Helping a Loved One Through Addiction? Watch This First

Personal Reflections on Addiction

Rob, how are you today, man?

Hey man, dude, I'm pretty well. It's my day off, you know? So one of the days like my sabbatical, that's my Saturday. I try to make sure that I just plug in and get fed personally, hang out with the kids, and so forth. So it's been a good day so far. It's sunny out here in good old San Diego. Man, how about you?

Nice man, it's rainy in Virginia. It's actually a blessing, and we haven't had any rain—haven't had much rain at all—so my gardens are loving it. I've been watering my grass; I'm the only idiot in the neighborhood watering my grass. But I'm not today, but like I need it green. You know?

Right, right, yeah. So I don't know—you don't get rain here, dude; it sucks.

No, but it's always sunny in 60 degrees.

Yeah, but you need rain. Everybody needs rain, you know, for sure. The harvest grows, dude. I need a little bit of rain.

The Catalyst for Change

So we were trying to chat and figure out what we're going to discuss today, and I think we decided that we were going to dive into the topic of addiction. Maybe share a little bit on some of the struggles of people when they're in active addiction—how they make the decision to ultimately quit, right? Acknowledge that they have a problem, and some of the struggles with that. I figured, man, we could just jump in and see where the conversation goes. We both have the lived experience; we work with people in that struggle before. So let’s talk about that from the beginning.

Acknowledging that you have an issue when you're dealing with active addiction—what do you think the catalyst is for most people? How do they move from denial to actually acknowledging, "Hey, this is a problem that I need to resolve in my life?"

Yeah, dude, you know that's a weighted question. There are so many different ways to approach it because, for me, when I had to come to the realization, I just kept on missing out. Everything that I put my hand to would just crumble and fall apart. I remember getting out of jail, almost being served a five-year sentence because of what I did at my previous job. I was working at a convenience store, and I just took all the money out of the safe and left this gas station unattended at twelve o'clock at night so I could go get high.

Moments of Realization

Eventually, I got caught and saw the judge. I was given another opportunity. I tried to go back to this girl that I had been with at that time, and she was still in her mess. I told myself I could go get a job and build myself back up to living a normal life again. But the truth of the matter was, as I was going, I was just going to do the same thing as before—find stability, have drugs, have money, and then go right back into my addiction.

So for me, it took really crying out to my mother and my stepfather, and I'm grateful for them today because they were the ones that kind of gave me the hard truth. They said, "Hey, look, we love you, but we're not going to tolerate the decisions and choices that you've made. In order for you to be back with us in a right relation, you must first make the decision and choice to get help."

The Complexity of Addiction

They had a vehicle to get me there, which was Teen Challenge, and it was really just that moment where I said, "You know what? I'm not really all in with this decision to get changed, but I'm open to the idea of what this vehicle could take me." It really just took me humbling myself and letting go of the reality that I don't have it under control.

I think that was the hard transition for me because being on my own for some of the years of my life and doing everything for myself, it took me a while to wrap my head around the idea that, "Hey, look, you were never meant to do this on your own." A lot of addicts think that they need to do this life or suffer in their addiction on their own, and the reality is that you're not alone. There are other people going through the same thing, but you need to put yourself in positions that align with people or put people in your circle that are going to give you those hard truths that you might not necessarily want to receive at first, but it's necessary for that transition, you know?

The Role of Trauma in Addiction

You know, it takes—man, I think there's a lot of conversation in addiction circles about rock bottom and having that rock bottom experience. I kind of live in the middle regarding rock bottoms. I understand coming to the end of the road on rock bottom. In 2023, though, ultimately with fentanyl being out there, it ends up at death for a lot of people, and that's a sad reality. It's terrifying to say, "Well, I'm just going to let somebody go to rock bottom."

I think about my own journey. I remember overdosing on meth one time and being in the hospital. Man, I was so outside of my mind, dealing with what I was dealing with. I had used too much, and I was mad at the nurses because they wouldn't let me go outside and have a cigarette.

