46: Truth Talks: Barbara Lodge Shares What Every Family Member Wants to Know About Addiction
“Keep loving your kids; love yourself. It’s not easy, but I don’t think you’re failing if you can’t have a moment in a room with your son.” –Barbara Straus Lodge
They say a mother’s love is the purest love on earth. But, can that love prevail when addiction creates a barrier between a mother and her child? Listen to the story of Barbara Straus Lodge.
Barbara is a writer and an activist and her works revolve around addiction and recovery. She is also the Vice President of Above the Noise Foundation, a foundation that funds addiction-stricken communities by hosting music festivals. She also founded TruthTalks™, a workshop that helps families understand what’s going on in the mind and heart of their loved one who has a substance-use disorder. Currently, she is working to pass a bill on selling Nitrous Oxide, a gas that has been used as a recreational drug since the 1700s. Learn why she is so determined to win this fight.
Today’s episode is more than just a heart-warming story of a mother’s love. Behind all the emotions are a real reason for parents to be cautious. If you have seen canisters in your kid’s trash, be alarmed. Know what they are and how they can affect your child. But, what if your child has already been pulled deep into the abyss of addiction? Learn how love and understanding play a major part in rebuilding the trust and ties that has been broken by the addiction barrier. As the words above suggest, parents fail if they stopped trying to reach out to their child. Communication is essential, but in a stress-filled home, it might seem impossible. So here are some tips on how to improve your communication and start reconnecting with each other. As our guest said, ‘It’s all about your kid.’ Save them while you still can.
Highlights:
03:22 Barbara Five Years Ago
06:46 Ask and Listen
10:00 The Writer Within
11:58 An Under the Radar Drug
17:16 Warning Signs!
22:47 Truth Talks
38:38 Breaking the Addiction Barrier
41:26 It’s All About Your Kid
Resources:
Barbara’s TruthTalks™ Workshop
What’s the 411? There’s a re-emerging drug in town! Have you heard about this type of drug that is pretty accessible to all and goes undetected during drug tests? Your kid might be using one! Learn more from today’s podcast with @TFRSolution and… Share on X
Connect With Barbara
Website: https://www.barbarastrauslodge.com/
Email: Barbara@barbarastrauslodge.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/barbara.straus.3/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/bstrauslodge?lang=en
Quotes:
07:43 “I guess my message to parents is, just don’t be naive, like me. I was listening for what I wanted to hear. I wasn’t listening to my son. Because if I had listened to him, I would have heard that he’s struggling.” –Barbara Straus Lodge
10:53 “It’s just my story of being a mom of a kid who’s struggling. And it’s cathartic to me. And I’ve learned that it helps other people to see that they’re not doing this alone, because I think my feelings and fears are pretty universal.” –Barbara Straus Lodge
28:18 “Because when your kid is in active addiction, and you’re a parent, there’s no way you can have a real conversation because the room is just full of stress. As a parent, I think it’s our responsibility to try to understand what’s going on inside their heads.” –Barbara Straus Lodge
29:53 “But even when I understand what’s going on, I still have the obligation to figure out how to communicate with him. But what it does, is it open my heart.” –Barbara Straus Lodge
37:48 “I really see that as the future of what can happen and how we as a country can start to change this statistics, with addiction by putting family members in a stronger position, a stronger role with a solution.” –Jeff Jones
38:17 “It sounds so naive, but it just comes down to love. Because these kids feel unloved, and the parents feel unloved. But underneath, there’s so much love slowing to be expressed, because we’re so fearful and mad and betrayed and blaming and all of this stuff.” –Barbara Straus Lodge
38:49 “We all know that addiction loves the darkness. Addiction thrives in isolation. It grows when it’s not talked about.” –Jeff Jones
41:27 “It just comes down to the kid. They’re our kids, and they deserve our best parenting. And I think that starts with listening and learning who they are, not who we want them to be…we just want them to live happy and we want them to live.” –Barbara Straus Lodge
42:17 “Keep loving your kids; love yourself. It’s not easy, but I don’t think you’re failing if you can’t have a moment in a room with your son.” –Barbara Straus Lodge
Got ideas? Perhaps a future podcast? Schedule time with Jeff here: https://meetme.so/jeffjones
Transcriptions
