50: Lee Daly is Passionate Family Advocate and Sees Her Role Now as “Just a Mom, but After Being a Daughter, Wife, and Mother of a Substance Abuser, Her Wisdom Pours Out
“You have to really look within to make sure that a family has what they need to be able to address the crisis.” –Lee Daly
Take that from a passionate family advocate who has a lifetime of wisdom to share for families struggling with addiction. Lee Daly was the daughter of an alcoholic. Meaning to find a solution, she drove to a recovery program only to her disappointment. She went through deep research and begged for help but was rejected by people she trusted due to fear and embarrassment. Although she lost her mom in this tragic story, she managed to turn her story to a better route. As a mom, she is determined not to lose her kids to addiction. Learn how she successfully helped her children and how she can help you too!
Have you ever doubted your gut feeling? Listen in as our guest explains why you should never question your judgment as a parent or a family member. “Crisis is a crisis.” See what outliers can help you address the crisis your family is into. Situations vary from one family to another so here are some tips in handling hard choices and dealing with your family member with addiction. Get ready for a big catch as a lifetime of wisdom is poured out in today’s podcast!
Highlights:
04:03 50 Years with Substance Abusers
13:29 The Crisis and the Outliers
21:06 Handling the Hard Choices
26:14 Be Aware of Your Gut Feelings
29:55 Helicopter Parents
31:29 Enabling vs Your Gut Feel
40:04 Teach Me!
45:51 Be Transparent
51:10 Call This Mom
Are you afraid or embarrassed or doubtful about your situation? Call this mom! Tune in to another episode of inspiring conversation with @TFRSolution and guest Lee Daly in #i’mamom #timemoney&effort #gutfeel #nuanceawareness #transparency… Share on X
Connect With Lee
Email: lee@leedaly.com
Telephone: (818) 263-7400
Quotes:
03:23 “…there’s never enough information out there.” -Lee Daly
15:45 “you have to really look within to make sure that a family has what they need to be able to address the crisis.” -Lee Daly
18:05 “That’s the problem. If life comes up in the hands of so many limitations. And I’m not even sure we’re able to successfully get past those limitations, I don’t think we can. But I think we can try to make it easier.” -Lee Daly
25:20 “I think that’s very dangerous, because people do succumb to what others are minimizing.” -Lee Daly
26:14 “Don’t listen to anybody else but your gut instinct. Never.” -Lee Daly
27:43 “Science plays a huge role, but it doesn’t play the entire role.” -Lee Daly
33:55 “I like to say that we are all in this together. This is not just for the addict to solve; this is for the family to solve. And it’s very critical that we change our own behavior.” -Lee Daly
37:02 “So oftentimes, what I’ve seen is when something happens that’s different, someone can take it personal. And when they take it personal, then they really minimize their own ability to kind of step back and just be curious.” –Jeff Jones
45:51 “I know that everybody looks perfect on the outside, but we’re not, we’re not.” -Lee Daly
50:47 “Science plays an enormous role; but so just common sense.” -Lee Daly
53:06 “There’s strength in numbers, we can’t do this by ourselves.” -Lee Daly
54:10 “It can’t all be doom and gloom. Humor gets us through a lot. If you can also get to the point of where you can laugh with the person who’s struggling with the mental health issues or the substance abuse you’ve entered into a new territory, and it’s a much more positive one.”
Got ideas? Perhaps a future podcast? Schedule time with Jeff here: https://meetme.so/jeffjones
Transcriptions
JEFF: So welcome everyone this is Jeff Jones with a podcast Families and Navigating Addiction and Recovery. And today my guest is Lee Daly and I’m so excited to have this conversation. And one of the reasons why is that Lee brings a lifetime of understanding addiction in the family. So what she just told me is she’s the daughter, the wife, and the mother of a substance abuser. And Lee brings with her 20 some years of family advocacy. I think that’s like working in a hospital or something. She’ll tell us more about this. But what Lee is going to be talking about is what she has lived and what she has seen and how she has connected dots specifically on some of the challenges that family members have in engaging in the process of addiction in the family. And She just told me, you know, essentially it’s time, money, and effort that it really takes. So that’s the commitment for families and I’m very happy to welcome Lee Daley. Welcome Lee.
LEE: Hi Jeff. Thank you so much for having me. I’m really appreciative that you offer this service to other families where they can tune in and listen and learn, –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -because there’s never enough information out there never enough. So it’s always, always good. Everybody gets one takeaway, I think from something when they tune in or, or read. There’s always at least one takeaway somewhere, so.
…there's never enough information out there.” -Lee Daly #FamiliesNavigatingAddiction&RecoveryPodcast #JeffJones Share on XJEFF: Yeah. And sometimes there can be so much information out there that it gets a little overwhelming. And what have they really do? Or like how do they approach this? So what I want to do is like if you could introduce yourself.
LEE: –Sure.
JEFF: And like I did this little overview kind of thing, but –
LEE: –Hmm Mm.
JEFF: If you could let people know a little bit more about who you are.
LEE: Oh, sure. Well, it’s funny, I’m 55 and I’ve lived a life with substance abusers for 50 years and didn’t realize until a couple of weeks ago that I carried with me the label that I’m the daughter of the ex-wife of the wife of and the mother of substance abuse.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: And I think, you know, we joked earlier about, well, when’s my time? Like when like when is somebody going to save me, you know, when can I crumble?
