Daughters,
I have been avoiding this topic because of many reasons. Perhaps your age is one of them, but I realized that it’s never too early to at least talk about the affects of alcohol and drugs. I’ll be honest, neither one has been a problem for your dad and I. And I hope that by us leading by example, that you both won’t be affected by them either. But I’ll be completely honest. It very much runs in our family. And addiction can affect anyone. I think it’s so important that I say this now and out loud. Society paints a very dangerous picture. One that makes life seem like it needs to have alcohol and drugs in it in order to deal with emotions, stress, busyness and of course, in order to have fun. Almost every show or movie that I have watched recently has involved young people in high school and college using drugs and alcohol as if they are a right of passage (as long as they are within the appropriate means 🙄). But even some members of your extended family has abused them and are abusing them right now. Nothing scares me more than the thought of losing you to addiction! Okay, there are other things too. But the difference here is that while most of the other things are out of our control, addiction is 💯 percent in our control. As Brene Brown says, “Genetics gave you the gun and your environment pulls the trigger.” She also says,
“It’s awful that the same substances that take the edge off anxiety and pain also dull our sense of observation. We see the pain caused by the misuse of power, so we numb our pain and lose track of our own power. We become terrified of feeling pain, so we engage in behaviors that become a magnet for more pain. We run from anger and grief straight into the arms of fear, perfectionism, and the desperate need for control.”
While I don’t know what is in either one of your futures, I can say that you both are meant to great things with your life. You are meant to achieve, learn, rest, and love your way through it all. There will be moments or people that make you feel like you need substances to handle them all but you don’t. Feeling even the bad stuff is okay. You’ll be okay. And if its really all too much there is real help here in me and out there.
Drugs and alcohol only temporarily numb the pain or give “liquid courage,” but the reality is that they won’t magically make you feel like you belong or take anything away no matter how you use them! More so, driving or being under the influence affects more than just you, remember that!
Dare to live without,
Mom
*Quotes taken from “Atlas of the Heart”
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