Addiction & The Ripple Effect that Recovery has on Families
Written by Ashley Taylor, M.S.W, LMSW
Licensed Master Social Worker
When someone we love deals with addiction, there tends to be an aspect of wishful thinking that surrounds their recovery. We sometimes think to ourselves, “If this person just gets better, then everything else will fall into place”. No matter how desirable that outcome may be, addiction is not something that only affects the person with the substance use disorder, but the entire system that the person exists within.
Substance use disorder is a systems disease. What this means is that not only is the person dealing with substance use disorder affected by their addiction, but the people closest to this person are also affected, as well as the environment that this person exists within. Just picture throwing a rock into a calm body of water. While the rock has only hit one spot, there are ripples that surround the rock that expand out far beyond where the rock was thrown. To better understand the entirety of recovery, I met up with Rachel Evans, who is a family therapist for the Center for Recovering Families at The Council on Recovery here in Houston. Through the work she does with families, she was able to give very valuable information about the ways in which the system is affected while navigating a relationship with someone with substance use disorder. “By the time people get treatment, the system has regulated around the addiction to maintain the status quo”, she said. “The addiction has become the locus of control.” What this means is that everyone who is involved in the system has adapted in ways that they might not even recognize in order to maintain a sense of normalcy and peace, while watching someone they love battle a terribly difficult disease.
However, regardless of the ways in which the support system has regulated itself around the addiction, the relationship between the person dealing with substance use disorder and their families can be an important one. “The collaborative effort of treatment is very beneficial”, said Rachel Evans. She explained to me that if family members are present for treatment, when appropriate, success rates are higher. This relates back to this idea that if someone gets treatment, things will just get better. But the reality of the system is that not only is the person struggling with substance use disorder affected, but the familial system that they exist within is affected too. This means that not only does the person struggling with substance use disorder benefit from treatment, but the family members benefit from help too. When it comes to recovery, the willingness for everyone to do things differently is crucial in order to set family recovery at the core of the system. Through family recovery, everyone is able to gather and understand different strategies for coping with the new way of life for this person, as well as unlearning potentially harmful practices that had been in use prior to the recovery process.
This help can take the form of family program treatment, like that offered at the Council on Recovery, other support groups such as Al-Anon and Nar-Anon, and even addiction counseling. When an entire system is affected, the entire system has to be reworked so that the treatment can be the most effective. This also takes the responsibility off one individual and makes the process a collaborative one. In this way, the person going through recovery does not feel alone in their journey, but rather feels the love and support from those closest to them.
What is important to understand about addiction and recovery is that the process is very rarely linear, nor does it only have an effect on the person working to overcome substance use disorder. When addiction is viewed as a systems disease, it can be addressed throughout the system. By viewing this process in a more collaborative light, we are able to better support and understand the journey of our loved ones.
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