Question by CreatioN: Is past extensive cocaine use and alcohol abuse treatable?
Im sorry if my question did not come out right, i’ll do the best i can to explain my situation.

My mother is 54 going on 55. In the past back in the 80s up to the 2000s, she did extensive coke use and was(or is) an alcoholic. She appears to be lack confidence and can be so controlling at times. She can never calm down nevertheless hold a job i think. When you do alot of cocaine, i know you lose your mind. You go a bit insane and paranoid. Is there any long-term treatments or options that i should take that can calm her down? She smoke cigarettes every day, so many packs and it will not improve her heart and medical conditions at all. Im very very close to sending her to a nursing home or have her seek counseling, but im trying to find out what other options that i can take that dont involve her leaving the house. Im so extremely lost, please help and God bless.

Best answer:

Answer by Techwing
It sounds like she has a personality that is very prone to addiction. She sounds like she may have other issues as well, which might benefit from professional help.

You can recover from addictions, but they don’t really go away, in the sense that you cannot resume use of a substance to which you’ve previously been addicted without running the very real risk of falling into addiction again. Thus, alcoholics (for example) remain alcoholic for life, even though they may recover from their alcoholism by abstaining permanently from alcohol. A recovered addict is, for all practical purposes, the same as anyone else, except that he can never touch the substance to which he was previously addicted without the risk of a major relapse.

Answer by rikki k
hi rolfe
your mom sounds so like a girl i know, she is 52, 2 girls, 22 and 20, she was/is into cocaine, loves her beer and smokes cigarettes and pot. she claims to be “”clean”” for months but you can never rely on that, you can’t or have a hard time believing them. she claims to want CA cocaine anonomous, and AA alcohlics anonomous, but she meets and befriends people that enable her behaviour.

this girl is also paranoid and can not hold down a job or does she want to, sounds a lot like your mom. the thing i’m noticing is that you sound like you are developing or are into a co-dependant relationship. if you don’t have the support group or haven’t looked into co-dependancy, then you need to do some research into the subject. its pain full and frustrating as i’m sure you love your mom, as i do this friend but i couldn’t “”help”” her. i say “”help”” because we can’t help them, we get sucked into the whole addiction , ocb < obsessive compulsive behaviour, i would say that you rolfe need to know that you may be enabling your mom out of sincere love, but she is using your good nature to justify her own behaviour. i'm not saying you don't love her and she you, but its an addicts mind here, forget who she was, because she's not that person all the time, maybe she is that person some of the times and that is what we hope they will become again. i know that with my friends continued drinking and pot smoking and maybe even cocaine use, i had to distance myself, even though when we got together it was nice for a few days, her behaviour went to the familiar. she was constantly threatening "i want drugs", cocaine, cuz she was smoking the pot. in any crisis that was her refrain,"i want drugs" , was that her cry for help or was it real? in additon to her addiction and ocb's, she claims many medical conditons, fibromyalgia, arthritis, thinning hair, insomnia, low appetit, constipation, hemmoroids, she feared being around people. she was not capable of simple chores, clothes washing, cleaning the house, shopping, even going out. recently a good fiend of mine has been seeing a guy with gambling ""addiction"" whichhe doesn't see as a problem, and is self treating bi polar disease, she feel into the enabling hole with in 2 months. as we talked she realized that she was changing and becoming the enable co-dependant, she had no clue at the time we spokee, but slowly she's realizing what was beccoming of her. good luck with that and take care of YOURSELF as you attempt to care for mom ..