I was trying to say that with her stealing her parents weeding rings, obviously there is not much further downhill left to go, short of violent crimes.
Well there’s always homelessness, prostitution, and death.
Purple haze I’m sorry about your situation, I’m really not sure what to tell you. I have a brother who is similarly spiraling into addiction (and I only know what I hear from my parents since he is still living with them and I haven’t in years), it’s bad but not quite as bad - yet. Hard to say if he’ll ever be able to turn it around.
Maybe it’s in the thread or another thread and I missed it, but how old is she? Does she have any sort of job prospects or some kind of interest you can help her cultivate? Is she in school?
I have thought about this quite a bit today (before reading your post, as hooking for a fix seems like it may well be the next step in this situation) and am still undecided—Is someone who prostitutes herself for a fix really WORSE than someone who would steal her parents wedding rings and sell them for a fix?
In some ways, it seems to me the junkie prostitute is running a more honest jamm than the thief is…
You can bet the junkie prostitute will rip off the John should the opportunity present itself.
Which filth is more filthy? That’s a matter of taste, no?
Unless treated properly, addiction of this type leads inevitably to jails, institutions, or death. Even with proper treatment, there’s an unfortunately high morbidity rate.
But people can and do get well from such low bottoms.
A worse person? Debatable.
In more danger? Definitely. A junkie prostitute is in severe risk of being beaten, robbed, raped, killed, etc. Not to mention doubling her possible venues for HIV transmission (high enough risk from just shooting up; but add multiple sex partners multiple times a day to that, and the odds against her staying HIV- become a lot worse).
If she were my daughter, I’d rather have her steal the most precious thing I own than risk her life that way.
purple haze, my heart goes out to you. This is a horrible, horrible position for any parent to be in.
I certainly dont want anyone to misundestand me—This is a heartbreaking, tragic situation for Purple Haze and her family.
But by stealing for drugs, there is an innocent victim (the people who are stolen from) where by trading sex for drugs (or money to buy drugs) both parties involved are willing participants.
This is a terrible thing to contemplate, so I will end my participation in this discussion by wishing Purple Haze my best thoughts and prayers, for her entire family…
Considering the “friends” this girl has, it might be the life of another family member. Alternately, she might lose the trust of her son.
I’m sorry, purple haze. I hope you can find your way to a decision that will bring more peace to your family.
No advice to offer, just some {{{Purple Haze}}}. I hope better days are on the way.
We found the receipts from the pawn shop, and they were both in the name of the other girl. My husband called her house and talked to her father. He is a nice guy and this is their only child. We met at the pawn shop. He showed up alone, while all four of us were there. We recovered our wedding rings, a necklace, and one of our son’s coins. The other dad recovered a couple of rings. Problem is, there were some things sold that my husband and I and the other dad didn’t recognize. He said he will find out where they came from. He needs to talk to his wife about what they will do with their daughter. I got the feeling that she isn’t welcome there anymore.
Since everything was sold under her name, the other girl’s dad paid to get it all out of hock and I’m wearing my wedding band now. She is also the one who sold our son’s video games and the electronics. We did not press charges against her and her father agreed to pay for the hocked items. As our daughter no doubt took some of the money, but we agreed not to press charges, we have decided to continue to work together to get our things back. He said he is missing quite a few electronic items and seemed especially upset about his camera. He is still deciding if he wants to call the police and let them take care of his daughter. We are still deciding if we want to do the same for the electronics. We called the place and left a message, so hopefully they will call back soon.
Our daughter is very tearful, very upset, and remorseful, which is an improvement over yesterday. We are watching her like hawks. My husband took her for a short walk today to get some sun; other than that, she won’t see the light of day until we check her into rehab. She absolutely lost it and apologized for taking our wedding rings. That’s good, but she has crossed the line now and we can’t go back.
There are other things missing, and who knows what will be discovered in the coming weeks and months. We do know that she can’t stay here after rehab because of what has happened over the past few days. The halfway house is a good suggestion. We are also looking at moving her temporarily to the northern part of the state. She needs to get away from the people in her life for a while, probably a long while.
I think a safe deposit box is a good idea. We need to protect our valuables now. We also need a good hiding place for the video games, etc. for the time being.
She is 20. She had a full time job until early last week. She’s gone to school in the past, but hasn’t been able to follow through.
I don’t know how I missed this thread before. purple haze, I don’t have much to offer except that my heart goes out to you and I wish you and your family strength and courage as you go through this crisis. I beat drugs many decades ago but it wasn’t heroin.
I realize you did not get everything back, but I am glad that you were able to get some. It seldom happens this easily (and I realize to you this has probably been very hard, it’s not easy, but typically people find it much more difficult to retrieve items or work with others on such an issue).
Let me underline something for you. You might already know this, but you really, really need to interalize it.
At the moment she apologized, when she cried over what she had done, she was almost certainly genuinely remorseful. She really did mean it at that point in time. However, if - nay, when - she needs another fix that will not matter. She will need that fix so badly that her past remorse will be forgotten and she will steal again, and sell again, and buy her fix and get high… only to once again be sincerely remorseful. Especially if caught. You can NOT trust her! She will try to manipulate you. Do not let her do that. She will make it amazingly difficult to keep your resolve but you must
I am very sorry to hear about your daughter. I can’t offer much advice other than what the others have said. I may be able, however, to offer a little hope.