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: But my quote unquote advocacy started when I was about fifteen and realized that my mother, who was a single mom was an alcoholic –
JEFF: –Hmm Mm.
LEE: -and it was mortifying for me to admit that out loud and I had nowhere to turn, but I had heard that Saint John’s in Santa Monica had an alcohol recovery program. And so I got in my little 19 or big, I should say 1966 delta 88 Oldsmobile and drove out there with my learner’s permit –
JEFF: –Oh my God.
LEE: -to find out about their program. And at the time it was the sort of new aversion therapy where you take a pill and you see the patient alcohol and they throw up and you know that’s supposed to cure them.
JEFF: — I see.
LEE: And I sat there and listening to the drug counselor and I thought, oh my gosh, there has got to be a better way. A more effective –
JEFF: At 15 years old your?
LEE: Hmm Mm, yeah, hmm. And so I drove home and started to do some research. And in reflecting upon my mother’s childhood, which she would recount to us the stories, I realized that there was a mental health component to her alcoholism, which eventually turned into prescription medications. But of course, because I lacked the guidance of a parent, I didn’t really understand, you know, let me go onto college and you know, research, this method. My world was really just about immediate problem solving and dealing with crises.
JEFF: –Yeah. Wow.
LEE: And so back then I had approached, she worked for a small office. I had approached her coworkers to ask them if they could help me with this new concept that I had learned about at our local library called an intervention. And –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -nobody wanted to get involved, nobody did. And I was willing to put in the time to research what we had to do. I was willing to take the money that I was earning from my part time job to get this intervention to, you know, pay the interventionists. But I realized that nobody was willing to put in the effort.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: And so that was sort of my first realization that triangle of instances has to happen in order for something to really move forward.
JEFF: Right, right. So when you said no one was willing to put in the effort, –
LEE: –Hmm.
JEFF: -are you referring to specifically people in your family weren’t willing to put in the effort for an intervention for your mom?
LEE: People in my family were not willing to put in the effort, and I was a single only child so –
JEFF: -Yeah.
LEE: -and with a single mom as a parent. And so it was really just the two of us and I, my grandparents were alive at the time, but we don’t have a large family that’s it. I’m the remaining family member with my two children. So there was nobody really to call on, but we were very close with her coworkers and none of them wanted to make the effort because I later found out after she passed away, that they were not only embarrassed, but they had fear in confronting her, –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -which is very much alive today, that people do not want to confront the addict.
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: So she ended up dying a very slow, awful, ugly death, which I could have predicted and it happened 15 years later,
JEFF: –Oh.
LEE: -and no joke. She passed away and two weeks later my daughter needed the first of her three brain surgeries to her brainstem –
JEFF: –Mm.
LEE: -and rather than this was a relatively unknown diagnosis at the time, it actually took them three days to figure it out. It was a vascular tumor the size of a golf ball on her brainstem.
JEFF: –Mm.
LEE: And so there was very little research, very little understanding about –
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: -how it functions and what it does at the time.
JEFF: And so this was happening at the same time this situation was going on with your mom.
LEE: My mom passed away from alcoholism and two weeks later my daughter –
JEFF: –Got it.
LEE: -at the hospital.
JEFF: –Yeah, Oh my Gosh.
LEE: Which is already another story, but here I was in the hospital looking to the experts to tell me what was wrong with my daughter and –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -they didn’t know. So as many say, moms on a mission, I went on a mission to really teach the neurosurgery community what this was all about. And while at the hospital I spent there almost 10 years directly with my daughter. But then more so after she left, I couldn’t sit still. And I started to realize how families in crisis operated in a –
JEFF: –Hmm.
LEE: -hospital setting because you know, there was like a period there for three weeks. I didn’t get to shower. So I really was entrenched in the hospital setting and I could analyze and really understand how families work.
JEFF: -Yeah
LEE: And –
JEFF: –Uh.
LEE: You and I have talked about how a crisis as a crisis, whether it’s, you know, a cocaine crisis and alcohol crisis, you know, a family member being stranded overseas, a death of a family member overseas, –
JEFF: –Right. –
LEE: a, you know, chronic illness – –
JEFF: -Right, crisis is crisis.
LEE: Crisis is crisis. And so what I did at my role of the hospital was to march down to the administration where I could see where families could be helped and patients could be helped. And the hospital administration, while having great intentions was missing the mark because they were not getting any feedback from parents.
JEFF: –Uh Huh.
LEE: So I was lucky they were forming a patient and family centered care committee at the time where they were revamping how they handled patient doctor, nurse care.
JEFF: –Sure.
LEE: And so when you mentioned overload of information at the beginning of this podcast, it reminded me of when they handed me the family patient and family handbook and I took a look at it and I said, we don’t have time to read this. Just give me the nuts and bolts of what I need to know bullet point it for me.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: And so that started my foray into advocating for patients and families and working with the hospital administration to really dial down the information and funnel it down to what’s the most critical component, what do you really need to know?
