Anger, Shame, and Secrets

I have seen so much written lately about the addict, but little about the families of addicts and what they go through.
Why did this happen to me? Why did my loved one become addicted? We are good people who never harmed anyone, struggling to earn a living, pay our bills and stay alive. It seems like the system always has services for the criminal, public defender, jail with three meals a day, TV, recreation, etc., but when I wanted help, the first words out of anyone’s mouth was how much money do you have or sorry we cannot help you. The school system was ill prepared to deal with the addict. I was ill prepared to deal to the addiction process. The phone was ringing at all hours of the night. Either the addict was in trouble and needed help or the addict’s associates were calling. I was sleeping with a separate lock on the bedroom door with the family cash and valuables under the pillow. I had the locks changed on the house. My house became a police substation with all the visits from the regular police and the juvenile officer. I had no control over my life. No wonder I walked around angry all the time.
I thought nobody would know or find out about my addict, but they do. At work, I tried to hide my problems but somehow it always came out. The closeness of the workstations and lack of privacy made it hard to hide conversations about or with the addict. The neighbors saw the craziness at our house and knew. I was deeply ashamed that I had this problem. Even when I sought help from a support group, I made sure the meeting was far enough away from where I lived so no one would recognize me and know I had this problem. I was so ashamed.
I desperately tried to keep the addiction a secret from everyone, including my extended family. However, once they did find out the comments were unbelievable; “beat it out of him” or “lock him up in the house” or “send him away to a facility.” At work I wanted no one to know because I feared I would lose my job. I did everything possible to keep my neighbors and extended family in the dark. I wanted to keep it a secret at all costs because I did not want to talk about this problem or explain to anyone about this problem. Mentally and emotionally I was a wreck.
With the help of a family support group, in the end I learned to take care of myself and my immediate family. I continued to offer support to the addict in whatever way I could without becoming an enabler to the addict and the addiction problem. The legal responsibility was still there to protect the addict as long as the addict did not reach majority, but somehow the burden was lessened. I never stopped loving the addict, but no longer felt guilty by saying no to the addict. I learned two beautiful words “boundaries and limits.” I had finally learned to deal with the anger, shame, and secrets.