This episode of Families Navigating Addiction and Recovery is sponsored by The Family Recovery Solution where we recognize that families are the biggest stakeholder in this addiction crisis. And we see that families can be a stronger part of the solution in their own family, in their communities, and in our world. We know that addiction in the family is not the fault of the family. We know that family engagement increases the potential of change happening sooner and positive outcomes lasting longer, as well as navigating healing connections in the family now and well into the future. So we’ve created an online platform for families to safely navigate this journey at their pace. Check out www.thefamilyrecoverysolution.com
JEFF: So welcome everyone, this is Jeff Jones. And I am here today with a guest I am just getting to know and hopefully in this conversation, well, I know in this conversation I will get to know her better, Barbara Lodge or her website actually is Barbarastrauslodge.com. But I had just met her, oh like on the phone a while ago and then today face to face, online face to face and wow, let me tell you this woman, the way I see her, she’s activist, a writer. A writer specifically around and an activist specifically around recovery and from the family’s standpoint. And she has, I think a son or a daughter who is had a background with substance use disorder. And she’s done some very interesting things, like – that I want her to talk about. One, she’s written numerous, numerous places and different articles. She’s an incredible writer. She is the co-founder of Voices. I’ll have her talk more about that because I’m actually forgetting the name. But then also she started this thing called TruthTalks, which really caught my attention. And she’s in LA and she was doing this TruthTalks thing for a while that I would like to hear more about. And so welcome Barbara.
BARBARA: Thank you.
JEFF: And yeah, if you could, and I know my rambling intro was partial, but if you could kind of fill in the gaps or modify what I said, that’d be wonderful.
BARBARA: I think you’ve got it pretty fairly well straight. I’m a writer and what we called Voices is called Above the Noise Foundation and that’s where we put together sober music festivals. We had our first one last September in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, and we had Macklemore as our headliner. And the wonderful thing about this music festival is that the money that we make through donations goes directly out into the communities, hardest hit by addiction and to –
JEFF: Wow.
BARBARA: – crack roots organizations to fund their work. So it was really an incredible experience and it’s called Above the Noise Foundation. We’re looking forward to making another sober music festival happen in 2020 possibly –
JEFF: Oh!!
BARBARA: – so that was great. And then TruthTalks is my baby. And now I’m just working tirelessly for this senator to pass a Bill in California.
JEFF: Oh, right. The Bill about nitrous oxide being sold legally and the Bill is about making it illegal. Is that?
BARBARA: Exactly. So illegally sold in smoke shops here in California.
JEFF: Yeah. Yeah – yeah. So is there more that you want to say about yourself so people have a little bit more info about you or, which one of these topics do we jump into?
BARBARA: Well, I think the most important thing to me is that I’m a mom of a young adult who suffers from substance use disorder, otherwise known as addiction, however people want to describe it these days.
JEFF: Right.
BARBARA: To me, sudden change has really prompted – it changed my whole life because it was about five years ago when I discovered that he had a serious problem. And once I got over my shock, because I was really had my head in the sand, I started trying to get involved in ways that I could understand him better and understand what was going on with him.
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: That’s really prompted my whole last five years of activity and investigation and, you know, searching.
JEFF: Yeah. Yeah – yeah. So that I want to ask just specifically about that kind of, because it’s so common for family members, parents specifically not to really have any idea.
BARBARA: Right.
JEFF: And then when they find out, and so the question that I have is, is there anything that you’re aware of looking back on this that could be helpful for families who are in the early stages of this to really take seriously what they’re seeing? And to what I heard that I thought was really beautiful Barbara, was this changed your life. You made a change yourself, which I think it’s so important for family members to do and it’s so difficult for them to understand, but you did that. And so looking back, is there anything, one or two things that stand out that can be helpful for families to help make that change?
