Navigating these complexities requires careful planning and professional advice. The emotional toll of living with a heroin addict, for instance, includes dealing with lies, financial strain, and personal safety concerns. All these feelings and experiences can push the spouse to decide to seek a healthier life. It’s vital to recognize when enabling and emotional support transform into harmful codependency. In these cases, seeking heroin rehab in Florida for the addicted spouse might be considered as part of the separation process.

What To Do If You’re Divorcing An Addicted Spouse: Step-By-Step

It is essential to remain calm and empathetic towards your partner and explain why you choose to leave. Express your care and concern for them beyond their addiction and encourage them to seek professional help. It is important to remember that you cannot force your spouse to seek treatment, but you can guide them in the right direction. You can provide treatment options by showing them treatment facilities online or by providing them with brochures.

Embracing Harm Reduction in Opioid Addiction Treatment

Most commonly, recovering addicts can choose between a Partial Hospitalization Program (PHP) or an Intensive Outpatient Program (IOP). Inpatient rehab is beneficial if a detox phase is necessary, as healthcare providers can administer medical care to ensure no dangerous side effects occur during the withdrawal phase. One of the most challenging situations a couple can face is when the addict isn’t ready to change. It’s crucial to remember that addiction is a mental illness, not something your partner engages in for trivial or spiteful reasons. What treatment fits your partner best will depend on their unique situation, so meeting with a physician or specialist is essential to assess and develop a game plan. This section will discuss the most common treatment options available to addicts and their families.

How Does Addiction Affect Different Relationships?

You could decide that discussions are only to occur during therapy sessions or mediated meetings, thus ensuring a structured environment that supports recovery and divorce rates after sobriety reduces potential conflicts. Some may relapse and begin to isolate themselves to hide their addictive behavior. Others become dishonest and claim to use drugs and alcohol to cope with their marital problems. It’s important to seek professional guidance with regard to the strategy you use in moving forward.

• Following a divorce and detachment from an addicted spouse, emotional healing is pivotal to reclaiming one’s life and health.
• Co-parenting after divorce and detachment from an addicted ex-spouse presents unique challenges.
• Here’s a closer look at the impact of divorce on addiction treatment and recovery, along with tips for maintaining your sobriety during this difficult time.
• Seeking sobriety, I’d needed to learn a lot about boundaries, cause, and effect.
• It’s beneficial for you to learn about substance use disorder, including how it affects both your partner as well as yourself.

More in the War on Recovery

• The biggest concern among spouses seeking a divorce from a spouse in early recovery from addiction is the fear of relapse.
• In addition, many who abuse drugs or alcohol may experience sexual dysfunction.
• Starting addiction treatment can be a good sign and aid more amicable separation.
• The announcement follows the department’s recent efforts to promote life-saving opioid drug-treatment medications, such as buprenorphine and methadone.
• The organization did not respond to the offer or to STAT’s multiple requests for comment.
• Those going through the experience will need support and guidance to ensure such a drastic life change doesn’t bring about relapse triggers.
• — Church Initiative, a trusted publisher of Christian content and curriculum, celebrates the 30-year anniversary of its widely used curriculum, DivorceCare.

One of the most destructive aspects of drug and alcohol addiction is its effects on people’s relationships with their loved ones—including children and spouses. Drug and alcohol abuse can widen the cracks already present in relationships, and create additional problems financially, physically, and emotionally. When a loved one is addicted to drugs, it can upend your life and your relationship. When you are married to someone, especially if you have children together, who is in active addiction, you may find yourself looking for the right exit.

So You’re Married to An Addict: Is Divorce Inevitable?

Additionally, each state has different laws about divorce regarding addiction and substance abuse. In addition, you should consult a reputable divorce attorney to ensure you understand your state’s laws and how your partner’s substance abuse will affect your divorce filing. Your lawyer will explain what to expect during and after the process, including details of your divorce settlement, child custody, division of assets, alimony, etc. According to Swedish research, 7.3% of marriages end in divorce due to drug or alcohol addiction.

Social and Psychological Effects

Understanding the link between addiction and divorce is important to determine the next step for couples working to resolve their marital issues. But even if you do work on the relationship during substance abuse treatment, divorce is still a possibility. This can throw a wrench into the recovery works, especially when you consider research indicating that rates of substance abuse are higher among divorced people than they are among married people. It’s important to remember that people can recover from addiction when they are willing to put in the time and effort to get better. If you or your spouse are struggling with addiction and would like to seek treatment before discussing divorce, many options are available to you.

Opioid Abuse Prevention: Knowing When to Take Acti…

One of the most significant issues was that when we came to Florida, I’d been completely uprooted from my support system, and I had a hard time finding a local twelve-step program I liked. I was used to going to five or six meetings a week, and I had sponsees and a sponsor. When I went to meetings in Tampa, they were different, and I didn’t know anybody. I felt like a newcomer again, and I had an ego—I hated feeling like I was new to this. I’d been sober for several years by the time Nikki and I met, and she’d always been very supportive and respectful of it, but in the years leading up to our divorce, I’d all but stopped going to meetings. I’d only go when I went home to San Francisco for a while, and when I did go, I stopped sharing as much.

• While it depends on the drug in question, dependence indicates the presence of withdrawal symptoms and doesn’t automatically mean addiction is present.
• This does not mean that the addicted person should not be held responsible for his or her actions, however.
• First, addiction can impact a person’s ability to work, often resulting in worsened job performance, job loss, and difficulty finding a job.

Mood swings, irritability, decreased motivation, and appearing lethargic or unusually energetic can all be indicators of underlying substance abuse. Four valuable card decks to help clinicians and partners identify and address the impact of recovery on the relationship. Deciding to divorce due to addiction can be a complex and emotionally taxing decision that should be taken seriously.