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: And then I noticed that the kids were not doing anything. They were just sitting staring at their television. And I said, this is crazy you know, these kids need to have hope and they need to have hopes and dreams. And so I helped co-found the art and music program, their healing arts, reaching kids, which is thriving now 20 years later.
JEFF: –Uh Huh. Wow.
LEE: And then went on to help co-found another field which raises money for the hospital. And so now we have kids at the hospital that don’t just sit and stare at the television. They’re out in their community of their hospital world thriving as much as they can thrive. And so my time working with the families was incredible in that I was able to see, again, as you and I have discussed, those families, the crisis on the outliers, –
JEFF: The crisis and the outliers.
LEE: Crisis and the outliers because the majority of crisis, the crisis itself is in that middle part of the bell curve. But how it’s handled, help families handle it –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -and how they can manage it always falls outside of the bell curve because every chase is different.
JEFF: That just sounds right there. That just sounds really important to underline the way that you said that crisis and outliers and I mean one way that I hear that is that, you know, when there’s crisis, there’s, and I think you said this as well, but there’s this automatic tendency to focus myopically on that crisis and that makes sense.
LEE: –Hmm Mm.
JEFF: And it’s like, if that’s all that’s done, then the, the outliers, people around the crisis, –
LEE: –Hmm Mm.
JEFF: -then if they don’t have a way to engage, then they, like you were saying with the kids, they just watch TV or just –
LEE: –Right.
JEFF: -then they need to do whatever they were doing.
LEE: Well, I believe the outlier is the time, the money and the effort, –
JEFF: –Hmm Mm.
LEE: -that because the crisis is the crisis, that’s the big elephant in the room.
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: And if you have the time, money, and the effort then and make the effort or can take the effort, then the success of the crisis of getting through the crisis is far greater. And of course, again, we have the outliers of the outliers. So maybe that particular circumstance, no matter how much you can focus on it and try to fix it, it will never get fixed. So there’s the outliers of the [inaudible] conti, continuum. Then there’s the outliers of those outliers. So –
JEFF: –Sure.
LEE: -since every, every case is different, you have to really look within to make sure that a family has what they need to be able to address the crisis. As a, for instance, –
“you have to really look within to make sure that a family has what they need to be able to address the crisis.” -Lee Daly #FamiliesNavigatingAddiction&RecoveryPodcast #JeffJone Share on XJEFF: –Please.
LEE: -If I knew somebody’s son was on the verge of addiction and they didn’t have insurance money and they had a job that you know was paycheck to paycheck, which is often the case, I mean, –
JEFF: –Yeah, absolutely.
LEE: -you know, so we don’t have who has millions of dollars floating around, not a lot of people. Then the chances of that son getting help is far less. Could I say, here, take this money and go here, take this money. Let me give you this money. Now take off from work and go do this, but this is not acceptable in society. What family is going to take money that I have to go…help there , you know it there’s so –
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: -many different scenarios in this game that you wanna be. You wanna be able to say to your friends, look, don’t worry about your job. Do what you need to go help your child.
JEFF: –Right, right.
LEE: You’re having to choose between your job and your child and –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: Often times the job wins because there’s bills to pay. There’s other mouths to feed.
JEFF: Yeah, oh my gosh. Do you know, just listening to you, Lee, one of the things that I think about is years ago having a cat and like something happened to it, I don’t even remember, but I do remember it was like $1500 or something like that. —
LEE: Right.
JEFF: Like a vet bill and for what we’re talking about, that’s not really that big of a deal. However, it’s like being in a situation, what do I do with this cat too? I let this cat go or do I do my best to try to, you know, help this cat in the way that I know and the way that I knew was take the cat to Yvette. You know, –
LEE: –Exactly, exactly that’s the problem is life comes up and hands so many limitations and –
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: -I’m not even sure we’re able to successfully get pass those limitations. I don’t think we can, but I think we can try to make it easier, now when you talk about the financial, we have to make it easier. We have to, when you talk about the financial constraints there, I had finally taken a deep breath from my daughter’s critical health issues to then have to be pushed into the arena of dealing with now mental health issues with her as –
“That's the problem. If life comes up in the hands of so many limitations. And I'm not even sure we're able to successfully get past those limitations, I don't think we can. But I think we can try to make it easier.” -Lee Daly… Share on XJEFF: –Right.
LEE: a teen.
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: And a massive depression that she fell into and which could have led to substance abuse. We don’t have to go into that, –
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: -but once we got her through that and on a good trajectory, I was then able to say, okay, I’m going to take a really big deep breath and focus on myself because my family is fine.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: Finally after 15 years but low and be appalled. I, no sooner took that deep breath when I had to turn around and like Tom Cruise in mission impossible go in and eject my son from a very dangerous situation —
JEFF: –Mm.
LEE: -and get him help for addiction –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -and only could I do that because my children’s trust that my mother had left them had paid out five days earlier, –
JEFF: –Uh Huh.
LEE: -so I suddenly had the money to be able to help him and get help –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -instantly. Now forget the story about the trust. My mother had left trust money to her best friend to manage and that best friends spent it all down over the course of 20 years. But there was enough in that money to fund my son’s recovery and to fund my daughter’s college.
JEFF: –Oh my Gosh, wow.
