Questions about in-patient substance abuse programs - does this sound remotely plausible?

In My Humble Opinion
1

I know this is long, sorry, but I don’t think my question will make much sense without a backstory.

I have a cousin who is a train wreck. He’s in his mid-30s and has been abusing meth for the past, oh, 10 years? Maybe less, maybe more. But it’s established he’s a meth-head, and has done all the normal things that drug abusers do as far as alienating their families - in his case, his parents and siblings, he’s not married - losing jobs, etc etc. Somewhere in there he managed to become HIV positive as well. It seems to be controlled, not sure how, but like I said, he’s a train wreck.

His family has tried to help him quit in any way they can, several times, no luck. He tends to show up for a while, tell everyone he’s quitting, then just disappears and nobody hears from him for months at a time. Very sad story, as he’s pretty bright and a nice guy when he’s not using, and his family loves him an awful lot.

So a month or so ago, he shows up at his brother’s house, and somehow brother talks him into going into rehab. But before they can find a place and get him there, he changes his mind and takes off. Somehow, they find him, and get him put in a court-ordered place for 3-4 days, at which time they had to go before a judge and convince the judge that he was a danger to himself. If the judge agreed, he’d be involuntarily committed to a longer substance abuse program. I guess this was not a for sure outcome, nor was it easy to do, but somehow they succeeded and convinced the judge to sign the papers.

Now it was a few day’s wait before a bed opened up for him. During this time, he was in the original facility, which I gather was pretty horrible (someplace in Denver?). But a bed does open up, and the family is given a choice - they can have the police bring him to the new place, or a family member can vouch for him and bring him their themselves. Brother steps up and says he’ll do it, which was an amazingly stupid move, but brother loves him and is trying to do the right thing. On the way between the two facilities, while brother is stopped at a traffic light, meth-head jumps out of the car and disappears. :smack:

That was… maybe 2 weeks ago? Since then, mother and brother have gotten crazy angry text messages from meth-head, with claims that he’s moving around the country, heading up to Michigan (where he grew up) to “go to treatment.” Nobody has any idea how he’s doing that, as he has no money and nothing but the clothes on his back. Somebody is financing him… or he’s lying through his teeth and is still in Denver and playing them for all they’re worth.

So now, the latest story is that he came to my town and tried to get in a substance abuse center. They had no beds for him, but called another town across the state, they had room, and he took the bus down there and is in treatment. We know this because he called him mother two days ago during what he called a “group session” where they wanted the patients to call someone and forgive them, so he had a 10 minute phone call he could make.

And that leads to my question: what is the likelihood that this story could be truthful? I would love it to be, but honestly, can someone really just march into a state of which they’re not a resident, have no health insurance or money, and get a bed in a substance abuse program? The whole story seems so crazy to me, and throughout all this, meth-head has been extremely uncooperative and obviously had no interest in going to treatment at all, much less running across the country to do it.

2

I’m not going to comment on the rest of this, but as someone who went through in-patient treatment many, many years ago:

Most treatment centers, in-patient or out, are based on the 12-step model originated by AA.

None of the 12 steps address forgiving other people. Instead, they’re about accepting responsibility for your own actions – including making amends to those you have wronged. Not a damn word about how others might have wronged you. Blaming others is the antithesis of the AA model.

Even if this story got garbled and it was about him asking her for forgiveness – that’s not something that would happen early in the treatment, and it would not happen via a 10-minute phone call during group therapy. (In-person, and after the person had completed 30 days clean and sober, yes – this scenario, no.)

So, based on my experience – which, again, was many years ago – this sounds like bullshit to me.

3

Could he have checked into a 7-day medical detox? You can into one pretty easily in my area, and its covered by medicaid. Many places offer a sliding scale as well, if you don’t qualify for Medicaid (but you would, if like the OP’s brother you were actually destitute).

They usually offer some therapy stuff but its not “rehab” just medically supervised withdrawal with services.

4

I’ve received apologies from people going through 12 Steps or something similar. It’s not the same as getting treatment. The people I know are in AA programs have done it to reduce legal penalties, and I don’t know any who stopped drinking. So I don’t think there’s any reason to doubt that meth-head is doing something, but I find it doubtful he’s in a real rehab program. I’m also wondering why you would care to hear from him until he’s been clean and sober for more than few days, or even hours.

5

I know someone that knows someone that lives in Michigan, and just got admitted to a 4-week (can be extended) inpatient rehab for alcoholism, with no insurance or money, completely free to them. So that part may be true. But they are and have been a resident of Michigan, so not sure if that is a requirement.

6

I got the story third-hand through people who can barely tell a simple story straight, much less one this complex, so I very well could have gotten the forgiving part wrong. But yeah, the whole thing does sound weird. Which is why I’m asking these questions!

7

This story is full of meth - it’s clearly all bullshit.
:wink:

8

Regardless of who was supposed to “forgive” who I don’t get the calling out of the group therapy room on the phone part. There are so many ways this is uncontrolled and could go sideways or devolve into a meltdown argument I don’t see any therapist doing it.

Maybe a therapist could weigh in if this is actually done IRL sessions.

9

I’d say follow your instincts in this situation. Drug addicts can often be great (or not so great) at manipulating the truth in ways that seem plausible.

10

Sounds like crap to me. I have some familiarity with inpatient alcohol treatment programs, and usually there is NO family contact at all for a period at the beginning. And the step where you “make amends” comes pretty far down the road. Did he ask for money during this phone call?

11

I don’t think the phone call actually happened in the midst of the group session; rather, as part of that session, he was allowed one ten-minute phone call to talk about forgiveness at a later time. Or something. Aunt did mention that it was highly unusual as most substance abuse programs don’t allow contact during the first few weeks.

But yeah, good to hear that this story is setting of other people’s bullshit meters as well. Well, not good, as we’d all like to see meth-head break the habit and I’d love to be proved wrong and find out his story is true. But good that I’m not totally off my rocker in questioning this whole crazy story.

And what a crappy thing in general. I babysat this kid when we were younger, and was pretty close to him. He’s had a good life, good family (though not without their ups and downs, but what family doesn’t have that?) and is very much loved. It’s really shitty that it’s gone down this way. I fear that if he doesn’t get clean pretty soon he’s going to end up dead. It’s all just too tragic.