ABOUT THE EPISODE:

If you’re parenting a young person struggling with substance and someone tells you that you need recovery too, it can land sideways since you're not the one using. You're just trying to hold everything together while your kid gets better. And you're already doing so much: the books, therapy, podcasts, late-night Googling.

Janice asked that question anyway. A member of The Stream and mom of two adult kids now in recovery, she used to be the one everyone called to get things done not for a hug. When she Googled what drugs her son was using, she chose to get educated instead of feeling sorry for herself. That education pointed straight back at her.

We talk about the two biggest shifts she had to make (one starts before you say a word), the small non-negotiable practices she keeps no matter what's happening with her kids, and a standoff over the air conditioning that taught her more than she expected plus the question she asks herself when her own recovery feels like walking away from her child.

It felt like the right way to close out Recovery Month, with the parent who so often gets left out of the conversation. If you've poured everything into your child's recovery and nothing into your own, this one's for you.

YOU'LL LEARN:

• What "doing the work" meant for Janice, after months of research
• The two biggest shifts she had to make and why one starts before a word is spoken
• The small, unglamorous practices she keeps non-negotiable, no matter what
• What a standoff over the air conditioning taught her about the rope she kept picking up
• The question she asks when her own recovery feels like abandoning her child

EPISODE RESOURCES:

• Beyond Addiction: How Science and Kindness Help People Change, by Jeffrey Foote, Carrie Wilkens, and Nicole Kosanke
• Co-Dependency Isn't What You Think, with Rawly Glass, LCSW: Hopestream podcast episode 324
• Hopestream Community free two-week trial of The Stream: https://hopestreamcommunity.org/try
• Free e-book: Worried Sick by Brenda Zane: https://hopestreamcommunity.org/worried

This podcast is part of a nonprofit called Hopestream Community
Learn about The Stream, our private online community for moms
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Watch the podcast on YouTube here
Download a free e-book, Worried Sick: A Compassionate Guide For Parents When Your Teen or Young Adult Child Misuses Drugs and Alcohol

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