The first of this three-post series on loving detachment focussed on the overall concept of loving the addict while at the same time making the decision NOT to support the addict in their addiction. The last post focused on physical detachment from the alcoholic. Physical detachment in this instance means no longer enabling addictive behaviour. We do this by allowing the addict to make their own choices, and feeling the results of those choices. In this post, we focus on emotional detachment, which is the change in ourselves that is needed in order to allow us to practice loving detachment.

When we love someone, it is very natural and human to want to protect that person. This protection instinct ensures our genetic survival, and so is deeply engrained in us. This parenting instinct is particularly strong in supporters of alcoholics. More often than not, we find that they seek our personalities out when looking for a partner. They need someone who is prepared to care for them, looked out for them, take responsibility for their actions, and clean up their messes. But unlike children, they never grow up. Their dependence on us only increases. We, in turn, are comfortable in the role of being needed, and through our actions – albeit very loving and altruistic actions – we encourage co-dependency.

In time, we find that our lives and even our personalities are almost completely geared toward enabling our addicts. Our sense of self becomes wrapped up with the alcoholic, as if their actions are our actions, their responsibilities are our responsibilities. In truth, depending on our relationship with the alcoholic we may indeed be very affected by what they do – so there is good reason to want to protect ourselves from the worst of the addict’s actions. Our finances may be tied, and we may be legally tied to the actions of our addicts. We need to set boundaries and protect ourselves and we’ll get there… but first we need to develop the strength and wisdom of our own person. We need to re-establish our independence emotionally, find our own personality again, feel our own feelings again. We need to emotionally detach ourselves from our addict and become ourselves again.

When I was in the throes of supporting the chaos of life with an alcoholic, I didn’t know how I was feeling that day until he woke up and set the mood for the house. If you had asked me my favourite colour I would not have been able to tell you. If you asked me what had happened that day, I would probably have told you about the day of my alcoholic. I was totally lost in his life, and all of my decisions were made from that fuzzy spot. I knew that before I could truly practice loving detachment, I needed to detach myself from my addict emotionally.

We do that by taking the focus off of the alcoholic and putting it onto ourselves. Those who regularly read my blog know that for a number of years, I was helped by a Shaman. She encouraged me to focus on my femininity as a way of rediscovering myself. I bought myself some new, feminine clothes. I painted my toe nails for the first time in my life (!) I hung out with girlfriends or my sisters. I read books that I wanted to read and I watched movies that I wanted to see. I explored who I was, apart from my alcoholic. I started to live at least some of my life for myself. In time, this space allowed me to create an emotional separation in my mind between my personality and actions, and those of my alcoholic. That, in turn, eventually enabled me to let him make his own choices, and live with the consequences. Eventually, I had the strength to establish and hold to certain boundaries. And at some point, my boundaries and change in behaviour forced my alcoholic to realize that he couldn’t carry on the way he had, and seek out help. By then, I was strong and independent enough to be able to care for my children, and manage my job and my household, while my alcoholic started the long road to potential recovery.

In truth, I probably wouldn’t have been ready for him to focus on himself if I hadn’t taken the time first to learn how to focus on myself. And he likely wouldn’t have made the choice to work toward recovery as long as I was carrying him, physically and emotionally.

The concept of loving detachment, and how to practice it, can’t be adequately covered in a blog, but hopefully this three-part series has given you a taste of the elements of loving detachment and how to practice it. For those who would appreciate more detail, I am writing a book on the concept and hope to have it published by the early summer. Stay tuned to this blog for the book launch announcement.

My grade 12 son recently announced that he intends to pursue a career in the Canadian military. I should have felt proud of his commitment to serve his country, but the mother in me was only terrified of losing her son. At first I was worried that he might be hurt, or worse; but now I understand that whether he goes to the military or leaves town to attend university in another part of the country, he will soon be leaving me to enter into independent adulthood. My loss of him is imminent, and inevitable, regardless of how it happens.

It’s taken several weeks and strong advice from friends and family in order for me to get to a place of acceptance and support for my son’s decision. But it’s been a rough ride, intensified by my programmed need to control situations I’m uncomfortable with.

If you’ve had an alcoholic in your life, you know exactly what I’m talking about. Alcoholics thrive in chaos and craziness, and we’ve been trained to try to neutralize or at least minimize the mayhem by attempting to mange the situation as much as possible. It was a survival mechanism, and it allowed us to keep our families together, our homes viable, and our lives somehow on track.

Through our own journey of recovery, we learn that it is not our job to try to change people. All we can really do is to establish and maintain our own boundaries around how we wish to be treated, and ensure that we keep our side of the street clean. This means that the only peson we should judge is oursleves, and we should seek to ensure that in every action and behaviour, we are living healthy, respectful and honest lives.