I have posted yearly threads on my alcoholism.
I think this onetells my story rather well.
In about a month and a half I will celebrate my sixth year sober.
I know right now things seem hopeless. There is hope out there. The most painful thing, I think, is that you cannot control her. I know my parents were going nuts trying to fix me. The problem is they couldn’t fix me, just like you cannot fix your daughter. All you can do is offer limited help. You can get her into treatment but from there it is all on her. Offer your support but realize she may turn the offer down. It sucks but that is the way it is.
Which ever path your daughter chooses there will be lots of pain ahead. I hope that she chooses treatment and makes a serious commitment to it. If she does that there will be a lot of issues to work out. I’ve been there and done that. It is hard, very hard, on everyone involved. Yet at the end, the results can be amazing.
If you have any questions at all please PM me. I will offer any advice I can. While I am an alkie and never got into junk, the difference I believe is trivial. The monkey has a different name but it is the same damned monkey.
Slee
I note that the daughter is 20, that rehab and halfway houses are strong options now and that laws and regulations may vary from state to state (and that I, admittedly, know little about those laws and regulations). So I ask: is it possible that you may check her into rehab or a house and she, as a legal adult, just checks herself out again? Maybe it’s been mentioned upthread somewhere, but that may be an option she might use that you folks should take into consideration (which you no doubt have already, I’m sure).
OP, don’t give up. No matter how hard it seems, no matter how badly she may cuss you out, no matter what…don’t give up. Now your daughter may be involved in some bad situations, but somewhere…deep down inside…your baby is still there and she still loves you and her family. It might take some tough love to make her see that, but she will in the end.
My love to your family.
purple haze, I am so sorry you and your family are going through this. It’s hard, I know. I hope your daughter gets the help she needs, but you can’t help her. Only she can help herself and she does not want help yet. When she does, SHE will get it. Right now, she’s playing you. You love her and she knows it, and she also knows you will believe her when she’s “very tearful, very upset, and remorseful.” As others have said, it’s not real and as soon as she possibly can, she’ll lie and steal from you again. Addicts are master manipulators. And she will lie and cheat and steal and maybe worse things and there is nothing, nothing, nothing you can do for her. I cannot emphasize this enough.
You cannot save your daughter. You will try – you will try everything, believe me – but you can’t. I’m sorry.
You do need to take care of yourself, your son and your family, and leave her alone. Really. As long as you keep providing for her, nothing will change. Do not let her in your house. Change the locks; get a security system. Go to Narc-anon or a therapist and get your son there, too. Good luck. You’re going to need it.
Untrue.
You can detach with love, you can stop enabling her behavior, and you can offer her good, orderly direction, such as entering treatment, where she can begin to get well if she chooses. These are all positive actions you can do for both yourself and her.
Beyond that, make sure you take care of yourselves first and foremost.
You are absolutely right, and put into writing what I’ve been thinking. It hasn’t been this bad, ever, but there have been times in the past (school, work, etc.) where the same pattern has taken place. She makes a mistake, is sorry, and then makes the same mistake again. That is a pattern that is simply irritating when it doesn’t come to doing drugs, but in this case there isn’t any more room for error. In other words, I don’t want to let her stay here, come home, and notice that the TV is gone.
Where can she go after rehab? Even she knows that staying in this area, around these people, will lead to bad news eventually.
Purple Haze I cannot add much, other than I understand your struggle, and wish you courage and strength.
I know you’re a doctor and have a history and all, but I disagree. The first two things you mention are not “doing things” for her. They’re the opposite of “doing” and they’re great: “detaching,” and changing your own behavior because you cannot change hers. Unfortunately your suggestions are the hardest things in the world for a parent to do because we feel like we must “do” something to fix things. We can’t fix this. No matter how much we want to.
I’m just puzzled by your suggestion to offer her direction. She knows very well where to get help. She just wants someone else to have the responsibility to get help for her, and it just flat won’t work until and unless she wants it, and gets it, for herself.
The object now is to *stop *doing for her because there is nothing you *can *do for her. purple haze needs to stop focusing on her daughter and focus on herself, her husband and her son. She needs to “do” for them. And I wish her the very best of luck because her situation totally sucks.
Oh, believe me. Detaching is doing something.
Semantics aside, there are actions that people can take which have been shown to improve outcomes for active addicts. Not all addicts, and not all the time. No guarantees with this disease.
But saying an addict knows what they have to do isn’t really true either. Their addiction screams out that what they have to do is take more drugs. But good orderly direction, when presented at a teachable moment, may make a difference.
You can lead a horse to water, and you can’t make them drink. But if you’ve left them with knowledge of where the water is, they may eventually get thirsty, and do the right thing.
Is she smoking it or shooting it? Did it start with something less intense, like a pot or prescription painkiller habit? How long have you known she was on it? Or which friends introduced it to her?
I’m devastated to read this - I’ve seen heroin destroy many lives around me. It’s incredible how fast and how desperate they get. I apologize if the questions seem blunt, but people rarely go from zero to black tar.