] Unfortunately, there is a high price to pay for living in denial. For our kids and for ourselves. For them, it can mean delayed help in whatever form that might take in your family. And if we're saying that there's not a problem, then there's no need to look for solutions, right. I also though, if you bury your head in the sand,
You sacrifice your vitality, your self-awareness, your sensitivity. And your capability to be fully present with everything that life offers. Good and bad.
And don't feel bad if this sounds like you. Because there's a pretty universal tendency to want to blind ourselves to the fact that our kids are doing risky things, hurting themselves and potentially others. Brisky and their future potential, like all of that is super scary in our human nature. Is to walk away from danger, not toward it.
Then how do we develop the courage to do all the really scary stuff? The difficult, painful things that we have to do as parents of these beautifully complicated kids. If you look up synonyms for courage. You'll find words like bravery conviction, guts, determination, faith. Resolve, backbone, spirit.
Spine, boldness you get the idea. You basically shake out your Cape, and if you're on the type, a [00:09:00] side of the equation, you may feel the need to iron it because it's likely been watered up at the bottom of a laundry basket somewhere.
But you take your Cape, you put it on. Tilt your chin up. Pull your shoulders back and plant your feet. You imagine yourself Having already conquered what it is you're about to go do And think about the satisfying feeling in your gut when it's done You meet that thing head on even if you're not totally sure you know what you're doing You ignore the chatter in your head that says wait I have to reach is one more book I have To think about it for a few more days I think it'll resolve itself and the other 4 million reasons that your brain is telling you you can't do this. You can. So you do it, and often you do. do it scared
But if you do the things scared with a bunch of other people around you It loses some of its power, and your courage can grow And then You do it again the next time and you realize hey i'm better at this than i thought And then you keep going.
Confidence
The next key is confidence. This is a tricky one, because even if you're a highly confident person, The experience of watching your child's self-destruct is one that can create just this chronic denigration of confidence and leave you. [00:10:30] Looking around for your footing.
The definition of confidence is a feeling of self-assurance arising from an appreciation of one's own abilities or qualities. So. What happens when you get dropped into a universe that you didn't know existed? And you're expected to somehow navigate your way through things, completely foreign to your world.
New language, new acronyms, lots of doctors, therapists, and really smart. And sometimes intimidating people. Oh, and by the way, you need to get up to speed really quickly because you have really huge decisions to make. About things you just learned about two days ago.
Also it's your child's life. So yeah, take that confidence. Not to mention there's a good chance your child. The one you love so much, you would eat your right arm for them. Is telling you, you suck. You've ruined my life. You have no clue what you're talking about. You don't understand me. And you are probably on the receiving end of a lot of anger and opposition.
Again, take that confidence.
So how in a world do you go about gaining some confidence in this subculture of families, dealing with substance use addiction and mental health? How do you push past the stigma of a society that tells you somehow you have screwed up your [00:12:00] kid? And if you had just been more diligent, worked less or worked more. Applied more discipline, had avoided that divorce, dealt with the bully at school, and also found a different school while you're at it. How do you keep your head up through this and move forward with a sense of confidence?
I will offer this. You learn. You do the research to know what things work and what doesn't, when you're parenting a child in this situation. You connect with other parents to know that you're not the only one who thinks that you're somehow to blame You shift your focus from 100% on your child To taking care of yourself and your other people
You go back to dancing or playing the guitar or writing poetry or rock climbing. You give back and serve others. And when you do these things slowly at first, it will feel counterintuitive. But when you start to rebalance your life in this way, your confidence will grow. And when you add that to the courage that you've developed. Life starts to feel a little less helpless. And a lot more manageable.
Compassion
And finally the third C is compassion. For me, this was the hardest. Mostly because I didn't understand what the chemicals in my son's brain were doing to his ability to think reason, see potential consequences of his actions. Or deal with his hurt and anger. [00:13:30] I just saw a guy who was really pissed off making very bad choices. Putting himself and our family at risk, you know, all the things.
So to feel compassionate for him didn't even enter my mind until I started to learn the CRAFT approach and about the adolescent brain. And substance use. I needed to understand its physiology and the psychology behind why people use substances, even when the consequences are so negative. And that takes work.
And I know sometimes you just feel like, why am I doing all the work? Why aren't they. Doing this. And I get that, but the reality is if they're an active use or in the middle of a treatment program, or just emerging on the other side and working every day to be healthier. They don't have the same frame of mind or context that you do.
