3 Ways to Help a Loved One Who is a Drug Addict

Do you have someone you love who is addicted to drugs? Are you feeling completely lost and powerless on how to help them?

Trying to help someone with a drug addiction can be extremely difficult.

According to recent statistics, substance abuse affects about 23 million Americans per year directly. If you count the number of people it affects indirectly, you would probably have to double, even quadruple, that number.

Still, with such a large number of people who are indirectly affected by drug addiction, there still isn’t a lot of information out there about dealing with a loved one who is a drug addict.

If you’re feeling at a loss when it comes to helping a loved one, check out this article.

We’ve got the top three ways you can help a loved one who is an addict.

1. Know That You Can’t Do It Alone

This is one of the things many people who are trying to help a loved one have trouble dealing with: You cannot help an addict all on your own.

Addiction is a disease, and just like any other disease, unless you are a trained professional, you can’t cure it. Think about it – you wouldn’t try to cure someone’s cancer if you weren’t a doctor, would you?

The same logic should be applied to addiction.

Therefore, one of the best things you can do is to enlist help from others.

Usually, the best option is to try to get them into drug rehab facilities where they’ll have the help of qualified medical professionals.

2. Stage an Intervention

More often than not, an addict is not going to come to the realization that they need treatment all on their own. They need someone else to point out those signs for them.

This is where an intervention comes in.

An intervention is when you schedule a face-to-face meeting with an addict, most often with other friends and family members present.

If you choose to stage an intervention, do so in a relaxing place. And, make sure you are constantly letting the addict know that you are doing this out of love, otherwise, they may end up feeling attacked.

Sometimes, all it takes is another person to say it like it is for an addict to come to their senses.

3. Trust Should Always Be a Priority

Going through the journey of addiction with a loved one is never going to be easy.

However, one way you can make things go a little further is by establishing trust with your loved one.

If you do not establish trust with your loved one, the throws of addiction may cause them to turn on you and even shut you out of their lives completely.

In order to maintain trust with an addict, you must do your best to always avoid nagging them, criticizing them, yelling at them, and, most importantly, engaging them in addictive behaviors or putting them in environments that would make it tough to not cave into their addiction.

With that being said, you should still never go so far as to protect a loved one from the consequences of their reckless behavior. And, you do not need to put up with any sort of bad behavior on their part.

By following these three tips, it should be much easier to help a loved one who is a drug addict. Just remember, the road is not going to be easy, but you need to stay strong for your loved one.