Welcome Lost in Sadness, I know you are so very tired and sad. Reading your post, I was taken back to the beginning with my Difficult Child. He was 19 instead of 18, but so many of the facts are very similar.
When they're into drugs, that is the end-all, be-all. Nothing else matters to them, and they will say and do anything to get what they want. We're the easiest target, because we are their mothers, and we love them so very much. We keep thinking...this time...this time I will help...and then it will be different. And the months and years go on.
If I knew then what I know now...I would work hard to try to stop enabling earlier. Hindsight you know. My Difficult Child was in the trenches for some six years. I was there with him, emotionally, for all of that time.
But in time, I came to believe that I couldn't do one single thing to make things different for him. Like you, I had tried literally everything. From physically pulling him out of bed, pushing him into the shower, coming back 5 or 6 times to get him out of the shower, laying out his clothes, pushing and pulling him into the car, driving him to multiple psychologist and therapist appointments, sitting there with him doing all of the talking, finally leaving the room so they could talk, sitting in the waiting room, paying for it all of course, only to be told by the professional that...he wouldn't talk for the whole hour. Said literally not one single word. This is the epitome of you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink. I did this type of thing with many situations with him for a long long time. I was working 50, 100, 1000, times harder on his life than he was.
Finally, I was so exhausted and so sad that I just had to stop. I was killing myself and nothing was changing. I'll tell you this: that was a very very good day for me, that day. It was the day that I started to change...and then in time (a long time, a long long time) he started to change. Today, it's been 2.5 years of steady progress. He has a really good full time job with benefits and a future, his own place, he is thinking about the future, he is sweet and kind, he is clean. It is a miracle. I had to completely get out of the way (my long backstory is here on this forum, in many many posts), and it was a long, hard process for me. I am very very grateful today for this forum and for the support and love I experienced here, and that my son is on a good path. I don't take it for granted.
This is the hardest stuff in the entire world. We know how hard it is, and we respect your decisions along the way.
Please stay with us and you'll find ideas, help and support here. We care.
