How to take care of ourselves and support our loved one, who is stuggling with alcohol and other drugs (AOD)
This site provides positive solutions-based support for families and friends who suffer because of their loved one’s use of addictive substances and activities.
Think for a moment about volume of music you've listened to in your life so far.
This is my play list of recovery tools. Like my favourite music it is the work of others more talented than me. My intention is to share what works for me and hopefully some of it will work for you and your loved one.
Alternat+ves Support Groups
Our Alternat+ves in-person F and F meetings
Our local Brett Young Carers Hub have kindly provided facilities for us to host our face to face meetings again.
The centre is warm, friendly and their staff offer a range of specialist support for carers.
They have a well equipped conference room so we can bring along our online families with their expertise
from around the world. Zoom call this a "hybrid meeting". This is an exciting challenge
for us to combine our experience pre and during covid and has many potential benefits.
Check this link to see if you can get to the meeting.
Get Directions.
If you would like to attend, please check with us before travelling.
Our email address is: alternatives@gmx.com
Our Alternat+ves F and F online meetings
Online meetings are a great way to get support if you don't have a face to face family and
friends meeting nearby or are unable to attend one because you work during the day.
All meetings are open and free to attend
Joining our meetings
You will usually find that the meeting room opens 15 minutes early so that
we can help you with any technical issues. Our Alterat+ves meetings run on the
the Zoom platform. We aim to encourage the group interaction that we enjoy in our
face to face meetings. So if you are able to, download and install the free Zoom app
and join the meeting on a laptop or desktop PC.
You can join the meeting and just listen in, or by using a headset with a
microphone, you can fully participate as you would in face to face meetings.
You don't have to switch on your web cam but many participants do.
Body language is an important component of communication in peer support, smiles are contagious!
The chat box is a really useful advantage that online meetings have. We use it to share links to modern recovery
websites and resources. Participants can ask questions and support each other throughout the meeting. During the
meeting we share simple presentation slides illustrating such things as the stages of change, positive communication and motivational interviewing.
Short videos may be shared to demonstrate the techniques.
Clicking on the "join by browser" option, without installing the app, will work fine but you lose some extra
features. Many people also join from their cars, using their phones, unfortunately the phone app doesn't offer
the "save chat" function. However chat links can still be opened and bookmarked to be explored after the meeting.
Click on the this link at 6pm (UK) to join our Sunday or Tuesday Alternat+ves Family and Friends online meeting.
(The following welcome speech is read out at the beginning of each meeting).
Safety and well-being
The purpose of this group is to bring about positive change. We will first
prioritise our own safety and well-being, and then the safety of our loved
ones. In these meetings we will learn better ways to support ourselves and
our loved ones.
Don’t believe everything you think
Regardless of what we may think or have been told, we are not
responsible for the choices and behaviour of our loved ones.
Nobody is completely "powerless" over addiction. Everyone can change including us.
When we learn to respond rather than react, our loved ones notice.
Positive communication works
Our loved ones are much more than their current problematic behaviour, so we
avoid disrespectful and stigmatising labels such as “alcoholic”, “druggie”, or
“addict” in our meetings.
Equally "enabler" and "co-dependant" stigmatise family members.
Labels are for jars - not people!
We will learn from, rather than dwell on, the bad things that have happened in
the past, so we avoid “war stories”. You can’t make progress if you are
glued to the rear view mirror.
Changing our behaviour
We don’t wait for our loved ones to reach “rock bottom”. We encourage and
reward non-using behaviour, whilst allowing the natural, negative consequences
of their using to happen sooner rather than later.
Positive change takes time and requires effort. Like any training, the more
meetings you attend and the more you learn and practice between meetings, the
sooner your life will improve, regardless of whether your loved one chooses
recovery or not.
We want this to be a safe place to share our experiences and be listened to
non-judgementally. We will respect confidentiality, unless you indicate
you may harm yourself or others. In this case, for safeguarding,
we will seek professional support.
Thank you for joining us, we hope you find tonight’s meeting supportive and
helpful.
Flyers
If you find our group helpful and would like others to have the opportunity to join please share our
details.
This public group is for people that are comfortable breaking down the stigma associated with SUD.
Here we can network with other families and share how CRAFT and ITC helps in practice.. Alternat+ves Open Group
Our Private Facebook Group
This private group is for people that have attended two or more of our Alternat+ves meetings.
ITC Member Resources, like the all ITC short guide chapter pdfs, are available via this group. Alternat+ves Private Group