Leadership Thought: Why I Won’t Help Some Addicts Who Comes to Our Church.

Dear Friend,

“Recovery Life” is a ministry of our church for those with addiction issues, and at one of our recent meetings one of the participants asked, “How do you know when it’s time to stop helping an addict?” The question asked was a familiar one

Although I do not consider myself to be an expert on alcoholism, I have been involved over many years in helping addicts deal with their addiction struggles. During those years I have seen first-hand the devastation that alcoholism causes individual and families.

While I support most all programs of recovery including AA, I have found that the most effective approach to recovery involves a Christ centered approach, and so when a person is seeking some form of treatment, this is the direction I will most often point them.

As we sat around the table that evening, I shared my response to the question of “How does one know when to stop helping someone struggling with addiction” by sharing my early failures in trying to assist people looking for recovery. I wanted to help everyone, and I thought I could help everyone. As a result, there was always a steady stream of people coming to our home or our church in need of help. The word quickly spread that this ‘Crenshaw guy’ was good for a few bucks, so for months in my first ministry I was inundated with people coming to me, not looking for genuine help but simply a generous handout.

Sadly, it took time for me to realize I wasn’t helping them, only enabling them, and when I found other more constructive ways to help them,  I quickly discovered that people stopped coming when I ceased trying to fix their problems.

I wasn’t helping. I was simply being used. The phrase “Show me, don’t snow me” became my mantra. No longer was I willing to be used in helping those who only wanted ‘handout help.’

And through this experience I grew in my understanding of how to help those suffering with addiction, and often that help meant saying no to them.

Al-Anon has an expression “Putting pillows under a person,” so the addict never has to feel the pain of their mistakes.” Too often we are guilty of doing just that, relieving the pain and the problems of the addict while thinking we are loving them and helping them.

Sometimes in trying to help someone struggling with addiction, we only enable them by rescuing them and cleaning up their mess. As a result, we often foster their addiction rather than help treat their addiction.

At the meeting I shared the importance of setting boundaries for addicts, of learning how to say no to them without feeling guilty, something that is not always easy to do.

The bible reminds us that “He who conceals his sins does not prosper, but whoever confesses and renounces them finds mercy” (Proverbs 28: 13). How serious a person is about recovery will often be discovered by assessing how honest the person is about what he is willing to do to realize recovery.

An enabler has been “defined as doing things for a person with an alcohol problem that they normally could and would do for themselves if they were sober.”

What are some of the signs you are enabling and not helping an addict: Accepting chronic lapses, cleaning up after the addict, giving the addict an ultimatum to stop  and then not following through, giving them a place to stay when they are homeless, lending money to the addict, making excuses for the addict to family and friends, making excuses for their inability to work, paying bills, showing unconditional love by taking on things that the addict has dropped, taking an extra responsibilities because the attic cannot function……..” (Armanda Andruzzi, author of Hope Street and founder of Symptom-Free Wellness).

There may come a time in dealing with a person’s addiction when we say, “I can’t and won’t continue to help you,” and yes, you may have to close your own door to get them to walk through their own door to recovery

We must never stop loving the addict, praying for them, encouraging them, and sharing how Jesus can change their lives, but we must establish clear boundaries regarding what we will do and not do for them and stick with them.

Only then will you be helping them not enabling.

Remember some of the best help you can give an addict it to say the word “no” and say it with conviction and without guilt.

Yours in faith and friendship,

Tom

P.S. Would love to hear any experiences you have had in dealing with addiction or those struggling with addiction.