LEE: But it landed at a time when we needed the most. Had that not happened. There’s –
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: the time, there’s the money piece right?
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: I could not work at the time we were in the middle of moving, so I was in between positions. So I, I had the time and because I had 20 years of experience with my daughter, and you add on, you know, 20 more 25 more with the experience with my mother, I knew the effort that it would take to get my son through this. So I was lucky.
JEFF: Yeah. Yeah.
LEE: One of the very few lucky ones have time, money and effort.
JEFF: Well, you know, just a minute Lee. Going back to your story about hard choices and my little, you know, story of the cat kind of thing that seems very crocs in this whole thing. And the story that you just told, there was a sequence of events that allowed you and supported you and you had experience and these things happen. And in some ways it seems like you set your life up to be able to manage some of this stuff. But it’s like everyone has different situations, they have different choices, they have diff, things happen at different times and –
LEE: –Hmm, Hmm Mm.
JEFF: -it’s like that’s an important point that I think is often glossed over. And then combine that with the slow, gradual, progressive process of addiction and the back and forth. Like, you know, there’s a crisis and then, you know, the one with addiction is saying, okay, I can handle this. Let me handle this by myself. And the family’s hoping,
LEE: –Hmm, Hmm.
JEFF: -praying, okay. Like, –
LEE: –Hmm Mm.
JEFF: -and this time and then like a couple weeks go by and wow, it looks like they’re getting better. And I feel,
LEE: –Hmm Mm.
JEFF: -and that doesn’t last very long.
LEE: No, no. And it doesn’t. It doesn’t. And that’s why there’s a hyper vigilance state that we live in when you are in crisis. And I have been in crisis for 50 years. I mean, that’s –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -unfortunately how I live my life now. I can’t say that I’m the lucky one because I don’t have to work, so I can take this time. We’re like most, you know, most people it’s paycheck to paycheck and then, oh my God, we have to pay the tax bill, or Oh my God, the car needs fixing, or oh my gosh, you know, the dog that bill was, how are we going to pay that? But I’ve somehow learned through all of and, and believe me, my cholesterol is through the roof and I eat healthy. So I know it’s all cholesterol problems, because –
JEFF: –Hmm.
LEE: -of stress but what I gleaned from all of this is that, a lot of people, when they’re dealing with a crisis, the it’s not that they have different ways of handling it, it’s they don’t want to deal with it. They have fear, –
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: -they have the inability to handle because somebody is taking control away from them.
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: There’s all these factors that are involved. And believe me, I would much rather, you know, like most people have a free flowing, easygoing life. But I’ve learned to problem solve and pay attention to the small nuances that we often miss. And –
JEFF: –Hmm.
LEE: -I don’t think that most people do. I didn’t at –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -one time or another, –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -you know, my, my daughter used to trip all the time and people would say, well, it’s cause she’s wearing new shoes. The say no, come on, you know, does your child trip all the time when they were new shoes, you know, and they think I’m nuts. Like, well, okay, she’s hiccuping. So what, you know, our children –
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: -get hiccups too. It’s like, no, no you know, –
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: -there’s something going on here. And so there’s also a component of, in this issue of peer pressure that people will minimize things that you might see as a parent or family member of, you know, of your child or husband or wife or father or mother or whatever in a crisis. You know, they will make you question your gut, feeling, your innate sense of, you know, what you think might be going on.
JEFF: –Yeah, yeah.
LEE: And, and I think that’s very dangerous because people do succumb to, others are minimizing.
“I think that's very dangerous, because people do succumb to what others are minimizing.” -Lee Daly #FamiliesNavigatingAddiction&RecoveryPodcast #JeffJones Share on XJEFF: So just a minute, let me interrupt you for a minute. [inaudible] And that is a few minutes ago you said something like that you learn to problem solve and pay attention to a lot of nuances that –
LEE: –Hmm Mm.
JEFF: -we miss. And so –
LEE: –Hmm.
JEFF: -one of the questions that I have is like, do you have some tips for other family members as to how they could start to problem solve or start to be aware of nuances that often times or are missed? Or like they have a gut feeling about something, –
LEE: –Hmm, yeah.
JEFF: -but then they’re told, no, that’s not it. That’s not important.
LEE: Yes, yes. Well, first of all, don’t listen to anybody else, but your gut instincts. Never, because I’ve watched children have surgeries that were unnecessary. I’ve watched children die unnecessarily. I have watched parents question their own judgment and then we’ve to regret it. And this was in the hospital setting, you know, –
Lee Daly is Passionate Family Advocate and Sees Her Role Now as “Just a Mom, but After Being a Daughter, Wife, and Mother of a Substance Abuser, Her Wisdom Pours Out Share on XJEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -this was years and hospitals and doctors and –
JEFF: –Oh wow.
LEE: Giving presentations and listening to nurses and you know.
JEFF: So the pattern that I hear you talking about is oftentimes people would listen to the doctors or –
LEE: –Yes.
JEFF: -listen to the hospital policy –
LEE: –Yes.
JEFF: -or like we have a protocol and we always do it like Dah, Dah, Dah, Dah. Kind of thing.