Even that experience wasn't what did it for me. What my parents did—we didn't understand what it was at that time—they did an intervention, and it brought the bottom up. It created a crisis in my life that made me realize something was off; something was not working.

Overcoming Shame and Isolation

It had to be pretty significant because as a meth user, there are no emotions, there's no feeling; everything's numb. It wasn't normal conversation getting through to me. Honestly, man, the thing that hit me harder than anything else—there were two things. One was my grandma throwing me out, right? Because grandma was always the safe place. I knew I had really screwed up when grandma wouldn't let me come home.

The second thing was when they threw me out, none of my friends picked up the phone. Nobody wanted the homeless Justin. Even though I had drugs in my pocket at the time, nobody wanted the homeless Justin who was willing to give me a place to stay. I eventually found somewhere, but that first experience of opening their refrigerator and the dude looking at me sideways like, "What are you doing eating my food?" I had never experienced homelessness and hunger, you know?

But that was like an eye-opening experience for me, and so I think there needs to be some sort of shaking. But you're right, man. Sometimes that shame—feeling like I'm dealing with this all alone; nobody's going to know what I'm going through. Nobody's going to understand what I'm struggling with—and I am alone in this battle keeps us bound and from acknowledging our issues.

The Importance of Sharing Our Burdens

You know the reason why I say this is I was just reading an article, and I'm not going to mention everybody's name, but for just—I mean, it's public information, but still, for the simple fact of not going off on a tangent, it was a story about someone that received abuse—child molestation and so on. Reading the article, this had been going on since the kid was 14; now this guy is in his 20s.

The fear of releasing the truth kept him paralyzed for so long even though he had the answer to be released or the solution to his problem just to share what had been going on in his life with somebody else. Being threatened by someone saying, "If you say something, I will kill you," caused him to hide behind the solution to his problem.

Now, mind you, if I were 14, I would have probably done the exact same thing. So many of us go through addiction with the lie and the shame and the guilt of not being able to articulate or even communicate it; rather than sharing where we hurt, we suppress it. That's the rooted cause.

I have a firm belief that—and some people may disagree with me on this—but I don't think people are really addicted to drugs. I think what happens is that people have a rooted issue that they've never been able to address, and therefore they hide behind the drugs, allowing that thing they've been unwilling to address to be suppressed.

By the time they go to dig it up, all that weight, that pain that they have to relive causes more harm than actually going through the healing process. For me, I had to face it—right? You know? I’m ten years going on eleven years sober next year, and I'm just now realizing that there's still stuff that I'm having to address in my personal life.

Identity and Healing in Recovery

I might not necessarily be addicted to drugs anymore, but I've pivoted and found another source of addiction. You know, one of the songs says, "I don’t do drugs; I’m addicted to the pain." I think that speaks to the reality of it. A lot of times we're like, "Why don’t you just stop using?" and it's like that's the wrong question to ask somebody. It's more like, "What are you hiding from? What are you afraid to face that you're going to have to deal with if you do stop using?"

A lot of times, we're saying, "Man, just quit! Why don't you just quit? It’s that easy!" Just stop, get a little more power, and it's like, "Man, trauma informs a lot of addiction." You understand that if an individual does stop using, they've got to face some of that trauma head-on.

I think that was one of the things after finally quitting—trying to reprogram my brain and figure out who I was apart from that lifestyle. That was painful work; it was hard work, to uncover and address the reasons that I ever started using in the first place.

You know, Jesus does set us free and make us a new creation, but the process—when you put the pot on the potter’s wheel and they're pounding the clay and working it into shape—that's what it felt like becoming the new creation in Christ. My heart was transformed, but this person had to become new.

A lot of times, I think many people—addicts know they need to quit, but they're more afraid of facing the work that it’s going to take to reshape them into the new person, you know? The scripture that comes to my mind as we're even speaking is, “A brother offended is harder to win than a strong city.”

The Walls We Build

I think about how the person becomes offended. They have to build this wall; they have to build this city if you will. The time and labor spent laying brick-by-brick has caused them to say, "You know what? I'm unwilling to remove these bricks now because of the fear of the unknown whether or not I’ll be offended again."

