Why and what to do when your kids trigger the shit out of you!
Does this sound familiar?
· “they don’t listen”,
· “they are disrespectful” and “acting up”,
· they’re “out of control” and
· “pushing my fucking buttons”.
· “it seems like my kids want me to relapse”
As a parent in recovery, not only are you trying to stay sober and get back into setting healthier boundaries with others, keeping away from certain places and people and using your coping skills, but you’re also trying to be there for your kids, get back into setting healthy boundaries with them, and take on more of the things your kids need because you know you’ve not been showing up as much as you’d like while you were using.
I bet when you thought about quitting you thought recovery would:
· make things easier
· relationships with others would be easier
· being a parent would be easier
· dealing with parent struggles would be easier and
I bet it was frustrating when you discovered it was harder.
And you weren’t prepared or expecting that all of that would be so overwhelming; that your urge to use and the emotions being so overwhelming would bring you to the break of just saying “fuck it”.
Or maybe you knew it would be harder, maybe you expected these fights and arguments, expected they would be “pissed that I’m setting boundaries and not letting them walk all over me”. And even with expecting it and trying to prepare for it, it seems like it’s so much harder to manage than you expected. So what do you do now? You don’t want to relapse but you don’t want to push your kids away, afraid they might make harmful choices.
In this post I will give you some insight into why things get worse before they get better as a parent in recovery and some tips on what you can do to help yourself and your kids.
First, I will help you gain some insight into what’s going on with your kiddo and you, explain some solutions that are helpful, and give you some next steps and resources to help you and your family.
I can imagine what you want to happen is
· your kids are happy you’re sober
· they are helping you out
· they understand that sometimes they need to just stop arguing and do what you say.
I mean after all, a big part of why you’re sober is for your kids. You chose sobriety so your family and kids can have you back.
So why does it seem they are pushing you away? Pushing you back into a relapse? Why are they not appreciating all the hard work you’re putting in to stay sober?! Ahhhhh!
I would like to take a quick moment to say, this article will talk about some things that might be challenging to hear and may make you feel like I’m full of shit and make you want to write me an email cussing me out. You can certainly write that email and I will take that as a sign I hit a nerve and there may be some truth to it, and then offer you some help. It is easier if you don’t cuss me out first but if you feel you need to be angry, I will listen.
The reality is, while you were using, the kids were going through some struggles themselves. They had feelings and fears for your safety. And anger… sadness… and yea they probably saw some things they shouldn’t have or had some traumatic experiences. Not that you’re a bad parent… it just wasn’t ideal, right?
Maybe it’s everything you hoped you wouldn’t do because you too went through it when you were a kid, you didn’t feel loved, you didn’t feel safe or important and now you’re feeling terrible and ashamed and like the worst parent in the world because you repeated that for your kids (if you’re going to be angry, this is probably the time it’s happening… or you’re crying; either is perfectly OK!).
The real challenge of trauma isn’t the trauma itself, It’s how a person deals with the trauma afterward. For your kids (and probably yourself if your childhood wasn’t great) they weren’t able to express the emotions they felt from going through the experiences and their feelings weren’t VALIDATED. (Validated just means the emotions were taken seriously and they felt understood and accepted).
Often, in environments where parents are using, kids do not get to express their feelings without their parent shutting them out, or telling them to “suck it up”. Some kids don’t say anything and they just silently suffer without saying a word because they are worried their parent will be upset, or feel guilty, or will have more stress and then use more.
Sometimes they feel like if they say anything then it would be their fault you used. So they just push them away. Some kids that went through violence not only couldn’t express their emotions but they were so afraid for their survival or the survival of their siblings that they became numb because it was too much.
So, they learned how NOT to feel emotions, how NOT to express their concerns and in the end, they learned their emotions, feelings, and needs weren’t important because no one would listen when they did try to express them (they felt invalidated). AND the only feelings they could express that were noticed were anger….
So (back to current day) now that you’re sober, your kids are confused. The chaos that happened at home before was at least predictable. They learned your cycles and patterns and now they are changing. And change is difficult, it creates anxiety and fear which increases outbursts and anger, and “acting up”. Especially because kids don’t know it’s fear or anxiety. They learned how to shut down or lash out. Be passive or be angry.
It feels like there’s only those 2 emotions. And likely those were the only 2 emotions you were expressing too. Maybe still the only emotions that make sense to you. So, you and your kids get stuck in this cycle of avoiding the problems or being angry about the problems.
Neither one actually help.
Another challenge is when a person shuts down instead of sharing and expressing their emotions, those emotions get stuck in the body and stored in the tissues, (like literally in the muscle and organ tissues thus why stress knots and tension is a thing). So. when a person starts feeling safer and things are getting better, all the stored emotions in the body start to come out.
They start experiencing the anger, the sadness, the fear, anxiety etc. As the environment gets safer, the kids’ behavior becomes temporarily more emotional and more dysregulated BECAUSE their body doesn’t want to hold on to that toxicity in the tissues anymore. But if you’re not aware that this is happening with them, you think they are being “spiteful”, “pushing my buttons”, “trying to manipulate me” and you push back, INVALIDATING their feelings again because you are also feeling all your emotions that are stuck in your body from all the years of doing drugs/alcohol instead of expressing your emotions.