BARBARA: Well, I think when we have addiction in our family, his father and his father’s side of the family, so tried to raise both my kids with a hyper awareness, this gene and to just be careful. We talked about openly about drugs and alcohol, it was just really like a dinner table situation. And so I was absolutely certain that both my kids were being absolutely honest and they weren’t interested in drugs and alcohol. So by the time I got the information from my son that he was in trouble, was in college. It was his second year of college and he had developed a severe addiction to Adderall, which he got from his roommate. And then that’s just snowballed into severe addictions to a lot of other things too. So I guess my message to parents is just don’t be naive like me. And I was listening for what I wanted to hear, I wasn’t listening to my son because if I had listened to him I would have heard that he’s struggling and school is really hard and, you know, he’s having problems with girls and friends, but I was so invested in them not having the addiction gene or something that I just really wasn’t there.
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: And so then it all came crashing down and then I just, after about a year of kind of being in disbelief, then I started really wanting to understand what happened, like who he is and the –
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: – the driving force.
JEFF: Yeah. Yeah – yeah. Wow. Thank you for that. I really appreciate that right away. Right up front in this conversation that pretty significant message to parents, you know, to really listen to what’s being told to them as opposed to listening to what they would like to hear -.
BARBARA: Right.
JEFF: – kind of thing. Wow. Thank you. Thank you.
BARBARA: And since then I’ve learned, I’m not very good at it yet, but I’ve learned there are ways to communicate with your kids. Like these open ended questions or motivational interview in ways instead –
JEFF: Right.
BARBARA: – of saying, you know, like: “Did you have a good day?” “Yeah.” I mean that works, but that’s [inaudible] hear, but I guess there are ways to talk to your kid or partner or whomever, just, you know, tell me something about your day or just keep it open, which –
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: – I never did. And which is what I’m trying to implement now because it’s hard. It’s hard to know what’s going on in other people’s minds and hearts and if you can keep it open then sometimes they tell you.
JEFF: Right. Wow. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And then so a number of different topics that I want to go into. One, can you talk a little bit more about your writing. I mean, you just have a lot of different stuff out there.
BARBARA: Yeah, I think my writing – I’ve always been a writer. I’m a lawyer and then I’ve been a writer in my adult years and once everything happened with my son, it was my way of sorta metabolizing what was going on. I was just really trying to get my head around this idea that not only does he have addiction issues, but they’re severe and they’re going to alter the course of his life. And so I just started writing from my heart and with his permission I would send out certain essays to different places. I’m particularly proud of one in the rumpus, which is a good, well respected online venue. And also I’ve been in the LA Times and New York Times and a lot of different places. Because it’s just my story of being a mom of a kid who’s struggling. And it’s Cathartic to me and I’ve learned that it helps other people to see that they’re not doing this alone, cause I think my feelings and fears are pretty universal.
JEFF: Yeah. Yeah – yeah. Right. I’m sure you’re right. You’re not alone by any means and you know this. And so you’re writing about this is really, really helpful for other people, other families, to know that they’re not alone too. So in my mind, that’s a big contribution that you had made to the addiction recovery space and yeah. Is there more that you want to say about the writing piece of it and what that is for you? Because I was about ready to jump to another one of your contributions here and the bill that you mentioned.
BARBARA: Yes. That’s something I never imagined in a million years I’d be involved in. But it happened because it turns out that in rehab, something that these kids do is they huff nitrous oxide. And the reason why they do this is because it’s undetectable on drug tests. So they have this secret life in rehab of getting high or, not necessarily rehab, sometimes rehab more often sober livings where they have a little more freedom where they –
JEFF: Right.
BARBARA: – live in a house. And I learned that this gas is being sold freely in smoke and tobacco shops all across California. And this particular gas was a drug of choice for my son and it latched onto him and he got severely addicted to this drug, to the point of brain damage and an inability to function normally in his daily life. And currently just for the record, currently he’s sober six months and doing a lot of work with brain people and he’s really back to normal and the smart, –
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: – sensitive young man that he is. But it was quite a scare because this drug is completely under the radar and it kills brain cells. It’s the pleasure that people perceive when they’re on it, is there brain cells starving for oxygen because the gas gets sucked into their lungs and stops oxygen from going to their brain. So once he was sober and I started talking about this and he was honest with me, I was astonished and infuriated that this is sold so freely.