So therefore, I might as well stay behind the walls that I built and remove myself from society and become isolated in my depression; my anxiety, my fear, my addiction, whatever it may be. The reality is, hey, look, that which you took offense to is understandable, but allow somebody to walk you through that process to begin to remove these bricks so that you can be established and firm in your identity. I think that's where it stems from; it's all about our identity.

I took offense to my mother and father not being there. Now I don’t even know what they were going to present me with at that time in my life. I made it about me when the reality is it was all used for God's greater purpose and will for my life. But I couldn’t see that in hindsight; all I saw was me.

So sometimes, man, it takes removing yourself from the center of attention, if you will, and having a bird’s-eye view of the circumstances and situation at play. But at the same time, it requires you having people in your life.

Navigating Recovery Without Support

If I'm an addict now and if there’s an addict that's listening and you don't want people in your life to kind of speak this truth—and you’re not hearing it from your parents, your siblings, friends, whoever it may be—then have you come to this realization moment? How do you navigate that?

For some people, it might not be like us, so for the people that are listening, if they want a solution to their problem—what do they do? Who do they reach out to? I mean, that's a good question. I think the challenging part of that is like, does the individual really want help, even if they know they don't feel like they can get help or they can make a change?

Realizing that, despite the resources—like that acknowledgment that there is an issue there. I mean, I know 12 Steppers talk about that all the time, and we didn't go through a Christian recovery program. We didn't do a lot of focus from the 12 steps, but they got some things right. Those steps talk about denial and acknowledgment, personal inventory, and all that stuff in those steps. There are some powerful principles there.

Even though we didn't come up in that type of program, I think that acknowledgment and uncovering why you don't want to change—what is the reason you’re afraid of change? Is it just a fear of the physical detox, a fear of being vulnerable? You know what I'm saying? You can go through the list. Once we figure out the “why”—why do I feel like it's okay to stay here?—that’s where the conversation can maybe go a little further, if that makes any sense.

The Fear of Success

Yeah, man, that's actually really good. I remember there was a guy named Steven when we were in Teen Challenge. Something that rang true for me was he said people don’t have a fear of failure, but they have a fear of success. I know that's not true for everybody because some people might have been in their addiction, had great success, and then hit rock bottom. You know, I had a taste of both worlds. I had money in my pocket when I was in my addiction, and I lost everything when I was in my addiction.

So, like, I kind of had the best of both worlds, but still at the same time, pivoting out of my addiction was hard for me to see a normal lifestyle. I didn’t know what that looked like.

For sure, because I came out of my addiction, got married immediately, and the first year of my marriage was nothing but fighting with my wife and myself. Then I had my firstborn. I went through a year-long program but still with undealt issues, right? The reality was I only had eight months of real surrender. But even in that eight months of surrender, I was working and doing all these different activities that kept my mind off the rooted issue that brought me there in the first place.

So then I stepped back into the busyness of life, never really identifying what it was that kept me bound from living free, even though I was.

The Challenge of Healing

Often, people can say, "You know what? I'm no longer addicted to drugs," but still be bound and no longer living in freedom. It's not so much about cleaning up the outside; it's like, what is happening on the inside that you're ignoring that the naked eye cannot see?

How do we get to the heart of man? I think the only way to get to the heart of man when it comes to addiction is to get to the heart of God. Compassion is what moves people. When Jesus saw all the people that had no shepherd, he said, "I look at them as sheep without a shepherd. The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few."

We walk by broken people each and every single day. You probably walked by a homeless person this week. You probably saw somebody in need but identified them as this psychopath, homeless individual—crazy and out of their mind. "I'm not giving them money," but didn't move with compassion to bring about a transformation in their life.

The Importance of Compassion in Recovery

I can recall the moments in my life when I was broken and in despair, and someone reached out to me out of the kindness of their heart. I felt the heart for me, and it caused me to pivot and make temporary change, right? But I needed more of that in my life.