LEE: Yes. And now that I’m in the substance abuse world addiction world, sort of more enough in official capacity. I see the same thing happen.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: And as you had an, I had mentioned earlier, I’m not sure if it was during this podcast, but we talked about how we get caught up in the Mumbo jumbo speak of it. And I was saying that I believe there is a time and place for the science of all of it, –
JEFF: –Hmm Mm.
LEE: -whether it’s terminal illness, chronic illness, addiction science plays a huge role, but it doesn’t play the entire row. And I have watched countless parents question their judgment because doctors who are more educated in –
“Science plays a huge role, but it doesn't play the entire role.” -Lee Daly #FamiliesNavigatingAddiction&RecoveryPodcast #JeffJones Share on XJEFF: –Right.
LEE: -science put down the parent’s belief. But –
JEFF: –Hmm Mm.
LEE: -my role at the hospital was to teach the doctors…to understand and be willing to admit that a parent knows their child better 100% of the time.
JEFF: Yeah. Oh my gosh. That’s just like, oh my God.
LEE: But it takes guts, Jeff. You can’t, –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -you can’t just argue with a neurosurgeon because you think, okay, well I’m a lawyer or you know, I’m an administrator or I, I work at Nordstrom’s. You know, anything, right? I have an online business and you’re speaking to a neurosurgeon –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -and the con, whoa. You know, society says the neurosurgeon should be smarter as a brain surgery than you, you know, than you are.
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: But you know your child, you know the symptoms your child has been having. You know the behavior your child has been having. Listen, I’ve been –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -called out as being crazy and I make demands and if I didn’t do what I had done to buck the system, I’m a system bucker –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -then my daughter would not be alive today if I –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -didn’t go against every mom and dad who said to me, your son has to reach bottoms first.
JEFF: –Oh my God.
LEE: -My son would not be alive today. –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -so the accusation, I understand the helicoptering parent claim or concept and that’s –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: Not what I’m talking about.
JEFF: Right. So can you discriminate between like the helicopter parent kind of thing and the system bucker that you.
LEE: Well you know, listen, I think we’re all helicopter parents. My daughter will tell me every day she walks out. Even today she’s 24 I tell her to bring a sweater okay so. You know, there are points in our life you can’t help being a parent if you are an involved parents and an active parents. There are things that you do that you know, you learn to laugh at in families.
JEFF: –Hmm.
LEE: But I think that when you can tap into your gut and you allow yourself to tap into your gut feeling that you can’t allow others to allow you to second guess that.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: It has to stand strong.
JEFF: So let me ask you a question. I really appreciate what you’re saying, but I’m wondering for someone who’s listening to this, how might they, like what tips might be available to discriminate between like –
LEE: –Okay.
JEFF: -enabling addiction as opposed to listening to your gut? Because we can have habitual impulses to like help, help, help. But if our help is enabling addiction, then that’s not so great. And I know that’s –
LEE: –Correct.
JEFF: -what you’re talking about, but I’m just asking you to kind a take a few more steps in clarifying that.
LEE: Okay. Oh well I can try and I can try by example. For instance, my son and I during his lead up to my doing an intervention and, and sort of rescuing him, cause it was very much a rescue, –
JEFF: –Hmm.
LEE: -a rescue mission. Obviously his behavior was becoming different. We had always been very close. And I understand the dynamics. I know psychology expert, but I pay attention.
JEFF: –Hmm.
LEE: I pay, I pay attention.
JEFF: I know you pay attention just from this conversation.
LEE: Yeah. So when your, you know that kids try to cut the cord and you know that they are sort of distance themselves for their autonomy.
JEFF: Right.
LEE: But if you can pay attention to that and especially if there is addiction in your family. And you know, one of the things we missed was anxiety on my son’s part because we were so focused on my daughter just living that we missed that her crisis caused a lot of anxiety for my son.
JEFF: –Hmm Mm.
LEE: And so, you know, I missed that whole thing. But watching his behavior over time and listening to the nuances, why is he suddenly not communicating to me the way he used –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -to communicate? Why is there a sudden shift? And I will tell you, you know, he’s been sober for a while, but now suddenly the dynamics are all of a sudden Shane shipping. And this morning I said to my daughter: “Huh, very interesting”. She’s not responding to me, but he’s talking to you now.
JEFF: –Hmm.
LEE: -You don’t have to panic about it, but you just raise a little flag –
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: -and say, let me start paying attention to this. Is this something that I need to be concerned about? And in doing so I think you train yourself to understand nuances and dynamics. And of course we all are responsible to, for our part in the eviction, –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: I think it is family addiction. I don’t like to say that it’s an addict. I like to say that we are all in this together.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: This is not just for the addict to solve. This is for the family to solve. And it’s very critical that we change our own behavior when –
“I like to say that we are all in this together. This is not just for the addict to solve; this is for the family to solve. And it's very critical that we change our own behavior.” -Lee Daly #FamiliesNavigatingAddiction&RecoveryPodcast… Share on XJEFF: –And our thinking.
LEE: -and are thinking, well, we can think it, but we might not change the behavior. You know, that’s the thing. It’s like, well, I can think I’m doing a good job, but am I really changing my behavior with the person who’s abusing the substances?
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: I might –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -think I’m changing the behavior, but you need to have an open dialogue with them. Am I changing the behavior?