Like adding fuel to a fuel fire right?
See how when a parent gets sober, things can certainly get worse before they get better? On many levels.
So, what the F*** do you do?
· You heal yourself so you can help your kids heal.
· You validate their feelings, you teach them and yourself emotion language so instead of sadness and guilt coming out as anger, there is expression of the real emotion so it can be released.
· And you LOVE.
· Kids need connection and love.
· They need to feel safe, loved, and protected.
· Even the 15 year old that pushes you away every time you try to give her a hug, she especially needs extra LOVE! She needs the type of love you likely didn’t get, the authentic unconditional kind where you say I love you in the middle of her screaming how you ruined her life.
She/He does NOT need discipline, punishment, or any other way of “learning how to be respectful”. In fact, those make it worse because that creates more shame and guilt, more anger, more sadness and rejection for just being an emotional human. (Probably another point of anger insert here).
And being punished for emotions that are coming out now after stored in the body, that she/he can’t control whether they come out or not, creates the shame and guilt, the feelings of worthlessness that you feel and likely lead to your own drug use.
S(he) needs validation of her feelings. Validation of her experience and what it feels like to be sad, guilty, worried, afraid, and anxious. Just like you do. And you have to figure out how to do that for yourself. At this point you likely won’t get it from your parent (maybe not even an apology) so you have to learn how to reparent yourself and allow yourself to feel those emotions. A friend of mine is a coach for emotional sobriety. It’s an interestingly simple, yet difficult concept of just feeling the feels.
Kids that have experienced trauma or emotional neglect HEAL when they are LOVED. YOU heal when you feel LOVED.
Just make sure that love is SELF-LOVE so no one can control your healing.
Suggestions
A couple suggestions I have:
· Look into energy healing like acupuncture, reiki, and reflexology, sound healing, crystal healing etc. Unfortunately, they are not covered by insurances but luckily you can learn the basics of reiki and reflexology on google so you can do it on yourself. These practices help your body release the “stuck” emotions so you and your child can get back to living with day-to-day emotions and not living from past emotions.
· Take meditation and shadow work as seriously as you did getting money to get high. This was my life saver for healing addiction. I lived 11 years in recovery still just coping and this is what leveled up my recovery into healing addiction instead of managing it.
· Listen, Accept, and LOVE your emotions. One of the gifts of addiction is we know how good it feels to feel really (really) happy but we are afraid to feel really (really) sad. Learn to listen to your emotions (through your body) and accept them and love them as information about you and life. My coach friend Aj Reidel is an emotional sobriety coach and can help you with this specifically if this feels like your biggest challenge. Reach her here at aj@4rmg.com and 602-840-4948.
· Communicate often. Learn and teach your kids how to communicate emotions and communicate needs to others in positive healthy ways.
· Holistic Healing. Some take mental health meds and some don’t want to. Holistic healing can be used with medications and uses herbs, crystals, meridians, spiritual journeys, biofeedback, and energetic grounding and cleansing to heal mind, body, spirit.
· Have help and do lots of Self-Help. No one can do it for you and doing it alone is really hard and lonely so find your tribe of light beings and learn all you can about wellness and all the options out there for healing and recovery.
Resources:
Some resources I have included here are ones I use myself and recommend to my clients:
Positive Intelligence | Building mental fitness for all
Positive intelligence is a mental fitness program with an app that helps you quiet the saboteurs that get in the way of your own growth and your relationships. (Think of saboteurs as the defense mechanisms that stop you from being able to grow). It has been the difference between slips in recovery and stopping relapses completely for some of my clients.
Healing Addictions Podcast Episode 1 — Holistic Recovery Services
Check out my podcast here, Healing Addictions where I talk about a lot of things recovery and next level recovery. Going beyond coping and managing addiction, we can heal and eliminate the reasons addiction happens in the first place.
Binaural beats are sounds and tones that have a specific effect on the brain. These have literally saved me from yelling at my kid. Using headphones is best and it may take a few minutes to start working but they do work. And you can find tones for a bunch of different things.
More about me
I have been in recovery since 2009 but most of it I was gritting my teeth just trying to get through the day without being triggered. At one point about 2 years ago I realized I was doing so much self-care that it was basically a part time job to keep up with the stress of owning a business and working in a field that doesn’t always serve those with addictions with dignity and respect. I am also an atheist so going to NA/AA or church was never going to happen. I ended up resonating with Buddhism and started on the path of enlightenment. Throughout my entire enlightenment journey I realized this is exactly what the field of addiction treatment needs in order to serve us better and so I set out on my mission to change the world and change the field of addiction services to help people heal their addictions and thrive instead of helping people just cope and survive in life. Along the way my journey has given me many tools that helped me heal things long in the past, improved my recovery, my parenting, my relationships, and especially helped me connect with a world of energy healing that truly is a world of magic. As a lightworker and healer I help others on their journey as well. Check out my other blog articles and services if you’re interested in working with me more.