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: Elicit use. Now this nitrous oxide can be used in cars to make engines go faster. It’s used in dentist’s office mixed with 70% oxygen to sedate dental patients before they have to surgery. And it’s also used like in Starbucks to fluff the lattes. So there are legal uses of this –
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: – But illegal use of this that’s been going on for decades, is you take the pure gas in these little canisters and you crack them open with a cracker and you suck them into your lungs and you get high. Lots of people do it in the car. There have been a lot of report, news reports on car accidents in and around Los Angeles for people pass out while they’re driving and hit another car or another human walking down the street. So when I learned that this is where he was getting this drug, I got mad and then I did my field research and I went into these smoke shops, any random smoke shops, there’s like 400 in Los Angeles –
JEFF: Wow.
BARBARA: – and I see stuff being sold, everything you need to get high on nitric oxide. And it shouldn’t be happening.
JEFF: Right.
BARBARA: So I wrote to our senator, he was – I’m not a constituent, I don’t know anything about legislation, but I just put a Google search in there somewhere and it turned out a senator, Jim Nielsen was working on a bill that makes the sale and nitrous oxide in smoking tobacco shops illegal. It adds a crime to the California penal code.
JEFF: Aha.
BARBARA: Since I was a lawyer and I understand that, I made contact with him. So I’ve been working with him to try and get this bill passed. And the effect of that would be that this product is not sold in smoke shops anymore.
JEFF: Right.
BARBARA: So while it’s sold on Amazon and an other like, you know, culinary stores, it’s just the easiest to walk in off the street and buy this stuff and get high. The kids are going to have to make more of an effort –
JEFF: Right.
BARBARA: – if this bill passed.
JEFF: So where in the process is this? Is it passed yet or?
BARBARA: [inaudible] passed. It just last week passed the senate. And it was a hard fight because there were fiscal concerns about implementing it, but it passed the Senate and now it’s heading towards the assembly and if it passes the assembly then it gets on the governor’s desk for signature and then it becomes a law and may hopefully by the end of summer.
JEFF: Yeah. And so would California be the first state like this?
BARBARA: There is one other state, Michigan that has nitrous oxide sales illegal. There’s a lot of talk online, in the UK it’s illegal, in Australia it’s illegal, different countries has abandoned – Vietnam is starting to catch up. But in the United States it’s really under the radar. And there’s a lot, there’s argument against this kind of regulation because people don’t like government regulation.
JEFF: Right.
BARBARA: But my position is, it’s a matter of public health and safety. And especially this is where my son got his drugs. So underneath it all, I’m a mom on a mission. I don’t want to be able to go into these small shops and get the drug, but it just, it kind of blew up from there and I started learning a lot. And so.
JEFF: Yeah. Yeah. Wow. And then the other question that I have about this is like, can you talk a little bit about what you know as far as warning signs, like other family members, what might they notice as far as, you know, warning signs that could clue them off that this type of product is being abused by a family member?
BARBARA: You know, the only warning signs that I saw over the years where these little tiny canisters, these little metal, probably three inch oblong canisters look kind of like fat bullet casings just laying around my house.
JEFF: Aha.
BARBARA: Not really and I didn’t know what they were. And so because this drug, it’s really tricky. It’s, you know, they don’t – it’s an isolation drug or what do they call it? A dissociative drugs. So they do it by themselves in their room or in their car. It just makes your brain just fizzled in this euphoric state, which like I said is actually brain cells suffocating.
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: The high lasts about 40 seconds.
JEFF: 40 seconds?
BARBARA: Yes. And that’s why you see, you know, if you look it up online, kids like holding this cracker, it’s like it becomes their just comfort item. It’s just completely, it’s a constant intake of this stuff. My son was doing up to 300 canisters a day and I found them in his car.
JEFF: 300 canisters a day?
BARBARA: Yeah. People are laughing and saying like part of the comments on one of my op eds, people are just saying it’s not addictive. You’re wrong. You’re making this up. But it is. It may be – it’s not physiologically addictive, but it’s definitely psychologically addictive
JEFF: And it kills brain cells. Like there’s a lot of addiction where the brain cells can regenerate like with neuroplasticity and all that kind of stuff, but this is one where that’s not the case.