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: Am I doing what you need to do? You know, how can I help you? What can I not do? So you have to have this open line of communication and so, –
JEFF: So just a minute, Lee, just from listening to you, I mean one of the things I’ve been thinking about is you’re not using the language, but you have what sounds like an incredible ability to be mindfully aware. So there’s like the mindfulness thing. I know you’ve heard that, but it’s, it’s like this is just something that you’ve learned and you know, done over and over. Because when you look at these patterns like, Oh, isn’t that interesting? My son’s not responding to me, but he’s talking to my daughter.
LEE: –Hmm Mm.
JEFF: You know, and that takes an incredible amount of, you know, really ability not to just react to your son’s not –
LEE: –Hmm Mm.
JEFF: -responding to you, but to just kind of stand back and go, hmm. And that curious, well what is he responding to? You know? And so there are some things that you’re doing that I really want to underline are really, really helpful. Really helpful.
LEE: You know, I’ve lived at, Jeff it’s I’m not and I will admit it’s really difficult. Many people over the years have say, how do you do what you do? Can you put a 10 point plan together? And you know, I go, I am so in the sick of the quick sands, okay, I can barely breathe. Uh, no, okay like –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -whatever I’m doing, just take notes. You know, I sit down with pen and paper and I go, I don’t know how I did this, you know, wake me up and tell me what I did.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: But you know, to use my situation with my son as an example, I am thinking, if I think about it hard enough, I have a feeling I know what I may have said or done to have him now suddenly communicates with my daughter and not with me. Which by the way is a very rare occurrence. And I had such an open relationship. We can talk all the time and my daughter complains, how come you guys
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: Talk all the time? And he never –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -talks to me, but –
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: -for him to suddenly be talking to her and not –
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: -talk to me like, wow.
JEFF: And Lee, you’re not taking that personal. So oftentimes what I’ve seen is when something happens that different, someone can take it personal and when they take it personal, then they really minimize their own ability to kind of step back and just be curious like what I –
“So oftentimes, what I've seen is when something happens that's different, someone can take it personal. And when they take it personal, then they really minimize their own ability to kind of step back and just be curious.” –Jeff Jones… Share on XLEE: –Well.
JEFF: -hear you doing.
LEE: Yeah. But you know, when I didn’t get here overnight, I mean this is been practice, practice you know, those 10,000 hours you’re supposed to practice the piano and then you, you know, your fabulous pianist. I practiced dysfunction responding to all of our dysfunction. And so, you know, and um, my husband and the lovely narcissist and he’s happy to blaze that narcissistic, you know, neon signs.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: So I get it from all angles. But when my daughter was in her depressive modes and would not leave her bedroom and you know, was really upset at the fact that she can’t travel, you know she can’t go above 2500 square feet, you know, that’s limiting for her and for our family. And she would scream at me. I would scream back at her, what am I doing wrong? What can I do better? What the hell do you need from me? Because I want to help you, but I’m not, you know, help me help you.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: And it, you know, we would, doors would slam and fights would occur tears. Oh my God the tears. And I would go into my bedroom and I would think what a horrible parent I am. That I have done something so terrible that my you know child won’t leave her room. Now it wasn’t as traumatic as that. But yes, family dynamics do play a role in that.
JEFF: Oh, it’s a huge role.
LEE: It’s a huge role. And so I can’t say I was 100% responsible, but I can say that, you know, we have nature and nurture and it’s a combination. And I –
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: -don’t think it’s 50 50 sometimes I think it’s 80 20 sometimes I think it’s 10 90 you know, –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -it all depends on the situation of what you’re dealing with.
JEFF: Yeah. And like with what you were saying before, the difference between a feeling that I may have or a gut feeling
LEE: –Hmm Mm.
JEFF: -and science,
LEE: –Hmm Mm.
JEFF: You know, and being able to discriminate and to like, what do I do in this situation? In this context –
LEE: –Hmm Mm.
JEFF: -I just don’t pay any attention to this one thing and put it all here or you know, how can I use information of both? Is it even possible to use information of both and come up with another solution or another way of view kind of thing, so.
LEE: You know, I have to tell you the crisis mode and living with people with chronic illness and, and or terminal illness and substance abuse and I sort of always kind of geared towards those three. Although I know it’s not as could be domestic violence as well so there’s a lot under this umbrella. You feel like you’re having darts thrown at you constantly and I don’t understand depression. It is so far off my radar, I don’t get it. You know, and I, okay, I’m gonna admit it. You know, I used to be one of those people that say, oh my God, you grew up in a hospital. You’re not in hospital anymore go out you know, smell the flowers out there.
JEFF: –Hmm Mm.
LEE: I have anxiety, I understand anxiety. I don’t understand or did not understand depression. I didn’t –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -understand it. And so I did what many people do and they say, come on, get out of your room we’re going for a walk. And you know you’re going to the gym you’re doing you know, do something. And so I had to take the time and the effort to really learn about depression –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -and one side then could respond with that compassion on the side of depression –
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: -and to really look at my daughter and have her teach me, please teach me.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: No judgments, just teach me what you’re going through and –
JEFF: –You mean what you’re going through.