And if your child is under 25 ish. They don't even have a fully working brain. So the deck is really stacked against them in a lot of ways. So we have to do the work. Just like if your son or daughter came home from the doctor with a diagnosis of leukemia. You would get super busy learning everything there is to know about leukemia. I'm guessing.
But here's the deeper question. Why should I feel compassion? What's that going to do? Why not just be tough. Tell them what we expect. Double down on the discipline and confront this thing. Head on what [00:15:00] is wrong with that? Why would I feel compassion for someone who's doing such stupid stuff.
This is the real question. And the response I just gave is one that's so many parents feel and often, it's because when we were young and doing stupid things, That's how our parents responded and we listened. Many of us didn't dare even consider going against what our parents told us to do or not to do.
So we're completely blindsided and baffled by a child who's so willfully risky, dangerous, oppositional, defiant, and angry. We just looked at what we experienced and believed the same thing will work now. Only at Walt and there's research to show that this is true.
Confrontation does not encourage someone to consider what they're doing and make positive change. In fact, direct confrontation. Leads to increased resistance when it comes to asking a person to make a change. And we know this from a number of studies that have been done on motivation.
Parents I work with sometimes want to directly hit their child over the head with the harsh facts, thinking that that is going to jolt them into wanting to change. They might record them when they're drunk or high and show it to them with the hopes that it will make them see the light. Or make them ashamed.
Well, our parents might keep laying punishment over punishment, over punishment. Assuming that the more strict and more [00:16:30] restrictive they are. Their son or daughter will see the light and change their ways.
The problem with this and the research shows that there's a significant chance that you are likely driving your child further away. Both from whatever it is you want them to do. And also from you. You're driving a wedge in your relationship. And we also know from research. That the parents of people who are misusing substances are often the most influential in helping move them towards safer choices or getting them into treatment.
This confrontational approach also often ends up in shouting matches and power struggles because no one likes to be confronted. And especially a young person who believes in their heart of hearts. They know. Everything.
So given that information, the best ways I can share to build your compassion are to learn as much as you can. Educate yourself about substance use and the mental health conditions that are almost always right at the wheel beside it. I talk to people who are in recovery or listen to some of the hope stream episodes with people who are now on the other side. You can find all of those www.brendazane.com/playlists. There's an entire playlist already built for you there.
You can really dial up your focus on taking care of yourself. Getting out of the house, not isolating. [00:18:00] Rediscovering things that you love to do. Basically restoring yourself. So you have the mind space and the physical health to feel compassion for others.
And you can, at the right time, talk to your son or daughter about what they're feeling, what they're experiencing. Kind of think of it as if you were talking to a neighbor's child or a niece or nephew. Get really curious and find out what they're experiencing instead of trying to convince them to change. And if you focus on these things, you'll start to grow space for compassion in your heart and in your mind.
And even if these things might feel counterintuitive at first, The question I would ask if you're hesitant to try this craft approach is. What do you have to lose? If things are currently bad. And your child is making horrible decisions, doing risky things. That might impact their life considerably.
And putting substances in them that could kill them. Why not try something that is actually evidence-based. If what you're doing, isn't working. Continuing to do it is likely making you and your child a little bit crazy. And depending on what they're using, it could also be deadly. If your son or daughter is experimenting with substances. Even if today they're limited to alcohol and marijuana. They are just one impaired decision away from taking what [00:19:30] looks like a harmless Percocet or Xanax pill that is actually fentanyl. So you truly don't have time to be stubborn about your method of dealing with this problem that's in front of you.
And working from an approach that leads with compassion and empathy is scientifically proven. To be the most effective way to help create change for the better.
Now, remember how I said, if you can do these things even 50% of the time, you're likely to start to see positive changes. And that there was a tool that I would give you for the other 50% of the time. When you revert back to your old habits. Not approaching this whole thing with confidence, not acting with the courage that you need.
Or not being compassionate. Here is the trick for those times.
Hello. I am jumping in for a quick minute to let you know that there is a very special community. I created online. Where moms have kids misusing or addicted to substances, gather together and get through the hard stuff with each other. It's called the stream and it is unique and that it's not a Facebook group and we focus on positively holding each other up when our kids are struggling.
It's a place where we focus on you, because if you're one of these amazing moms, there's a lot of focus on your son or your daughter. But who is taking care of you? That's what we do. And we would love to have you join us to get a team around you. Help you learn some great tools for [00:21:00] encouraging change in your child.
And to have a place to connect with real moms who totally get it. You can take a look at our membership options at www.thestreamcommunity.com and I will see you there. Now let's get back to it.