Yeah, when we get more offended about the person's lifestyle—and when our offense about how that person is living their life outweighs our compassion, we lose our ability to minister to them authentically. Am I more bothered by the behavior, or am I more bothered by the condition of the heart?

Behavioral trips us up every time, especially if we're not focused on the Lord and knowing it's not us that can change a person. It's the Lord that can change a person. They may be messy; they may be doing things or making lifestyle choices that I disagree with, but I heard this again. I think I said this last week on our show, but I listened to a podcast where a guy said, "I don't have to sacrifice my conviction to close somebody in compassion."

Compassion vs. Enabling

That brings true when it comes to ministering to people in our lives or trying to level with people in our lives that are bound up in addiction. I lived it; I don't understand it all the way. And, you know, when we're trying to help family members or friends that are battling with this, there is a fine line between compassion and enabling. I get that—that's a whole 'nother discussion—but just showing people love and showing them compassion in and of itself can open the door for us to ultimately win that heart, you know?

And that's a huge thing, man.

Reasons Addicts Refuse Treatment

Actually, I googled while we were talking about seven reasons, and I found a website that says the top seven reasons that addicts refuse treatment. I thought this was interesting.

Now, there's tons of information on the internet, but it said they are in denial; they’re scared of detox; they don’t want to change; they fear they will fail; they don’t want to be vulnerable; they want to keep using; or they’re embarrassed. I thought that was pretty interesting.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, shoot, let’s be honest—everybody wants to keep using, right? It felt good. It felt good to be numb, you know? But I get that, though, man. At the end of the day, everybody is designed differently when it comes to how they receive their breakthrough. The problem is when we begin to try to replicate somebody else's breakthrough to an individual that’s not going to work with.

I said that’s the way you understand what I’m saying?

For sure. And so I parent each one of my kids differently; they're all mine; they're a seed of my wife and me, right? We're here, but I can’t address my oldest the way I address my middle child and vice versa.

So the way that you look at people is understanding where they're at, right? Like you said, man, I think it gets to knowing the person. Because I think half the time, man, we just have this preconceived notion of who the addict is. So you have the person that never does drugs, and you say, "Hey, look, like you said earlier, why don’t you just stop? Why don’t you just quit?”

Breaking Down Preconceived Notions

I can do the exact same thing to that person and say, "Well why are you always on social media? Why don’t you just stop doing it? Why don’t you just stop doing this?” And so then they look and justify their actions because they're offended.

The way that you deliver something to bring forth change in an individual's life is due to the relationship that you establish.

Hey, Kenzie, how are you? And Lisa chimed in; I was saying hi to the folks in the comments. I'm trying to get better at that. Y'all, I'm not ignoring y'all; I'm learning the whole live thing.

No, you’re spot on. Oh man, I think people react to change differently. It messed with me early on at TC where I had a guy come in the program. He was there for like three days, had a great experience with the Lord at the chapel service, and then he ended up leaving, saying he got what he needed.

I've heard that a bunch of times before, you know, and most of the time that's just, "Okay, I'm ready to go now. I want to go back out and do my thing." And homeboy ended up leaving, and I was like, "Man, what happened?" He had this incredible experience with the Lord at this chapel service, and now he's gone already? I don't get it, you know?

Until seven months later, he called me and there were a series of events. He ended up at a train station where he met a missionary who ended up taking him in and discipling him. He was on his way to serve on the mission field in a different country.

God's Timing in Recovery

It was just like the set of circumstances that God put together to get this guy discipled and to the place where he was free from something that I would have never planned. Nobody would write a program structure that way, right? I mean, you’ve got to have boundaries, and you’ve got to have a program. But for me, it was like God had a way that He wanted to get to that individual, and it really wrecked me afterward, you know, hearing that story.

Because it’s like, what if we were so in tune, right? And obviously, this is pertaining to believers, right? So ongoing risks probably wouldn’t really understand this, but what if we were so in tune with our relationship with the Father and listened to the Holy Spirit that we knew that was what needed to happen?

