What Families Need While a Young Adult Builds Recovery
For families supporting young adults ages 18 and older.
I think we sometimes expect a family to be ready for a loved one's recovery as soon as that person is ready to get sober. A parent might be willing to help and still have a lot of hurt to work through from what happened during active addiction. Finding out where that parent is emotionally, and what they feel able to do, is an important part of the conversation. I would want them to have people they can talk honestly with while they make those decisions. The young adult's recovery will take time, and the family deserves some time to find its footing as well.
The new SAMHSA guide, Navigating Mental Health and Substance Use Care: An Introductory Guide for Families, has some useful questions for families about the roles they take on. What help does their loved one need? What will that person's own responsibilities be? What help does the family member need from other people? Published in June and shared again for Recovery Month, the guide includes the family's wellbeing throughout the discussion of finding care. I appreciate that approach, particularly for a parent whose attention may have been almost entirely on getting their child help.
Even when a young adult is willing to get help, a family may struggle to work out what level of care they need and how to find it. A licensed clinician can assess their needs and talk through the options with them, and I would encourage the family to ask how they can participate in that conversation and what might call for a change in care over time.
It seems reasonable to me that the person being asked to help would have an opportunity to think about what they are able to do, and yet there can be a lot of urgency around these conversations. Someone needs a ride, money or a place to stay, and the family member has to make a decision. My hope would be that we help families think some of this through ahead of time, with guidance from people who understand what they are dealing with. There will be limits to how much money a person has and how much time they can take away from work or other responsibilities that need to be weighed against their need for sustained help with their substance addiction. Having an honest conversation about those limits gives the young adult useful information as well.
I also think we have to allow for the possibility that a young adult has a different idea of what would help them. A parent can have years of experience making decisions for their child, and learning how to participate as that child becomes an adult involves a change for both of them. The willingness to listen, ask questions and learn from the answer is important here. What would they like to do for themselves? Where are they asking for help? Those questions can give us a place to start, and the licensed professionals involved in their care can explain the permissions needed for family participation and sharing information. I would encourage a family to ask for a clear explanation of those arrangements and who will be responsible for coordinating care.
Something as simple as keeping notes can help with the practical side of this. The guide recommends writing down conversations with providers, questions asked and answers given. You can refer back to who said what, what is supposed to happen next and whom to call. Ask for an explanation in plain language if that is what you need. Understanding what someone has told you is important enough to take the extra time.
Family members also need somewhere to speak freely about what they are going through. Some people may want to meet other families; others may want time with a licensed therapist. A family peer-support group is one of the options discussed in the guide. Al‑Anon Family Groups gives people affected by a loved one's drinking a place to share their experience and learn from others who have been through similar difficulties. Ask how the group works, who leads it and what expectations there are around privacy. Give yourself time to find a place where you feel comfortable talking about your own experience. A sibling or another family member may want support of their own as well, particularly if most of the attention has been on the person getting help.
Healing damaged or severed relationships can take many years of sustained effort on both sides. Someone entering recovery may be enthusiastic about the changes they are making and anxious for their family to see them, while that family is still hurt by what happened during active addiction. The person in recovery has work of their own to do with a sponsor and recovering peers, including how to handle disappointment and continue following through on their responsibilities. In Finding Your People in Recovery, I wrote about developing those connections while family relationships are healing. Families get to decide when they are ready to take another step in rebuilding a relationship, and they deserve support while they work that out.
A 2023 review of 19 studies looked at different ways of helping family members affected by another person's substance use. Some programs showed promise in reducing depression and distress, although the authors pointed out that small samples and weaknesses in the studies limit what we can conclude. Those findings give us further reason to ask how family members are doing when they seek help, and to keep asking as their loved one's recovery develops. What they need may change along the way.
Asking for help and being willing to receive it is something we encourage in recovery. I would extend that encouragement to the family member who is trying hard to be useful and could use some guidance themselves. Read the guide, bring your questions to someone qualified to help and take the time to consider what you can reasonably commit to. There is room for your wellbeing in your loved one's recovery.
