According to Chapter 7 of the Big Book, “helping others is the foundation stone of your recovery”. However, when you are helping others with their recovery from an addiction, you must remember a few things. You must keep in mind that you can’t control what they do and you certainly can’t control their recovery process. You can only offer your assistance and help in ways that don’t deprive yourself or your family.
Offer Assistance with Caution
While it can feel great to help another person overcome their addiction, you must offer your assistance with a bit of caution. This does not mean you shouldn’t trust the other person. However, you should be cautious about how much help you are giving him or her. For instance, if they need a bit of money or a place to stay to help them out of a rough situation, you can offer your assistance. Although, you should only do so to an extent and if it doesn’t put yourself and your family in a negative way. If you are going to let them stay with you for a bit, give them a timeframe of when they need to find another place to live.
Doing the Right Thing
If you are going to take on the responsibility of helping another person overcome their addiction, make sure you are doing the right thing. For instance, if you tell this person they can call you day or night and they start calling you five times during the night or calling you when they are drunk, they are overstepping some boundaries and you shouldn’t continue to let this happen.
Be Ready for Bad Conditions
Not every alcoholic or drug addict is able to recover on their first try. If you are letting a man or a woman with an addiction stay with you, you should be ready for bad conditions. If you refuse to let them drink or do drugs in your home, they may become violent. There might come a time when you have to call the police. Make sure you are ready for such times.
With all of this being said, you should know that many alcoholics and addicts need help from a drug rehab or alcohol rehab before they get further into their recovery. If the person you are trying to help has yet to get into an alcohol rebabilitation or drug rehabilitation center, talk to them about going. It might be the best thing for them.
If they decide to get that sort of help, you can have them call 888-992-7955 to reach alcohol treatment centers and drug treatment centers today.
