My Dad is Addicted to Prescription Meds. I Don't Know What to do?....

My dad has always had an issue with taking meds for everything that is wrong. He lives a couple hours away and I don't get to see him often but my younger brother sees him every day and has made me aware that he is addicted to prescriptions meds and he doesn't know how to handle it.

My father is on a lot of prescription meds and abusing alcohol with it. He is going to numerous doctors and getting prescriptions. He has started to have problems with slurring his words, drooling on himself and he will be in mid-sentence and forget what he's talking about - and this is while he's at work.

We are extremely concerned and don't know how to approach the situation. We want to get people together to talk to him but are worried he may think we are ganging up on him. He's had a history of being paranoid and we don't want to push him the wrong way.

I've reached out to one of his Dr's who said he'd talk to him but I don't know what what will really do. We are scared and don't know what to do. We aren't a close family and most of the family doesn't get along so that makes it even harder because we are trying to get some of his own children to talk to him and they don't care.

What can we do? I'm not ready to bury my dad and if something doesn't happen soon I'm scared that's what will happen.

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Answer

You need to understand that addiction in someone you love isn't something you can dance around. It requires absolute and even brutal honesty. It might not be stuff your Dad might want to hear and yes it may upset him, but it's the only way you'll ever break through his denial and hopefully get through to him.

Your Dad is clearly in a bad way due to his prescription drug addiction and needs to get professional help urgently. And the best way to do that would be to get him into a proper addiction treatment program like rehab, because in my experience generalists like GP's are not necessarily the best people to be advising on addiction because they don't really understand it.

The problem you face is your Dad actually agreeing to get professional help for his addiction. Most addicts live in such denial that they simply don't recognise the extent of their problem, and so refuse to do anything about it. Or they simply make empty promises about changing that they don't keep. That's why total honesty and saying things your Dad might not particularly want to hear is so important.

You might need to perform an intervention, with the help of an intervention specialist, to try and get your Dad into treatment. It can be a very effective way to get through to someone you love and so get them the help they need. Remember it's not about doing what your Dad may/may not like, it's about doing what works and doing everything you can to get your Dad into treatment. His life could depend on it.

From there it's out of your hands. The rest then is up to your Dad and whether he then comes to his own realisation that he actually needs and wants to turn his life around. But by getting him into rehab you give him the best possible opportunity of doing so.

Best of Luck

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