Are YOU an Enabler?!

 

Are YOU an Enabler

Preethi’s fiancé loves drinking on the weekends. But somehow Preethi is uncomfortable with this as she is well aware that this goes beyond mere social drinking. Every Saturday things get out of hand, often leading to fistfights between prem and complete strangers. Preethi has had to undergo unthinkable humiliation on his behalf to get him out of sticky situations. Preethi has also kept prem’s drinking as a secret from her family and friends, on his request. She tells herself that this is a passing phase. She ignores the advice of his friends who tell her to consider getting help.

Kavitha couldn’t bear the thought of her husband Prakash coming home drunk every night. Last week he wasn’t home two days in a row. Kavitha and her 13-year-old son had gone looking for him. They had found him a few yards away from home lying in a ditch, drunk and unconscious. It had been an embarrassing moment for Kavitha. She and her son had bundled him into the car with the help of a passerby. Since then Kavitha allows Prakash to stock as much alcohol as he wants at home and drink as much as he wants provided he didn’t drink out side the house. Prakash has a 15 year history of abusing alcohol but refuses to take any help, assuring Kavitha each time that he would change tomorrow. But that ‘tomorrow’ just never came.

Kavitha and Preethi are both enablers. They have unwittingly enabled their partner’s continued abuse of alcohol. Enablers are people in a substance abusing person’s life who consciously or unconsciously contribute to their continued abuse. Enablers usually are those closest to the abuser and care the most for the addicted person’s well-being. However they are under the false belief that their protectiveness and deliberate silence or oversight is actually preventing the addict from getting hurt or getting worse. But in reality they end up encouraging a pattern of dependence, domestic violence and emotional blackmail.

In a study reported in 2002 on “Burden on Women due to Drug Abuse by Family Members” conducted by the United Nations Drug Control Program (UNDCP) in Asia it was found that 58% of drug users depended on their families to support their drug habit. The respondents were usually forced by the addict to give money, or did so because they could not bear to see their loved one suffering through withdrawal symptoms. A majority of the women in the study were wives (56%) or mothers (35%) of drug abusers. One of the major burdens that wives perceived was that of blame. This included being blamed for the drug use in the family member, hiding the issue from others, and not getting timely treatment.

Here are some typical patterns of enabling behavior:

• Give in to the affected individual’s demands for money on emotional grounds
• Do the addicted individual’s share of housework, domestic chores and other family responsibilities because they are too intoxicated to do so themselves.
• Encourage other family members to lie and discourage members from seeking any kind of help or support for the sake of ‘family prestige’.
• Call up to the work place on the addicted individual’s behalf and make excuses for his non-performance or absence from work.
• Feel intense guilt and responsibility for the affected individual’s chemical dependence and the fights because the addicted individual frequently blames the enabler for not providing adequate support.
• Pay off the addicted persons debts and borrow money on their behalf.

After having lived with an addicted individual for prolonged periods of time, enablers themselves may experience loss of sleep, anger, anxiety, frequent crying spells, decline in job performance, destructive behavior, abuse of drugs and alcohol or depression. The UNDCP study also found that 57% of the women reported feeling depressed, shameful guilty and embarrassed. Such symptoms are common in caregivers of chronically ill people. In this case the chronically ill person is the substance abusing individual.

Ways to make a breakthrough

If you think that you fit the description of an enabler, there are several things that you can do to break the vicious cycle:

Break the silence

Talk and seek help for your self. You have been in the relationship so long that you may have lost the ability to look at the problem objectively. Seek help from psychiatrists, counselors, NGO’s or telephonic help lines. Marriage and family counselors can help with tensions created in the home. School counselors can provide information and support to adolescents who have family problems because of parental alcoholism. Kavitha first broke the silence about her husband by telling her older sister and brother-in-law about what was going on. They were immediately supportive and her brother-in-law intervened and somehow managed to convince Kavitha’s husband to get help. It took some time for this to happen, but Kavitha experienced huge relief knowing that her sister was always accessible to her for help whenever she needed it.

Draw the lines

Do not base your decision or boundaries of acceptable behavior on what others will think. You do not have to put up with bruised or broken bones or smashed cutlery. Be clear about the consequences for such behavior. Losing a fetus during pregnancy because of an addicted and physically abusive spouse is not acceptable behavior or a passing phase! Realize that by not keeping boundaries for acceptable behavior you may be putting the lives of your family at risk, especially infants or elderly feeble adults. The affected family member needs to get admitted in a drug and alcohol detoxification and rehabilitation facility.

Stop the guilt trip

Remember that the addicted individual does not continue being substance dependent because of something you said or did. You do not control their behavior and choices. You need to allow them to take personal responsibility for their actions without condemning them or turning hostile toward them. Drug dependence is a medical problem that cannot be set right with pure will-power on your part or that of the addict. A relapse to drug use can be triggered by the loss of a loved one or even a happy occasion like a festival. Addicted individuals develop severe craving and if they have not learnt the adequate skills, or learnt to develop alternative means to deal with the craving there is a good chance that the person may relapse.

Reach out for help

Do not hesitate to take help from religious leaders, NGO’s or the police in your locality. Even though all-women police stations and women’s cells and shelters are present, they serve no purpose unless someone actually seeks their help and lodges a complaint. Do not ignore or avoid helpful neighbors or relatives. They may be more than willing to help you, if you are willing to ask for it. Indian families put tremendous emphasis on family pride and honor which could sometimes prove fatal for the enabler. A study on domestic violence in Mumbai found that few women were willing to implicate their husbands or other family members as the abusers. It was only after some sensitive probing and insightful counsel that they were willing to speak up.

Have a safety plan

This is necessary especially if there is frequent physical violence and you or your children’s physical safety is in question. Always have a bag packed and some money stashed away just incase your spouse or family member turns violent and you need to get away in a hurry. Find out about organizations that provide temporary shelter till a suitable solution has been found. These counseling centers ideally would arrange for traumatized family members to stay in shelters or Respite Homes until a reasonable solution has been found.

Being an enabler is not a disease or an affliction. Family members cannot be regarded as criminals because they care. However they do need to seek help for themselves and the addict. Family members or other careers need to determine how much they will allow for, without jeopardizing the safety of the affected person’s life and that of the rest of the family as well as their own personal safety. The solution is not found in isolating the affected individual or disinheriting an affected child. It lies in facing the fact that the addicted individual needs help. If the affected family member is in self-destruction mode, refusing any kind of help and continuing to be abusive, it would advisable to consider legal options as well, especially if the safety of younger family members is at stake. Enabling stops when enablers realize that they cannot control the addict’s behavior and that professional help is needed.