Why Parents Must Change First When a Child Is Struggling With Addiction, with Brook McKenzie

Brook McKenzie's personal story of addiction and recovery Brook McKenzie's journey into addiction began around age 13 or 14. By 15 he needed treatment, and he went through three adolescent treatment programs between 15 and 17. His brother took a very different path — college, career, marriage — while Brook's life looked nothing like that through his adolescent years and well beyond. He did not get into long-term recovery until he was in his 30s. Reflecting on that time, Brook says the suffering his family experienced may have been greater than his own. 'The terror, the confusion, the guilt, all of the fear that my mom and dad and brother and extended family experienced defies description.' His family made decisions in isolation with no real community or guidance available to them. What finally changed things, he says, was that the people who loved him most eventually allowed him to fully experience the consequences of his own decisions. 'They finally took a loving step back and said, you know what, we're gonna allow Brook to experience fully the consequence that he creates.' Until that happened, he was always waiting on them to solve the problems he created. Why parenting from fear keeps everyone stuck Brook describes a cycle where both the addicted loved one and the parents are each seeking relief. The loved one reaches for a substance. The parents reach for what he calls their own lever — doing something, fixing something, paying something — to get relief from the fear or guilt they feel in the moment. 'Everyone's just trying to feel better. Everyone's trying to feel relief. Everyone's trying to feel and access more comfort. In my experience, as long as my family was pursuing that, I was never getting better.' — Brook McKenzie He describes fear as having just two faces: being afraid of losing something you have, or being afraid of not getting something you want. Any parent, he says, can look back over the past 48 hours and recognize one or both of those at work in a recent decision. The illusion of control and the ineffective contract Brook has seen parents do a great deal of talking and telling — explaining to their child why they need to change, trying to find the right words to inspire them. He says he has worked with thousands and thousands of families and has never, not even once, seen that approach produce a good result. What he has seen work is parents shifting to simply stating what they will do and what they will not do, and leaving it there. When parents start doing that, he says, the results can come in weeks or months, not years. He also describes what he calls an ineffective contract that families get locked into — an unspoken arrangement where fear and guilt on one side produce rescuing and enabling on the other. 'The families that do the best, I mean there's no comparison, are the families that make a decision and say, you know what, I'm willing to feel. I'm willing to feel the discomfort, the trepidation, the pain, the guilt, and the fear. I'm willing to walk through it.' Disabling versus enabling: how lowering the bar harms the loved one Brook prefers the word disabling over enabling, because he says it more accurately captures what happens over time. When families continuously do things for the loved one that the loved one could do for themselves, they are sending a message — not an intentional one, but a message all the same — that they do not believe the loved one is capable. 'Every time someone who loved me did something like that for me, they were demanding that I acknowledge I'm not capable of doing these things. I'm not capable of basic responsibilities. I'm not capable of accountability. I'm not capable of being responsible for really any aspect of my life.' — Brook McKenzie He also talks about how the bar drops for the addicted loved one while staying in place for siblings. The goal, he says, is to get that bar back up as quickly as possible and to be honest with the loved one about what is expected and what the family will and will not do. What parents can actually do differently When asked what ends up in the two columns — what we will do and what we will not do — Brook keeps it simple. What parents will do is support access to recovery and treatment. What they will not do is lie, make excuses, or pay debts the loved one created through their own choices and decisions. He also encourages parents who are in therapy to go in with a specific purpose: to explore how fear and guilt are shaping their parenting decisions. 'Go in, be honest, authentic, and say, hey, I've become very curious about how my fear and my guilt is influencing my parenting decisions. Can you help me with that?' For parents wondering why their child pushes back or threatens or withdraws love the moment a parent starts holding firmer, Brook has a clear answer: 'They do that because it works. That's the only reason.' And the good news, he says, is that once the loved one sees that tactic no longer works, they stop doing it almost immediately. His final message to parents: you must go first. The families waiting on their loved one to change are, in his experience, unlikely to see results. The families who make changes in their own behavior, get into community, and are willing to feel the discomfort of doing harder things — those are the families he sees get good outcomes.