I think that's the thing. We want our hands in the mix of everything—and we want things to be done a certain way. It's like, man, take a step back and realize how God moves. He doesn’t move in an ordinary way; it’s absurd, actually. Because the thing is that if people saw Jesus spit in the mud today and then wipe mud on somebody’s eyes, we’d be like, "That’s heretical! That’s heresy! What is this person doing?" But He did it in the scripture.

The Essence of Transformation

So then when you see our people do crazy stuff nowadays, it’s like, don’t get me wrong, test all the spirits. But like, why are we alarmed at what people are doing if it’s resulting in someone having a connection with the Lord?

You know even the people with the most polished stories—the reality of the gospel is that the Lord uses broken vessels, right? No matter how difficult your past is or how spotless your past is, or quote unquote spotlessness, the Lord uses broken vessels. We all have sin; it just happens to be labeled differently for each of us.

I think that’s the encouragement for the person that may find themselves bound and feel like they're embarrassed or afraid to ask for help because they’ve blown it too bad. It's like, man, you know, God has taken just a lump of clay, a broken vessel if you will, and put His light in it, and that’s what makes the difference—the light of Jesus inside of us, not anything we’ve done.

The Journey of Healing and Transformation

I know it’s easy to say that on a podcast; I’ve experienced that. It’s hard to get to that realization, but it’s a lot easier when you’re willing to let people be compassionate. And that would be the challenge, I think, for those that are struggling: it’s like, man, you gotta stop pushing people away, you know? And I know it’s easy to get on the other side of it and say, "Well, stop judging them." But really, for the addict, having lived that, it's like: you know, stop pushing people away that just want to love you.

They're trying to figure out how to love you in the middle of all this mess and all of this pain, and sometimes I think we make it harder on them because they’re having to tiptoe around all of our stuff rather than just letting people love us in the middle of our mess, you know?

The Impact of Connection

So that’s a really good point that you brought up, man. And it’s kind of like a pivot a little bit, but what was that for you when you saw that? Like how were you receptive to the person that began to pour into you? What allowed you to open that door?

Well, I posted my testimony video—a couple—a few days ago, and it was on the day I showed up at Teen Challenge. One of the staff members there, he had been in my grandma's yard after that intervention. Nobody would pick up the phone, and I had contemplated ending my life. I had a bunch of meth in my pocket, and I was going to put it all in the needle and done. I had an encounter with the Lord in the yard that night, and people get uncomfortable even when you say that.

But I called out to the Lord, and I felt His presence, and I wept. After being on meth for five years, I had never wept before. There was an encounter with Jesus that took place. Now, that didn’t fix it all for me; I still ended up going to TC, but I was 105 pounds. I’ve got track marks on my arm. I showed up at the Teen Challenge center, and talk about being coiled with compassion.

Words That Transform

The staff member there looked at me and said, "God has a plan for your life." In a moment, his properly timed words of encouragement cut through all the failure, cut through all the garbage, and I believed it. You know, it was just the timing of it all, and that’s what broke through for me.

It was somebody just not seeing who I was but seeing the potential of the Lord inside of me. Wow, that’s so good. That blew my mind, man. And I, you know, it’s funny. Even today, I remember those words, and every time I start new effort or I try to pursue something new—even though it was just God has a plan for seven words, right? It was just seven words.

Those seven words have literally shifted the trajectory of my life. And that goes back to speak to: regardless of addiction or not, never discount the impact of a word in due season for a friend.

Supporting Those Who Grieve

The non-friend—anybody. The simple encouragement and what it can do to transform the destiny and the future of somebody’s life is mind-blowing. So, wow, that’s so good, man. That’s really, really good.

You know, I think to myself, you know, there are probably people that are listening that might have never struggled with addiction but may have lost a loved one who never really got to make that or take the opportunity to transform. You know, and didn’t receive, you know?

And so, like, my heart goes out for them because it’s like, man, how are they processing hearing all this great testimony? And like, if I’m in their shoes, I’m like, "Well, that’s good for you! I’m glad that you came out on the other side of mine!" But like, I didn’t—I lost my son; I lost my nephew, my niece, and whatever it may be. So, yeah, it’s painful, man.

