Hi Mattie and welcome. I could have written your post. Your story is uncanny in its similarity to my story with my son, who is now 25
My sister said the other day: He absolutely does everything the hardest way with the most resistance, doesn't he? I'm the writer (lol) but she nailed it.
My son lived with me here after high school and in and out during his two years of junior college. The drug use was going on then, but naive me didn't have a clue. The problems were worse and worse. My husband (now ex) and I separated when my son went into his senior year of h.s., and so it was me, here, alone (with my ex's telephone support) trying to figure out every day how to deal with my increasingly very difficult son.
He wouldn't do anything in terms of following my rules or anybody else's. I could tell you a million stories about that. I remember the day he came home from class (he went to school part-time---well, kind of---and worked part-time) and told me he was going to pay a CPA on craigslist $20 to do his accounting homework for him. I was horrified and sat him down for ANOTHER long talk about right and wrong...I laugh now at myself...I threw so many words at him for so long. Made no difference---things just got worse and worse and worse.
Your son is right where he needs to be right now. Out of your house. Selling/pawning/hocking his stuff. Let him have anything that belongs to him. Don't fight it.
Being homeless isn't that bad, evidently. My son has now been homeless five different times. This time, right now, it's been since June 26. The longest stint. He's been homeless in another city last winter during the coldest days and over Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and New Year's Day. Hard to believe and hear, I know, but the drama has continued nonstop for the past four+ years. He's been in jail 8 or 9 times. He has multiple misdemeanors and two felonies.
I remember agonizing over each awful thing and the surreal feeling that this is a new low and it can't get worse. And then it did get worse, and I had to learn how to accept and cope with that.
You cannot save him. You cannot throw enough words, boundaries, rules, contracts, begging, pleading, therapy appointments, appointments with ministers, etc., etc., etc., to shake the sense into him that he needs. I wish you could. If it were so, all of us on this board would have done it already. I spent 10 years trying to get my son to "fly right."
The pain and despair is agonizing. That is why you must take care of yourself. I would work hard, if I were you right now, so that I could learn to say very little, do very little, but be kind, loving and encouraging. That takes work, to be able to do that.
Comfort yourself in the meantime with these thoughts: there is so much help for homeless people. Food, temporary shelter, clothes, food stamps, meals (three meals a day and two on the weekends here, in a small city of 110K), medical care, job and resume assistance. On and on. I believe there is actually too much help today (this from a bleeding heart liberal).
There is a community among homeless people. They look out for each other. They give each other a few dollars here and there when one of them gets some funds. They pile up in motel rooms, 10 to 15, until they get banned from the motel. They hang out at the library (air conditioning and heat) and in the mall food courts until they have to move along. They learn the ropes, very quickly. It is a whole sub-culture.
Go to Al-Anon. Read Al-Anon literature. You can order it online. Read CoDependent No More. Start working on yourself. This could be a phase for your son, and I hope and pray that it is. I am an eternal optimist, still. Your son and my son can stop today, and turn and walk in a new direction, but only if THEY decide to.
Are they mentally ill? Maybe. It is still their choice to get help, and then to comply with that help.
We're here for you. We will support you no matter what you decide to do. We care, and we get it. Keep coming back.