LEE: College [inaudible], what you’re going through so I can understand it because I don’t get it.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: And so…I then, first of all, an apology goes a long way and I’m sorry goes a long, long way.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: And my daughter and I, and my son and I have had many discussions about how I have missed things over the years or I misinterpreted things over the years and how this is a learning lesson, you know, for me too.
JEFF: –Right, right.
LEE: And that it’s –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -not just them and it’s not just there. And I don’t like to say problem okay, because that indicates it’s a problem. I like to have a little more help for that. It’s just their struggle to get over. Like some people –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -have awful Eczema, somebody might say: “How can you compare Substance Abuse Eczema”? I’m going to compare it because that Eczema might create such depression for somebody that they then turn into a substance abuser.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: And so we don’t know what the catalyst is for somebody to take their mental health to an extreme you know, –
JEFF: -Right.
LEE: -and so the discussions about what is it that you need, what do you need? What do you need from me? What do you need from society? What is it that you need? And you can’t accept, I don’t know as an answer. Like, okay you don’t know now, but you know we’re gonna get to the bottom of this. You’re not getting mad –
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: -at this until they –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -figure it out.
JEFF: So just a minute, Lee, I could talk and talk and talk and, and we could, you know, I mean, my sense is there’s so much here and when I’m listening to you talk about this, I have my own curiosity, which I’ve expressed some of and I’m like with where we’re at now in this podcast, I’m wondering like are there messages that you wanted to share that I haven’t asked about or you haven’t yet?
LEE: Again, having been in the advocacy world for a long time, I think it is really critical for anybody, for a wife, a mother, a father, a sister, a brother, somebody to not take no for an answer and to find somebody. It is such a stigma in the substance abuse world to talk about and in the mental health world to talk about mental health challenges and to talk about substance abuse. That one of –
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: -my areas of interest is to be able to talk like it’s no big deal.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: But the problem is is we have to hide behind them because we’re embarrassed or we might feel that we might lose our job or we’re going to be judged. And so going along with our gut feeling of if you know that there is a feeling that you have that even if professionals are not agreeing with you, that you owe it to yourself and to that person to investigate it and don’t –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -second guess yourself.
JEFF: It goes back to the time and effort that you –
LEE: [inaudible]
JEFF: -before investigate research, learn more.
LEE: Yes and paying attention to little nuances. And believe me, I’ve missed my share so I, you know, –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -I’ve missed my share and I can see how the domino effect had I done things differently. You know, may have been better but you can’t beat yourself up about it. But to also, to not be embarrassed by –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -any sort of mental health issue or substance abuse issue there. I live in a neighborhood, a new neighborhood, so I had an opportunity to meet new friends and…I know that everybody looks perfect on the outside, but we’re not we’re not. And so –
“I know that everybody looks perfect on the outside, but we're not, we’re not.” -Lee Daly #FamiliesNavigatingAddiction&RecoveryPodcast #JeffJones Share on XJEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -what I have been able to do, and maybe because I’ve been in it for such a long time and I’ve had to share these stories for so long, for me it just rolls off my tongue, but to break the ice with the new neighbors in our walking our dogs or whatever it’s been, I mentioned to them about some of the struggles that our family is having. Not as a, I’m gonna, you know exhaust them with my problems but just to say, you know, we’ve had some challenges in our family and uh, if you –
JEFF: -Right.
LEE: -ever need any help or you ever know of anybody that needs any help, I can maybe help with some resources.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: It’s amazing how that opens up the conversation for people to say thank you. Yes I do have challenges in my family and yes we can use some help and yes, can we talk? And so for those who feel more comfortable about talking about this issue, to perhaps break the ice with people they’re speaking to, to allow those others the space and the comfort that they need to be able to share as well. Because so many people hide behind these doors of embarrassment and fear.
JEFF: Yeah. Well I mean, one of the things that I’m, I’m really getting with what you’re saying is that you’re leading with transparency and –
LEE: –Hmm Mm.
JEFF: -it was something –
LEE: –Yes.
JEFF: -like, you know, the new neighbors saying we’ve had our own problems in our family and –
LEE: –Hmm Mm.
JEFF: -I have resources and if you ever need them, you know, I’m happy to share them. Something –
LEE: –Hmm Mm.
JEFF: -like that. But you’re leading with –
LEE: –Yes
JEFF: -I, –
LEE: –Yes.
JEFF: -You know and transparency and that like opens the door to, you know other people being transparent. I mean you’re leading with –
LEE: -Yeah.
JEFF: -vulnerability, you’re not leading.
LEE: –Yes.
JEFF: Like a real slick image that you’re trying to like get the neighbors to buy into or something.
LEE: –Correct, correct absolutely correct and that’s what I used to do just by default when I would have to give presentations to the hospital board or to, you know, 300 doctors and nurses, you know, I’m just a mom –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -and had a, you know, and I’ve had a career in real estate and other things as well. So it’s not that the, you know, I haven’t been out in the working world, but at the time there was no way to work. And so I took the opportunity to work for patients and parents and to help them.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: But when I would give these presentations, you know, I hadn’t done a presentation in front of anybody, you know, since college and which I by the way did not finish and went back at age 51 to finish and got my BS in public health. So there’s, there’s another transparency right there, okay.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: But I would start these conversations or these talks with, okay, I am so nervous. I actually could faint and I’m glad I have a lot of doctors around me or I might throw up and I know you have little throw up balls here, so let’s see if we can get through this and that would create kind of a laughter in the group. But I was expressing my fears from the word go.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: And –
JEFF: –Yeah, yeah.