How can God use something like that still, even though there was death that was involved? You know, and so like that for me—I’ve witnessed that too many times in Team Challenge, and I still get reached out to to this day of families and friends where it’s like, "Hey Rob, hate to share this with you, but this person passed away" or "that person relapsed." And I’m just like, man, dude. Like, what happened, you know?

The Role of Community in Healing

Why did it have to happen this way? But I’m reassured in knowing that there still can be a great impact. Well, it’s not easy to overcome. You know, so that's where I think communities, man, and just really being receptive to even other people's words because then what happens is a person that might be an addict becomes depressed or anxiety-filled or whatever it may be and isolates themselves just like the addict did.

Now they're in the same position that the addict was, where they're not willing to receive any help. Yeah, you know?

And so it’s like, now the tables have turned. And so it’s like we have to be very mindful and careful as people how fragile we’re all going through something. But we must be aware of who God is placing in our lives to help deliver us from that pit. You know, it’s like Ecclesiastes, right? Ecclesiastes says, I forgot the scripture off the top of my head, but better is two is better than one, right? Because if one falls in the pit, there’s one to pull them out.

Conclusion and Call to Action

Three strands, three or four quarters are not easily broken. And so, like, we need people in our circle in our lives that will help us in the time of need.

Yeah, you know, even the people with the most polished stories, the reality of the gospel is that the Lord uses broken vessels, right? No matter how difficult your past is or how spotless your past is or quote-unquote is spotless, the Lord uses broken vessels. We all have sin; it just happens to be labeled differently for each of us.

I think that’s the encouragement to the person that may find themselves bound and feel like they’re embarrassed or afraid to ask for help because they’ve blown it too bad. It’s like, man, you know, God has taken just a lump of clay—a broken vessel, if you will—and put His light in it, and that’s what makes the difference: the light of Jesus inside of us, not anything we’ve done.

I know that it’s easy to say that on a podcast; I’ve experienced that, and it’s hard to get to that realization, but it’s a lot easier when you’re willing to let people be compassionate, and that would be the challenge, I think, for those that are struggling: it’s like, man, you gotta stop pushing people away, you know?

And I know that it’s easy to get on the other side of it and say, “Well, stop judging them,” but really for the addict—having lived that—it’s like, you know, stop pushing people away that just want to love you. They’re trying to figure out how to love you in the middle of all of this mess and all of this pain. Sometimes I think we make it harder on them because they’re having to tiptoe around all of our stuff, rather than just letting people love us in the middle of our mess, you know?

So that’s a really good point that you brought up, man. And it’s kind of like a pivot a little bit, but what was that for you when you saw that? Like how were you receptive to the person that began to pour into you? What allowed you to open that door?

Well, I posted my testimony video—a couple—a few days ago, and it was on the day I showed up at Teen Challenge. One of the staff members there, he had been in my grandma's yard after that intervention. Nobody would pick up the phone, and I had contemplated ending my life. I had a bunch of meth in my pocket, and I was going to put it all in the needle and done. I had an encounter with the Lord in the yard that night, and people get uncomfortable even when you say that.

I called out to the Lord, and I felt His presence, and I wept. After being on meth for five years, I had never wept before. There was an encounter with Jesus that took place. Now, that didn’t fix it all for me; I still ended up going to TC, but I was 105 pounds. I’ve got track marks on my arm. I showed up at the Teen Challenge center, and talk about being coiled with compassion.

The staff member there looked at me and said, "God has a plan for your life." In a moment, his properly timed words of encouragement cut through all the failure, cut through all the garbage, and I believed it. It was just the timing of it all, and that’s what broke through for me.

It was somebody just not seeing who I was but seeing the potential of the Lord inside of me. Wow, that’s so good. That blew my mind, man. And I, you know, it’s funny. Even today, I remember those words, and every time I start new effort or I try to pursue something new—even though it was just God has a plan for seven words, right? It was just seven words.

Those seven words have literally shifted the trajectory of my life, and that goes back to speaking to: regardless of addiction or not, never discount the impact of a word in due season for a friend.

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