To “control” life is a fallacy anyway. The people we love could – heaven forbid – be hit by a bus or diagnosed with a terrible illness tomorrow. My son could fall in love and move to Australia and there’s very little I could do about it. All I can control is my own behaviour, my own reactions. So I decided to examine my behavious around my son’s decisions, and realized that while I had no control over his future, I could certainly do a better job of enjoying the time I have with him today. So I’m teaching him to drive, I continue to serve as one of his soccer coashes, and we’re planning a trip together – just the two of us – to Europe this summer after his graduation. The other night, we went shopping for his first suit and it was an evening I will always treasure. Who knew that such a simple task could be such fun, and so poignant?

Admittedly, this moment was possible because I have built structure and care into my life so my time is not wasted on managing mayhem. I’ve created the physical and emotional space in which to experience joy, but I’ve come to realize that I haven’t always allowed for the time in which to let joy happen. Thanfully, a loving Universe has given me another gentle lesson. I have the time, and now the awareness, to truly appreciate life right now. All we ever really have is this moment, anyway. And in this moment, I love my son unconditionally, and I thank God that he’s in my life.

This being the end of the school year, parents like me are starting to receive report cards for their children.   Grades, test scores and other reporting information from the school allow us to track the degree of scholastic accomplishment of our kids.  As a single working mom, I’m not as attuned to their daily accomplishments as I’d like to be, so I’ve come to rely on periodic report cards.  This year, I was not happy.  My kids have just finished grades 9 and 11 respectively.  With one or two exceptions, they did not do well in their courses.  In fact, both of them came extremely close to failing at least one subject, and the average for many of their other classes was a “C”.  I would be less upset if there weren’t extremely bright children, more than capable of achieving straight A’s but lazy enough to feel it’s acceptable to just get by.

Over the past two years, I have been slowly expanding my horizons and starting to build a bit of a life for myself again, after having lived for so long entirely for other people.  I’ve started to go out with friends more often, date, and developed more personal interests.  As a result, I haven’t had the same amount of time to dedicate to the micromanaging of my childrens’ studying; but as they were well into their teenage years, I figured they could start to learn some self-responsibility.  I get up early in the morning and thus, have to go to bed before them, so we agreed on a reasonable shut-off time for their computers and the TV which they almost never adhered to.  If I took away their keyboards as punishment, they would secretly find replacements.  I would ask them every night if they had homework, or a test coming up, and they almost never did.  Occasionally I would hear at the last minute about a major assignment due and I would have to drop everything to help them complete it.   So I was angry although not surprised when, going into exam time, I learned from their math teachers of their abysmal marks, and that one son has missed 35 homework assignments throughout the year.  I wonder how many on-line play dates he had missed with his computer buddies? Probably not a one.

Alcoholics take a very long time to grow up.  They challenge all rules, believing themselves to be beyond rules.  They stretch boundaries as much as possible, and make endless excuses for their own behaviours.  When things don’t work out well as a result, they blame everyone around them but themselves.  This is an excellent description of my ex-husband during his bad drinking years.  I never want this to be an accurate description of my children, but left unchecked, that is where they are headed. 

So with help from my program, and a dear friend who is a fabulous teacher, I’ve decided on the following:

This summer, we will have very strict rules in the house with respect to use of computers, chores, expectations regarding interactivity (eat dinner at the table, take time to see friends).  Both kids will also be attending remedial summer school to ensure that they fully understand their previous year’s math program.  That’s called logical consequences.   In September, their computers will be disassembled and removed from their rooms.  They will have access to my computer (which will not house games) for ½ hour per day for social networking, provided their chores and homework are done.  I will also create a positive re-enforcement program: for   or A mark they receive for a test or project, they will get a star.  Once they collect ten stars, they will win a prize that we will agree on beforehand.  My teacher friend has explained to me that children who do not yet have intrinsic (or internal) motivation require extrinsic (external) motivation.  In time, they will develop an intrinsic desire to do well in their studies but until then, it’s OK and actually encouraged by educators to reward them.  And frankly, I’d rather reward than punish them.

Which brings me to my last point.  The person in this family who probably needs to modify their behaviours the most is me.  My children are clearly not ready for self-responsibility.  And I clearly have allowed them to be on their own too much and for too long, and enforced very few consequences so that they learn self-responsibility.  When I went to puppy training school, it quickly became apparent that the training was really for me.  I get the sense that parenting the children of alcoholics requires the same primary focus on myself.   Why am I not surprised? : )