Child of Addict(s): How to begin HEALING

First off, if you are like me you have probably been parenting them your whole life! Now listen to this..

YOU are NOT their PARENT!! and SMILE, because thank got we are not:) NOW lets start living for us, so we can be there for others!!!

Now if again you are like me..I know it is soooooo hard to accept that we can’t fix our parents, well maybe we can help them, but that will be another post. Now remember because were children born into this world with parent(s) with addictions, we probably have a lot of the same ways of coping and being, so HI!!

ALSO if you had to walk away from your parents I’m SURE it is KILLING you, Because I know you SOOOO wanted to stay, but it was probably too much pain. It was probably taking you down. AND if no one ever said this to you.. THAT IS OK!!

I state that the way for ME a way to be friends with my mom, came from healing my own pain. SO LET’S START THERE.

When I was doing all this work with my mom, I had no idea what I was doing, it was all new territory, so I offer you now anything and everything I have learned along the way, to help heal my pain, and I hope there is something for your own process here.

1. “YOU ARE THE MOST IMPORTANT PROJECT YOU WILL EVER WORK ON”

   KNOW you are NUMBER ONE, that means if you are not ready to be there with your parent it is ok to disconnect until you feel you are able to, and if that is NEVER that is also ok, we HAVE to be honest with our hearts and understand what we are capable of. This leads me into us understanding BOUNDARIES.

2. BOUNDARIES:

   https://www.instagram.com/boundariesarebeautiful/ is a great page on instagram

   https://www.tiktok.com/@shefasjourney? is a great page on TikTok with lots of tools, plus you can do your own research, enter #boundaries on either platform or google and see if someone resonates better for you.

   This will be your OWN journey of healing, so follow those that speak to your soul and start trusting your intuition.

   As children of addicts were didn’t have good role models on how to take care of our needs, so we will have to learn these things on our own, plus if you have a stable healthy “other” (which can be a family member, friend, etc) that you can watch and model from, do that. I had my second mom and my grandparents as role models for healthy relationships.

3. Start learning about “CODEPENDENCY” it’s not actually what we used to think it was…where we couldn’t be alone. It is so much more diverse than that. It’s how we have been trained as children to survive. We learned that in order to get our basic needs met we had to sacrifice our voices. We need to learn how to undo this… trust me it is a PROCESS I am still single because I haven’t been able to integrate this into my relationships yet. BUT I have learned/learning how important it is to be kind to my own healing process first before trying to put myself in someone else life where I look to them to “fix” me.

   I suggest this book as a starting point… Click here

   Here is the audio version and you have a free trial if you have never used it before.. Click Here

4. You will also need to implement some Self-Soothing techniques to help when the emotions come up.. YOU will know what brings happiness to your heart and remember to do that when things get heavy, you want to make sure you are not staying STUCK in victim mentality, what happened and what you had to endure was NOT ok, but you know that now, so now you are here.. READY and WILLING to heal, so let’s meet here, not in the past.

   I like to be in nature, go to the gym, go dancing, meet with friends and be silly or talk about everything BUT what I’m going through, OR to ONLY talk about what I’m going through. Pet animals, are gifts and bring us comfort. What funny movies, stay away from things that will keep you STUCK in your head and victim mentality. I call this “FILLING your CUP”

5. COMMITMENT TO SELF and your practice of filling your cup:

   Make SMALL plans, and achieve them, small rewards will help boost your confidence, but trying to achieve something you are not capable of will lead you back to beating yourself up, so start small.

   I do 10 mins of meditation a day (sometimes I miss it) but I stay pretty consistent because it shows me I can commit to a practice and we need some sort of routine and stability after growing up not having it.

   I LOVE this 10/12 min meditation on SoundCloud because it reminds me to forgive myself, that’s SELF LOVE and we ALL need lots of that to get through this sometimes harsh world. Click here

   And if you are not on Soundcloud you can find many other good 10 min ones here Click here

6. Inner child healing will be super important to retrain your inner child how to feel safe again. After a lot of trauma, it is hard to show up as an adult for life. That’s why this work is Crucial, and to be honest a bit difficult. I am still constantly catching myself acting from a place of a child. But it is a process. Here is a great couple that teaches you all the ways to start healing this part of yourself. Click here

7. A more progressive way to heal trauma without having to do a lot of work is EMDR. I am not well versed in this but you can google it and find specialists to help facilitate this technique. There is also Somatic healing and other alternative ways to healing Trauma without having to take drugs, which obviously we all want to be free from:)

I’d love to hear your comments on all of this and please share any techniques anyone else has found useful below!:)

AND WELCOME TO THE STOP THE CYCLE COMMUNITY!! We got this, lets keep connecting with one another, and supporting the process!!

PS, if you are battling an addiction yourself, and haven’t gotten clean yet, maybe start implementing some of these healing techniques before you do it, as it will help you along the way of your recovery!!!

A forever home

As I sit there writing the words “let me know what time you plan to grab him, so should I have all his stuff ready” I Feel a pain in my heart, a remembering, of these words, of this moment. Except before, I was the foster child being passed around.

I started fostering a dog, he came in afraid, but curious. A feeling I knew too well, so it was natural we instantly bonded. One week in, I was given the disheartening call that the organization had found a home for (Meatloaf). I surely didn’t expect to have this happen so quickly, let alone feel this way. I had fostered a few dogs in the past and I could always let them go because I was living in Bali and I wasn’t sure how long I would be there. However, this time it felt different. I felt a deep connection to this animal, somewhat like a soul connection. But I was too late. I had never felt confident enough to take care of another’s complete needs outside of my own. So I was left with the reality that I would be giving this animal up to who knows who. Would they know he gets anxiety sometimes and needs to be sat with and consoled? Would they see when his little heart is beating fast and it being a signal to give him your attention? Would they know that he listens well and wants to please, but doesn’t like to be yelled at? Would they give him the love he needs?

But these were question I wouldn’t get answers to, I was just a temporary home.

So off he went. again holding back the tears, I stated over and over, “if they don’t want him, for any reason I will take him, please let them know this.”

And inside I went, where I let it all out. All the pain of myself being passed around from home to home. All the situations where people signed up to be “parents” only to treat me like I was an animal myself. Calling me names, being abusive, and sometimes sexual towards. This is what foster care provides, a roof over your head but no safety, no real love. For most, it was just about the paycheck.

As I sat in the room crying for myself. I realized the gift this little animal had brought to me was an opportunity to heal. To reflect back on some very painful experiences and to weep. Sometimes the hardest part in healing is allowing yourself to grieve. To acknowledge that there were things that should never have happened to you. And to let yourself feel the pain for what happened, then self soothe. And hopefully, find compassion for the ones that did it to you, and let it go.

As I was deep in tears, my phone started ringing. I was told to come outside. that Meatloaf was mine. I couldn’t believe it. He came right back! I was told he was crying in the car and they realized we were bonded and they didn’t want to break that. Ahhh…. how good that felt, to know as scared as I was to commit to taking care of another life, that I was given this opportunity. So I made a promise to him then, I would take care of him, no matter what. That I was his new mom, and he has a forever home with me.

There is always something to be grateful for, and today it is for my new life as a mom, thank you Meatloaf for trusting me to take care of you. I know we will do great things in this life together because all great things start from a place of love.