A Letter to Parents

by Charlotte Kungston

To the parents that put their own children to ‘suffer’ from their parents drinking alcohol, and doing drugs. You the parent may be having a hard time to keep going and living your life while raising your children alone or something that makes you have a hard time, and drinking and doing drugs may seem to “numb” the pain.

You would think that it’s fun while your children are watching you, but what you are doing to your children is putting them through something worse than what you, the parent are going through.

Especially if your parents, other family or the oldest of the siblings is trying to make sure your children are well-fed, dressed, and most of all, loved. We, the children, mostly need the attention for your love, instead of putting us through the pain that you are trying to hide from.

In order to recover from the pain you are in, is changing your behavior towards the people you are hurting, especially the people who love you the most, your loved ones. Since the very first moment you drank the bottle, and drugs, is where the pain started and never stopped.

If you continue to keep doing what you are doing, it will never get better, and know that you are harming your health. You have ruined your child’s future, to not want to continue with their own life, just because they don’t feel loved and safe. They can also follow you doing the same thing you are doing as they watch you. Continuing having alcohol, and drugs will kill you, and will place your children through the worst nightmare of their lives.

We want our parents to be in our life. Changing your behavior towards them to do better by throwing that disease away, will change our life too. Opening your heart to quit, and become the person than you were before, will make us proud. It may be hard to stop craving for it and to be sober, but it is a choice to be there for your child(ren), to be a better parent.

There are many ways to recover from the disease that you cannot seem to recover from. Practicing forgiveness, letting go of anger, being more honest, seeing yourself for who you are, and accept the responsibility. Being clean for yourself is a big change. You will become more happier, alive, lighter, and more healthy living learning to accept the pain by fighting through it.

It is now time to become aware, to see how beautiful the world it is out there. The events, celebrations and occasions that you have missed will give you so much pride and joy and make you wonder why you never went to them. When you start to change for who you are, you will see that there is so many of your family and friends who care about you.

It will be a long process to recovery, by cutting down the habit, not spending time with people you used to drink with or have drugs with, but along the way, you will realize that your children needed you the most while you, the parent, was not there.

You will realize that you have spent so much wasting money and time on those things instead of buying what your children needs and not spending time with them. You will also realize that your children will smile much more and be filled with gratitude and happiness.

No matter what situations you are going through, the hardships and the heartaches, your children will never fail to make you realize that you had a purpose and a reason for choosing them over alcohol and drugs, and always remind them that your addiction was never their fault.

You are never alone, a process to healing is step-by-step. Help from a family member, a friend, or even going through rehab will be enough to help you. Keeping yourself busy and doing some activities could help you be distracted from thinking about it. Choose healthy living, and most of all, your children.

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