BARBARA: Well, and also the interesting scary thing about this also is it somehow depletes your vitamin B 12, which somehow causes your nerve endings to stop firing and so people end up paralyzed, unable to walk. And I met in throughout this process up in Sacramento, I met a young man who had been in a wheelchair for a year because he did a lot of whip-its and he became unable to use his legs. And I’ve read stories of other people online losing their ability to write or eat because it – when oxygen, I don’t know, I’m not a doctor, but something about killing –
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: – [inaudible] without, when oxygen doesn’t get there and B12’s being depleted. And it’s really devastating lives, but not in a number enough to catch attention, –
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: – you know, the public or the news or whatever. But when you start looking, you start meeting people. And I have a friend of mine now who’s brother about 30 years ago died in his bedroom from inhaling whip-its and she found whip-it canisters around. There are stories in the news, if one takes the time to look it up, but they’re kind of hidden.
JEFF: Wow. And so this is really frontline stuff you’re doing because there’s many States where this is available and you can buy it online
BARBARA: People, yeah. You can buy it online at Amazon. It’s just everywhere. And people argue because it has a legal use, which is the fluffing whipped cream.
JEFF: Right.
BARBARA: Making car engines go faster, but it’s never been intended to be inhaled in its purest form.
JEFF: Right.
BARBARA: You get razor burns like in your esophagus because it’s frozen or something, down in your lungs and your hands get burned and you’re sucking it in. It’s a really outrageous, deadly drug.
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: Completely undetectable.
JEFF: Wow. Well, thank you very much for talking about that shining light on that. I’m, you know, my guess is many of the people listening to this may know nothing at all.
BARBARA: Yeah.
JEFF: About this.
BARBARA: There’s of the canisters and the paraphernalia because it’s just, I’m sure – you know, when I put something up online on certain Facebook groups with pictures, there’ll be mom’s coming back and saying: “Oh my god, I saw those in my kid’s trashcan. I didn’t know what they were.”
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: You know, a lot of people don’t get addicted to this, don’t take, have such a drastic effect, you know, on their bodies and minds, but a lot do.
JEFF: Yeah. Yeah -yeah.
BARBARA: That’s why Senator Nielsen is working towards this bill.
JEFF: Yeah. Well, thank you for the work that you’re doing and connecting the dots and sharing this with, you know, people listening to this podcast. But, you know, sharing this with the world, because I assume, you know, a number of the things that you’ve written about, you’ve written about this as well.
BARBARA: Yeah.
JEFF: Yeah. Well, thank you. And so the other thing that I’m really curious that you’ve done that you’ve talked a little bit with me about is this program that you started called TruthTalks.
BARBARA: Yeah.
JEFF: And so can you talk a little bit more about like what that program is and how it came to be?
BARBARA: Okay. Yes, thank you. Sort of labor of love. So when my son was in his early recovery, we’ve been through a couple of cycles, but in his first cycle of early recovery, we had a sober coach that was spending time with him at my house. And so, my son and I did not have a way to communicate. It was really tense. When I look at him, I would see, like not him. I just like smell him or what are you doing? You smell like weed or your eyes, you know, your eyes dilated. And I just didn’t have – he was objectified to the point where our relationship was gone and I was very scared that I would lose him.
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: And we had this sober companion in the house. I get up early, the sober companion Connor got up early, so we’d talk in the kitchen every morning with coffee and he would explain to me what it’s like to be a drug addict. And he’d explained to me what’s in Garrett’s head. And generally I learned things, for example, like I shouldn’t take things personally. Like if my son’s, you know, rude or whatever, it’s not, it’s not really directed at me, it’s because he feels like crap about himself.
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: And I heard about the deep, deep well of shame and self loathing that accompanies a person that’s addicted and the lying and the stealing and all of the things that every family experiences. I learn it’s typical. It’s a symptom.
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: And Connor, who was in recovery for like three years, was explaining to me how horrible my son feels on the inside and how he feels so alone and isolated and full of shame. It opened up a part of compassion in me. So whereas instead of fear and anger when I’m looking at this kid, like he’s a stranger, a soft as my son, this soft part inside, I’m like: “Wow, is that really what’s going on? Cause I had no idea.”
