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What seems right is wrong and what feels wrong is right?
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<blockquote data-quote="Deni D" data-source="post: 764272" data-attributes="member: 22840"><p>This is my life ~ I can only speak to my experiences with my son. </p><p></p><p>My son has bipolar disorder (inherited) with schizoaffective tendencies(I think from substance abuse). He told me when he was psychotic he still has some connection to reality. He knew he was thinking wrong. I tell you this because during the worst of it with my son I questioned whether he had any ability to deal with reality. I often thought there was just no way to turn, I couldn't help him, he couldn't help himself. I'm hoping in the back of your son's mind there is something that will bring him forward to get help for himself. He did work, even with all of his troubles, until April of this year. This is pretty big, because there is a place for him feel a loss in his life and hopefully want to work himself back into that better life. </p><p></p><p></p><p>My son said the same at the time he went years without taking medication. And now he refers to incidents back when he wasn't taking medication as a mistake because he wasn't taking medication. </p><p></p><p></p><p>Detachment is such a weird and difficult thing. And really in my case it doesn't end, I still can get sucked into doing and being too much at times but considering my son's situation now detaching is easier. It's not the forcing yourself to cut off the money flow in desperate hope that he will turn around. It's also not the forcing yourself to detach emotionally with the hope that will change him. For a long time my thoughts were "I'll detach and he will get better. Hope this works, I'll try it because nothing else has". </p><p>As Copa said</p><p></p><p>My center of gravity was still my son. </p><p></p><p>Maybe in the long run it was good thing I started and stayed in the mode of working on detaching with the idea of changing my son. I might not have kept going back to it so many times if I didn't have that motivation. I can't really say, but I do know now that detaching is really for us. Figuring out where we end and where our loved one's begin in situations. Keeping ourselves from going down that rabbit hole we have no control of, bit by bit. </p><p></p><p>One thing I can think of that I know helped me was I was able to get the idea in situations with other people first. During the worst times I would distract myself by getting into other people's business too much. I would become too emotionally invested in problems other people had and also helped people too much when I should have stood back. So when I recognized this in myself I practiced detaching in those situations. They were much easier to understand and do than in dealing with my son. It was easier to work through what I should be doing, or not, both emotionally and physically. I would step back and think to myself am I getting too invested here? Am I taking on the emotions of this person too much? Am I going to be doing too much here? With these thoughts I had to remind myself that:</p><p>~ people are not all little birds with broken wings that have to be rescued by me or they won't make it. </p><p>~ I'm not the end all and be all, I'm not in charge of fixing everything. </p><p>~ It's insulting someone if I take on too much of their business and treat them like they can't do for themselves or handle an emotional situation themself. </p><p>This thought process helped me figure out what's okay to do and what was too much in less dramatic/traumatic situations than the one's our adult children have brought us into. </p><p></p><p>With my son I had to define boundaries that were measurable before I could get anywhere with detaching. This included what I would provide financially for him. Examples are ~ doctor's out of pocket expenses, therapy expenses, uber rides to and from certain places. Also what I was going to put up with emotionally from him like ~ swearing at me, I would hang up the phone, do it again within the same week, hang up and not answer calls for a week, keep it up and calls are not answered for longer. </p><p></p><p>Please don't see this as setting him loose, just shifting gears.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Deni D, post: 764272, member: 22840"] This is my life ~ I can only speak to my experiences with my son. My son has bipolar disorder (inherited) with schizoaffective tendencies(I think from substance abuse). He told me when he was psychotic he still has some connection to reality. He knew he was thinking wrong. I tell you this because during the worst of it with my son I questioned whether he had any ability to deal with reality. I often thought there was just no way to turn, I couldn't help him, he couldn't help himself. I'm hoping in the back of your son's mind there is something that will bring him forward to get help for himself. He did work, even with all of his troubles, until April of this year. This is pretty big, because there is a place for him feel a loss in his life and hopefully want to work himself back into that better life. My son said the same at the time he went years without taking medication. And now he refers to incidents back when he wasn't taking medication as a mistake because he wasn't taking medication. Detachment is such a weird and difficult thing. And really in my case it doesn't end, I still can get sucked into doing and being too much at times but considering my son's situation now detaching is easier. It's not the forcing yourself to cut off the money flow in desperate hope that he will turn around. It's also not the forcing yourself to detach emotionally with the hope that will change him. For a long time my thoughts were "I'll detach and he will get better. Hope this works, I'll try it because nothing else has". As Copa said My center of gravity was still my son. Maybe in the long run it was good thing I started and stayed in the mode of working on detaching with the idea of changing my son. I might not have kept going back to it so many times if I didn't have that motivation. I can't really say, but I do know now that detaching is really for us. Figuring out where we end and where our loved one's begin in situations. Keeping ourselves from going down that rabbit hole we have no control of, bit by bit. One thing I can think of that I know helped me was I was able to get the idea in situations with other people first. During the worst times I would distract myself by getting into other people's business too much. I would become too emotionally invested in problems other people had and also helped people too much when I should have stood back. So when I recognized this in myself I practiced detaching in those situations. They were much easier to understand and do than in dealing with my son. It was easier to work through what I should be doing, or not, both emotionally and physically. I would step back and think to myself am I getting too invested here? Am I taking on the emotions of this person too much? Am I going to be doing too much here? With these thoughts I had to remind myself that: ~ people are not all little birds with broken wings that have to be rescued by me or they won't make it. ~ I'm not the end all and be all, I'm not in charge of fixing everything. ~ It's insulting someone if I take on too much of their business and treat them like they can't do for themselves or handle an emotional situation themself. This thought process helped me figure out what's okay to do and what was too much in less dramatic/traumatic situations than the one's our adult children have brought us into. With my son I had to define boundaries that were measurable before I could get anywhere with detaching. This included what I would provide financially for him. Examples are ~ doctor's out of pocket expenses, therapy expenses, uber rides to and from certain places. Also what I was going to put up with emotionally from him like ~ swearing at me, I would hang up the phone, do it again within the same week, hang up and not answer calls for a week, keep it up and calls are not answered for longer. Please don't see this as setting him loose, just shifting gears. [/QUOTE]
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