You state to your child or partner or whoever was the recipient of your less than desired response. Wow. That was not how I wanted that to go. Uh, or you can say, Hey. I'm going to do that over. That was not the way I wanted to treat you. You get to do that. You get to be vulnerable and real and human.
And just call it like it is. You can say, I screwed up. I am working on this stuff. And it's hard sometimes, but I want to get it right. Let me redo that.
And then you get to rewind. Think about the response or the mindset that you would have rather had, and then do that. And it may not happen in the moment. You may have a blow up or a meltdown or a power struggle and everyone storms off. With door slamming and it all just falls apart. And that's not the end of the world.
Take a minute. Or a day or whatever you need to regroup. Approach with love and compassion and try again. Trust me. This is a very powerful way to build and earn trust with your child. Or your partner? It is an amazing [00:22:30] way to model the behavior. You want to see in them?
Okay. So now you have your backup plan. If everything hits the wall and you feel discouraged.
I will put links in the show notes for the resources that I'm going to mention here, but I would highly encourage you to check out drug-free dot org. Which is the website for the nonprofit, the partnership to end addiction. That is where you can find free coaching, support calls, and tons of online information and tools. And they also offer a helpline that you can set up an appointment with.
And you will have a call with a master's level clinician who can help you navigate what you're going through and point you in the right direction for resources.
This is hard. I know it is so freaking hard to do this. You're juggling a career. And likely a relationship or other family relationships. And often those people don't understand what you're dealing with. You may have parents whom you're now caring for. So you're in the proverbial caretaker sandwich.
working to help your child to be healthier. And at the same time, trying to sort out options and care for your parents or your in-laws. Oh, and if you're a mom, there's a good chance that you're in one variation or another of menopause. So that's awesome. And with all of that. You are here. You're learning.
You're being proactive. [00:24:00] And that is huge. I just want to reiterate how huge that is. And if anything you learn here encourages you to try a new way, a new approach. A different mindset. Don't feel like you've given up or that you're admitting defeat on your old ways. If your stance has been confrontational and punishment heavy. It's okay.
Just acknowledge that there is so much to learn. And you didn't receive a manual with this young person that you're trying to help. So please, please give yourself big fat break. Pat yourself on the back while you're added. For showing up again and again for your family. And just put one foot. Foot in front of the other today.
If you are looking for an idea of how you could put this into action today. I would suggest you spend a few minutes thinking about one positive thing related to your beautifully challenging child. Just one. And you might have to think hard. Or something might come to mind right away. But think about it, and then mention it to them the next time you see them.
And if you don't live together, just shoot them a quick text, not a novel. And let them know you acknowledge that they are more than their substance use. That could sound something like, Hey, I noticed you put the trash out by the curb. Thank you. That saves me time in the morning.
Or it [00:25:30] might be, it was cool that you hung out with your sister for a few minutes last night. I know she really appreciates that. Just little, it doesn't have to be earth shattering. But reinforcing these little positives really does start to shift the needle.
Okay, quick review because our brains are full and sometimes we get distracted while listening.
The three keys to a positive approach with your child's current situation are. One courage. Remember the wizard of Oz lion and how you need to find the internal source of courage, not just the metal or the outward trappings of it.
Number two confidence. Digging out your Cape. And doing the things scared sometimes.
And third compassion. Which helps pull your child closer versus pushing them away with confrontation.
And, would you mind doing me a huge favor?
If you like Hopestream and it's been helpful for you on the roller coaster with your child, would you leave a review and a rating in your podcast player? On apple podcast, just go to the main hope stream listing, where all the episodes are, scroll down about seven or eight episodes. I don't know why they do that. I don't know why they bury the ratings area, but they do.
So scroll down and then you will see a little section where it says ratings and reviews. And if you tap the purple hearts, it helps apple know that people are actually [00:27:00] listening to the podcast. So when another parent does a search for help with their child, hope stream will show up in the results. I really hate that. That's how it works.
But it does. So if you did that for me, it would mean the world.
Because ultimately, it's helping other parents find this information. Thanks for being here. It is so important for our families and our communities. And for the world at large, when we can help create healthier, happier people. Please be really good to yourself today. And I will meet you right back here, next week.
Thank you so much for listening. If you'd like to go to the show notes, you can always find those at www.brendazane.com/podcast, each episode is listed there with a full transcript, all of the resources that we mentioned, as well as a place to leave comments if you'd like to do that. You might also want to download a free ebook I wrote called hindsight. Three things I wish I knew when my son was addicted to drugs. It's full of the information I wish I would have known when my son was struggling with his addiction. You can grab that at www.Brendazane.com/hindsight. Thanks again for listening and I will meet you right back here next week.