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: You know, no doubt he has significant learning disabilities and that underlay a lot of his addiction. He felt like he needed Adderall and Ritalin and all that stuff in college even though he didn’t have ADD. He felt like he needed it because the learning disabilities gotten in the way of him producing in college. And so they’re just became so much more underlying the surface and that came to light by my talking to this kid in recovery.
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: [inaudible] you never know. You know, because you go to Al Anon and you talk to parents and they’re all freaked out and still you don’t learn about your kid. And so David Sheff is a man that I respect and admire so much. And I’ve had the privilege of meeting him a couple times and he – I want to be him because, well, not really, but he’s like my hero because he really sets the stage for listening to your kid. Listening to your kid and underlying addiction is stress. So you need to ask these open ended questions that we’re talking about, like when they’re young, you know? Because school is so stressful and so anyway, I digress, but so talking to Connor kind of rocked my world.
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: And so that idea of like, wow, you know, maybe talking to other kids in recovery could teach me more about my son. So I started reaching out to like people that were working in the sober living that he was in or other people and I was learning so much. I had this idea that perhaps parents of kids in active addiction could benefit from speaking to kids in Solid Recovery. Just going straight to the source.
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: You know, like, not in – it’s structured, but it’s not like Al Anon or an open AA meeting where you don’t get to converse in dialogue. So I started running these workshops with parents and I had a slew of kids in recovery who wanted to do it because they looked at it as a service.
JEFF: Right.
BARBARA: A service to parents who are struggling. They’re telling of their experiences. For example, one kid told us how it felt when his parents locked the door and threw him out. And he said he was scared and isolated and alone. And you know, whereas they were hoping for him to hit bottom but they just made him worse because he was just so rejected by his family.
JEFF: Right.
BARBARA: I mean every case is different, but it’s of course very telling to hear from the horse’s mouth exactly what they’re going through and what we did at TruthTalks is we tried to match parents. Let’s say my kid was struggling with speed, amphetamines, you know.
JEFF: Right.
BARBARA: I tried to match a parent whose kid was struggling with those things, with kids in recovery from those things.
JEFF: Yeah. Yeah. Oh my gosh, Barbara!
BARBARA: That was really good. It was fantastic. And like a kid who was sober from opiates would tell the parent what it’s like, like social anxiety. What it’s like to walk in a room and be so afraid that you just have to take your drugs to survive. And I watched parents faces change. I watched them like: “Oh my god! So that’s what’s going on with our kid.” Because when your kid is an active addiction and your parents, there’s no way, for me and the people I know, there’s no way you can have a real conversation because the room is just full of stress.
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: And even though we didn’t scream at each other, it was just more of like an anxiety provoking avoidance thing that we had. So as a parent, I think it’s our responsibility to try to understand what’s going on inside their heads. And you learn that, the only way in five years, which probably isn’t a long time, but the only way that I’ve learned that is by talking to kids in recovery. Nobody can tell me about it. They have to tell me from their own selves.
JEFF: Right.
BARBARA: And it has helped. Granted my relationship with my son is good right now. It’s been rocky, but even when I understand what’s going on, I still have the obligation to figure out how to communicate with him. But what it does is, it open my heart.
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: It made softer inside to say: “Wow, this is my son and he’s suffering.”
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: Instead of all the anger that you hear about or kids slamming doors or punching holes in walls. My kid never did that, but that sure shuts down the communication between the parent and kid. But then if you have a TruthTalks kid saying, I punched the wall because, you know, something, I don’t know, I was scared or –
JEFF: Yeah. Yeah.
BARBARA: – you didn’t or just whatever. It just.
JEFF: Well, I mean, so I want to respond to what you’re saying other than, oh my god, this is brilliant. I mean, one of the things I’m learning about you Barbara, is when you learned something that’s really important, you want to share it with others. And you do that with your writing. You do that with this bill and you do that with this TruthTalks. So that’s one thing that I’m seeing and I’m going, wow, I’m getting to know Barbara Lodge a little bit better.
BARBARA: You do. I didn’t put it together either.
