Family Education and Support For Addiction in Washington

Drug and alcohol addictions affect the entire family. Successful recovery is not just about healing the client, but it is also for healing the client’s loved ones. The family bonds can be tested during addiction.

Free by the Sea offers a monthly one-day family program. This family program is focused on helping this vital support unit establish a foundation for a successful recovery not only for the client but for the entire family. Contact us to start your healing process for your family and your relationships.

Important Notice Regarding COVID-19 Restrictions:
We are closely monitoring all developments associated with Coronavirus (COVID-19) and are taking proactive steps to ensure the health and safety of all our patients and employees. This means some of our programming or in-person visitations have been affected. Please call the Admissions Team for more information.

We are serving the Nation, based in the Pacific Northwest.

Addiction Impacts the Entire Family

The goals of our family education and support program are as follows:

• Learn about addiction as a disease model
• Identify family roles in addiction
• Education about addiction
• To avoid stigma
• Understand and prevent enabling behaviors
• Learn to identify codependency
• Move on from denial and shame
• To help proceed with recovery even with fear
• Improve communication and learn to practice healthy conflict resolution
• Establish healthy boundaries
• Maintain healthy roles within the family
• Successfully enforcing rules
• Practice healthy recovery principles
• Bring trust back within the family dynamic

If you live with a loved one who is struggling with addiction, you need support and therapy to help you get your own needs met. You simply cannot help someone else unless you take care of your own needs. We can help you with your needs through our family education and support services.

Our therapy services are a helpful tool for the whole family. Sometimes addiction hurts the family member even more. It is heartbreaking for family members to see their loved ones transform and sabotage their own lives. The good news is, the family can encourage the addict to achieve and maintain their sobriety and enjoy a healthy life.

Feelings of Loved Ones

There are many ups and downs with addiction. The needs of the whole of the family need to be addressed. The loved ones of addicts or alcoholics often have feelings and emotions that need to be addressed, such as:

• The feeling of anger towards the addicted loved one
• The state of being confused and not knowing what needs to be done or how to do it
• The feeling of being frustrated by the addicted family member. Feeling frustrated at the whole situation
• The feeling of being hurt by someone you love and their actions
• The feeling of being helpless and not knowing what to do
• Not having hope for the future
• The erosion of trust within the family unit

Here at Free by the Sea, we can help you with all these feelings and dynamics to make the entire family whole.

Your loved one’s addiction has left you struggling with the following negative effects:

• Addiction affects the whole family in a physical way. An example of a physical manifestation is the strain on the family and the fatigue it brings to the family. There are times when nutrition takes a back seat to the substance being abused, which can manifest into some serious health problems.
• A negative effect is the emotional roller coaster that is associated with addiction for the client and their whole family.
• The social aspect of addiction is another struggle. This struggle would include embarrassing behavior or even secluded behavior.
• The spiritual dynamic of addiction does pull apart the family and hurt the dynamic between the person and the Creator.
• There are mental impacts of being addicted. One mental impact is that using drugs and alcohol does change the chemistry of the brain. There is also a mental impact on the whole family that just wears them down.

A family education program can prove invaluable in helping you realize how you can start healing from the harm that addiction has done to the life of your family.

Our family education and support program will help you recognize that you cannot control the addiction of your loved one. You cannot cure the addiction, and you cannot be blamed for the addiction. Your loved one is, in reality, a victim of a disease. Your loved one cannot help that they are an addict.

Although no cure exists for addiction, professional treatment can help them effectively manage their condition. Professional treatment can also help you realize how you can best provide support for the successful recovery of your loved one.

Family Support for Addiction

After enrolling in our family support and education program, you will learn more information about your own beliefs and the nature of addiction. This program will also teach you how these beliefs have shaped your interactions with your loved one. In turn, this will better equip you to have the coping skills needed to create a lasting and loving relationship with your loved one. These coping skills will help both you and your loved one to be successful in life.

At Free by the Sea, you will learn about addiction from those who have walked the same road you walk now. You will discover that you are never alone. You will also discover that these support and therapy groups will walk that road with you to the eventual recovery of your loved one. You will also learn how to set achievable goals that will help you recover emotionally as you experience the support and fellowship of others who have been in your shoes. It is time to provide for your own needs.

Enabling Stops Here

Helping an addicted family member or loved one is essential for them to become healthy again. The addicted individual needs a healthy and sound foundation of support. Enabling is not a foundation of support. Enabling is detrimental to the healing of the addict. Enabling is also detrimental to your relationship with your loved one. This may have them take advantage of your kindness. Enabling also provides an environment that supports the addiction. The cycle of enabling needs to be broken.

Families that Suffer From Addiction

In 1956 addiction was recognized as a disease. Unfortunately, at least one in ten Americans will suffer from addiction within their lifetime. Some statistics say that this number can be as low as one in seven Americans.

Addiction crosses the barriers of sex, race, age, and socioeconomic status. There is no group that is left out. Genetics may take part in developing a substance abuse disorder. If a parent struggles with addiction their children are more than 5 times likely to suffer with addiction.

There are some things as a family that can be done for your loved one. Here are some ideas to get started:

• Start with educating yourself about addiction
• Pursue help from a psychotherapist or a mental health professional
• Have an intervention with guidance from a mental health professional
• Decide and set boundaries and limits for your loved one

Why Choose Free by the Sea?

Free by the Sea is a beautiful campus. We are located on the Long Beach Peninsula in Ocean Park, WA. Our community of dedicated professionals are committed to providing care to all individuals with dignity and respect.

The client-centered care that we provide is respectful of the individual needs and concerns, which is the foundation of our approach. We adhere to evidence-based practices that are focused on successful outcomes for long term recovery. Services provided include:

• 77 treatment beds.
• Certified Substance Abuse Counselors, including licensed Mental Health Therapists.
• High quality evidence-based addiction treatment, including gambling.
• DBT, CBT, EMDR and trauma informed treatment addresses underlying issues of addiction that include depression, anxiety, self-esteem and relationships.
• Relapse Prevention
• Life Skills building
• Addiction education provided in groups and individual sessions
• Twelve step meetings include celebrate recovery, wellbriety, dual disorder and AA/NA/GA
• We offer residential programs
• We offer partial hospitalization programs
• We offer intensive outpatient levels of care.
• We provide a peaceful and safe setting located on five acres facing the Pacific Ocean.
• Multi-sport areas that include volleyball and basketball courts in addition to an exercise room.
• Nutritionally designed meals to restore health

We offer family counseling over the family program weekend. If you are unable to be present for the family program, but you are still interested in engaging in sessions, kindly reach out to a member of our clinical team to make arrangements.

Don’t Wait, Call Free by the Sea Today

Addiction affects the family as much as the person who is using drugs and alcohol. If your family is affected by drugs or alcohol, then please call Free by the Sea today for more information. At Free by the Sea, our team is ready to help families who are dealing with a loved one who is addicted to alcohol or drugs. We are conveniently located in Washington State. Contact us today. This one call can bring your family back together. It is not too late to mend broken relationships and heal.