LEE: -once I led with my vulnerability, I realized that that opens the door for such incredible conversation with others. And you know, here I am now, you know, leading some of my neighbors to the resources that they need.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: So –
JEFF: –Yeah, yeah.
LEE: -who would have known, you know, who would have thought so.
JEFF: You know, like when we first started talking, actually before I even turned on the recording, you know, one of the things that I remember you saying and I was trying to go, well how do I introduce you? And we’re going well I’m just a mom. I’m just a mom.
LEE: –I’m just a mom.
JEFF: I’m just a mom, and so you know, but you’re like a mom with a lot of experience and history and I’ve seen and witnessed a lot of different things and as you said, have a lot of resources so.
LEE: A lot of resources, yes, a lot of resources. But I think I bring to the table an interesting perspective that shifts a little bit from the typical –
JEFF: –Absolutely.
LEE: -environment, –
JEFF: –Absolutely.
LEE: -because again, like we spoke in our previous conversation and a little bit during this, science plays an enormous role, but so does common sense.
“Science plays an enormous role; but so just common sense.” -Lee Daly #FamiliesNavigatingAddiction&RecoveryPodcast #JeffJones Share on XJEFF: –Yeah, yeah science and common sense.
LEE: Science and –
JEFF: –So.
LEE: -common sense? Yes.
JEFF: So Lee, in bringing this podcast to a close, are there resources that you would like to share other that you haven’t?
LEE: Well, anybody is willing to contact me. I have been struggling in my own right to figure out an avenue to be a resource for people. And I have in the past, I started a five oh one c three for brain research for what my daughter was going through and then –
JEFF: –Uh Huh, wow.
LEE: -stopped and stopped it because my daughter didn’t want to live in that world. She said that was then, this is now stop it let somebody else go find the cure.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: And somebody is very close to doing that now. But I think what I would like to do is to bring conversation about and have those people, who may be fearful of contacting a organization.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: So just say, let me just call this mom.
JEFF: –Yeah, yeah, yeah.
LEE: You know, let me call this mom and talk to this mom because right now that’s all I can offer.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: I can be the sounding board and I can offer the advice and I have a wealth of resources to send people to, but I’m there to help, problem solve. And they’re to be –
JEFF: –Sure.
LEE: -the sounding board for what they’re going through.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: And as I [inaudible] my own why of why I do what I do, it will eventually come out in a more official format and I will keep you posted on that.
JEFF: Great.
LEE: But right now if people are welcome to reach out to me on my email, which I can provide for you, and you can post and my phone number and that you know, I will listen to anybody. And from that listening, it’s amazing what we can do. There’s strength in numbers, we can’t –
JEFF: -Yeah.
LEE: -do this by ourselves. But –
“There's strength in numbers, we can't do this by ourselves.” -Lee Daly #FamiliesNavigatingAddiction&RecoveryPodcast #JeffJones Share on XJEFF: -Right.
LEE: -what I bring something to the table, somebody else brings something to the table, you know? And at some point we have a table of people that can really make a difference. And that’s what I like to do. I’d like to help other families –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -figure out their time, money, and effort, you know, conundrum and, –
JEFF: –Right.
LEE: -and how to erase the stigma from this by being open –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -and being able to say, you know, when I call up my girlfriends in the morning, we have a morning chat a couple of times a week, you have to make light of it. I mean, for God’s sake, I got a crush on my daughter’s neurosurgeon cause he was hot at the time you know what I mean?
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: You have to do something when you’re sitting –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: -In brain tumor conferences, you’re like, okay my neurosurgeon was super cute, you know he was really cute. I make sure to get all made up at four o’clock in the morning when they did their rounds. You know, you do crazy stuff but when I talked to my girlfriend, I go, hi, yes, I’m the mother of a substance abuser. How are you doing today? You know, you can’t all be doom and gloom.
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: You have to humor gets us through a lot.
JEFF: –Yeah, yeah.
LEE: And if you can also get to the point of where you can laugh with the person who’s struggling with the mental health issues or the substance abuse you’ve like entered into a new territory and –
JEFF: –Yeah.
LEE: It’s much, more positive one so.
“It can't all be doom and gloom. Humor gets us through a lot. If you can also get to the point of where you can laugh with the person who's struggling with the mental health issues or the substance abuse you've entered into a new territory, and… Share on XJEFF: So Lee, in following up with you about anyone can contact me.
LEE: –Yes.
JEFF: And this podcast is gonna be –
LEE: –Yes.
JEFF: -various places in the show notes are just going to be on my website. Can you say your email address and phone number?
LEE: Yes, it’s Lee, l e e, @leedaily.com so it’s l e e @ l e e d a l y.com and my phone number is area code (818) 263-7400
JEFF: Wow. Lee, thank you very much. I really appreciate this conversation and we’ll have more I’m sure.