JEFF: Well, and the other thing, like with this TruthTalks thing, specifically the brilliance that I see of, you know, pairing a child or teen in recovery from the exact same substance a family where they have a loved one who’s in that are going through that or some stage of that. Because one of the things that happen so much is that we take things personally and how can we not? And you know, one of the things that I try to do in the work that I’m doing is to show that there’s impersonal patterns that are also contributing here. And it isn’t just a 100% persona,l easy for me to say that, but when you’re in the moment with this stuff, it’s awfully damn personal. And you know what you’re doing there, I just see as a brilliant way to bring people with information together with people who really need the information and the parents are more likely to do what you said earlier, really listen. Really – like what you see David Sheff as being really excellent at is really listening. It’s like that really listening can happen in that context and ideally they can learn ways to empathize and really listen with their own child. So, oh my gosh!
BARBARA: Like diffuses it. You know, you get the information outside from the kid that’s sincere, that’s done the work that wants you to understand because this is their way of paying amends to their parents. And so they –
JEFF: Right.
BARBARA: – most kids anyway, and so they really try to engage with you and answer – because it was set up that parents got to ask questions and there were themes. So let’s say enabling. So parents would ask these kids: “You know, when I bought you that car, you know, did it make you not want to use?” And the kids like: “Are you kidding me now? You make me, you know, want to work you more or whatever.” So it’s just an honest conversation about experiences.
JEFF: Yeah. Yeah. Oh, and the other thing that I really, really like here, I could probably go on for a while, but the other thing that I really, really like is, you know, you’re setting up this perfect opportunity for the team in recovery to share their story, to be open and honest about what went and we all know like, you know, sense. What was that movie? The Anonymous People, you know, that I, in my mind started this kind of snowball of more and more people being out there telling their story. That’s a huge part of one’s recovery and building of us team and accepting and acknowledging what happened, and so you’re doing that in this context. The other thing that I am connecting dots in my own mind with what I’m trying to do with families and create a space where family members can tell their story to other family members who –
BARBARA: Yeah.
JEFF: – who may be a step or two behind them.
BARBARA: That’s another version of what I wanted to implement. That was my, one of my dreams is that siblings of kids in recovery could talk to siblings of kids in active addiction. It’s just a way to develop.
JEFF: Yeah. Yeah. It’s like, so in this podcast, I just interviewed someone a while ago and her podcast came out Wednesday. And so she has this program for teens who are from like 13 to 18 which is the gap, like the Betty Ford’s Children’s program is like seven to 12, so this is the gap between 13 to 18. And so she has this program for kids, siblings who are not in addiction, but they grew up and they’re growing up in families with addiction. So it’s like there’s a lot of really positive things happening, but, you know, but then the question comes, so I see these things as positive things. You see these things as positive things, but then it’s like, do other people see these things as positive things? And it’s like earlier when we were talking and you were telling me about TruthTalks and you are saying that that happens less and less or there’s less people kind of coming to you and knocking on your door and saying: “Barbara, what you’re doing is brilliant. I really want to be a part of your group.” And that’s not happening I think.
BARBARA: Right. It fizzled. It fizzled out, whereas I had a pool of kids in recovery that wanted to participate. And I always had these workshops with a facilitator who had experience with groups because –
JEFF: Right.
BARBARA: – because we had like three parents and three kids and it was just sort of like a dialogue. So that side was set up and it was doing well but parents lost, like we did this series, there were four of them.
JEFF: Right.
BARBARA: Each one had a different theme, like enabling, lying, you know, things like that and a bottom. And then the parents is – I couldn’t find any more parents to come because I’m not sure why, I’m sort of – it probably has a lot to do with my lack of knowing how to market this. And we were even offering them for free, so it’s not – it was, at first just to get it rolling.
JEFF: Right.
BARBARA: I just think it may have been too close to the bone. Like, I’m wondering if parents of kids in active addiction may not be ready to talk.
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: [inaudible] I don’t know.
JEFF: Yeah. Well, so Barbara, here I am, you know, doing my planting seeds things with enthusiasm and stuff like that. And so I’m just thinking off the top of my head, what about the idea of doing these groups online?
BARBARA: That’s an idea.
JEFF: You know, and doing these –
BARBARA: That was my first online experience.
