It’s been said that addiction is a disease of relationships and nowhere is that more true than within the family unit. Families in which someone struggles with substance use disorder can develop all sorts of maladaptive coping skills, including enabling and codependent tendencies. Children can be hit especially hard, as parents’ addiction makes it difficult to form proper attachment bonds and see healthy coping mechanisms modeled.
Dr. Alia Kaneaiakala has studied attachment theory extensively and has used it to inform her care for people with substance use disorder. As the chief clinical officer of Phoenix Rising, a behavioral health center in Southern California, Kaneaiakala aims to help clients form secure attachments that allow them to interrupt the family cycle of addiction.
“When someone in the family struggles with addiction its’ a two-fold problem: there’s the addiction is going on, and it’s impacting how they’re seen by loved ones,” she says.
This is especially problematic for children of people with substance use disorder. Children normally look to their parents to know how to respond to different situations throughout their lives. Rather than modeling healthy coping mechanisms, parents with substance use disorder show children that when things get tough they can turn to drugs or alcohol to ease their suffering.
“The child sees that and turns to drugs and alcohol as a teen because they saw their parents do that when life’s problems come up,” Kaneaiakala says.
In order to break that cycle there needs to be a reversal—for parents to demonstrate that there are healthier ways of coping with stress. Kaneaiakala says even as adults, children of alcoholics and addicts fare better in sobriety if their parent is clean as well.
“Our parents provide a road map for our future, at least on a subconscious level,” she says. “If a parent gets into recovery it increases the chances that child will too because it shows the opportunity.”
Kaneaiakala recommends that as parents navigate recovery they speak openly about what they are doing—going to meetings, speaking with a sponsor, and taking time for self-care. It’s also important to talk about when things don’t go well—times when the parents reacts badly, for example.
“As the parent learns coping skills, it’s important to be articulate,” she says.
This doesn’t mean that a person with a parent who does not get into recovery is doomed. However, people trying to learn healthy coping mechanisms without parental example have to rely on themselves much more.
“This beautiful thing exists,” Kaneaiakala says. “We have the opportunity to become our own secure attachment: our own safety net and secure base. We believe in ourselves and our resiliency and recognize the power of what we’ve survived.”
In theses cases it may be helpful to view the parents as an example of what not to do.
“We can learn from other’s lives whether they do or not,” Kaneaiakala says.
Fellowship programs, whether through 12 steps, church or other organizations, can play an important role for individuals trying to break a family cycle.
“These become an outlet to find people who can become role models,” Kaneaiakala says.
People who are healing childhood trauma around addiction should be mindful of their past, especially if they find themselves having an unexpectedly large reaction to something that has happened to them recently. Kaneaiakala says that therapists recognize that so called “10-90” reactions are common: where someone’s reaction is 10 percent because of the current situation and 90 percent because that situation triggers memories of a something similar that happened in the past.
In those moments it is important to self-regulate quickly to get the situation under control, and later seek professional help to avoid being triggered in the future, she says.
Phoenix Rising provides behavior health care services in southern California. Find out more at https://phoenixrisingbehavioral.com/ and follow them on Facebook and Twitter
Sponsored DISCLAIMER: This is a paid advertisement for California Behavioral Health, LLC, a CA licensed substance abuse treatment provider and not a service provided by The Fix. Calls to this number are answered by CBH, free and without obligation to the consumer. No one who answers the call receives a fee based upon the consumer’s choice to enter treatment. For additional info on other treatment providers and options visit www.samhsa.gov.