JEFF: Yeah. And to where people can participate and they can, like regulate how much of themselves they reveal when to where they have responsibility and control over their own confidentiality. Like trust building, when they decide to reveal more of themself and they can notch that up themself as opposed to, you know, walking into a room and showing their face and kind of go from having everything in the dark and isolated to boom in the spotlight. But, I mean, what you’re talking about there and kind of, you know, some of my ideas that I’m throwing out there, I really see that as the future of what can happen and how we as a country can start to change the statistics with addiction by putting family members in a stronger position, a stronger role with the solution. And that’s what you’re doing with this truth. That’s what I see that you’re doing with these TruthTalks.
BARBARA: It’s just, I mean, this sounds so naive, but it just comes down to love, because these kids feel unloved and their parents feel unloved. But underneath there’s so much love flowing, but –
JEFF: Right.
BARBARA: – knowing how to express it, because we’re so fearful, and mad, and betrayed, blaming and all of this stuff –
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: – [inaudible] through that. And to me, the way to work through it is by talking to someone else who’s been there.
JEFF: Right.
BARBARA: [inaudible] We’ll be doing it with our own kid at first. We have to diffuse and –
JEFF: Whoohhh! And we all know that addiction loves the darkness. Addiction thrives in isolation. You know, it grows and, you know, when it’s not talked about it’s like, and so here I’m throwing out some of my judgments but I really see that, you know, the culture that we live in is in some ways kind of an incubator for addiction to thrive. And, you know, a lot really everything that I see you doing, you are like bringing it out of the darkness, you know? So addiction ideally hopefully doesn’t thrive and empowering and encouraging family members, specifically to take steps towards –
BARBARA: Connection.
JEFF: Yeah, coming out of the darkness and connection. So you talk about the connection piece of it. One of the ways that I talk about addiction is that often times the, like, you’ve heard this I’m sure, the opposite of addiction isn’t sobriety, it’s connection. And so addiction is a slow, gradual process like we know, but this transition of connection from once, like the parent-child kind of connection of love to the child in the context you’re talking about, the child having more and more of a connection to their drug of choice to the addiction and the parent’s feeling that loss of connection, you know, gradually. So, wow. What you’re doing Barbara is brilliant. I love it. I really appreciate –
BARBARA: Thank you.
JEFF: – the work that you’ve done and, you know, in my way, I’m doing some things that are in alignment and that’s probably one reason why I’m so excited.
BARBARA: Yeah. Because TruthTalks has stalled at the moment because the interest is lacking. So hopefully I can reinvigorate it and we can work together.
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: Make something happen.
JEFF: Well, yeah. So after this podcast is over, maybe we can have that conversation about what that might look like because I would love to support you and be a part of that and it’s wonderful.
BARBARA: Yeah, thanks. It just comes down to the kid. They are kids and they deserve our best parenting. And I think that starts with listening and learning who they are, not like I said, who we want them to be.
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: We want our kids to be like, you know, college grad, whatever. It’s not that and we just want them to live happy, we want them to live.
JEFF: Yeah. It starts with listening. And, you know, just yesterday I was doing an intervention and so one of the things I – and it was a son, but he was not a teenager, he was 38. And what you’re saying about listening applies in that context as well.
BARBARA: Yeah.
JEFF: And as we start to wind this up, is there any message that you wanted to share with people that you have not said?
BARBARA: Just keep loving your kids. Love yourself. It’s not easy.
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: Don’t think you’re failing if you can’t have a moment in a room with your son. You’re all like hugging, but it just takes time. Be patient with yourself.
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: That’s my message, because the thing that helps me the most is self compassion and taking these meditation classes here on mindful self compassion because I had to get over blaming myself and all this. What did I do wrong? How did he turn out like this? And it’s not any of that. First you have to say you did the best job that you could Mama, you know?
JEFF: Yeah.
BARBARA: Then you’re able to look at your kid more, just about heart opening.
JEFF: Wow. Barbara, I love that I – and that you made that primary. It’s like that’s the place to start with loving oneself and I love the fact that you talked about the mindfulness as a way to do that, as a strategy to do that, so thank you very much. I appreciate it.