Standing Aside…and letting go

I’ve written about Tough Love, and Loving from a Distance.  These are hard concepts to wrap one’s parental heart around.  I recently read the above words;  “Standing Aside” in a friends status update on Facebook.  These words are a gentler way of saying Tough Love.

I honestly think that most parents of addicts berate the idea of Tough Love because of the very word TOUGH.  We think with our hearts instead of our heads and conjure up all kinds of reasons not to use it.  We are afraid that if we do act toughly they may end up worse off than they are right now.  We reason with ourselves that if we keep them at home we will know they are fed, warm, clothed etc.

This August it will be 3 years ago that my son was; fed, clothed, warm and laying on his bedroom floor of an overdose; unresponsive.  Thankfully the person with him knew CPR and to call 911, Narcan was administered and he was transported to a Hospital.  Where he then refused treatment.  And I then refused to let him live in my home.

For a short span of time he came home this past August.  It went relatively well for a time.  But now I am Standing Aside… Letting the natural consequences of the choices he has made happen.  These will either strengthen him and lead him to place of growth, sobriety and freedom.  Or they will send him backward.  But either way I am Standing Aside, Letting Go, and truly Letting God.

Letting Go – Author Unknown

To “let go” does not mean to stop caring, 
it means I can’t do it for someone else.

To “let go” is not to cut myself off,
it’s the realization I can’t control another.

To “let go” is not to enable,
but to allow learning from natural consequences.

To “let go” is to admit powerlessness, 
which means the outcome is not in my hands.

To “let go” is not to try to change or blame another,
it’s to make the most of myself.

To “let go” is not to care for, but care about.

To “let go” is not to fix, but to be supportive.

To “let go” is not to judge, but to allow another to be a human being.

To “let go” is not to be in the middle arranging all the outcomes, 
but to allow others to affect their own destinies.

To “let go” is not to be protective,
it’s to permit another to face reality.

To “let go” is not to deny, but to accept.

To “let go” is not to adjust everything to my desires
but to take each day as it comes, and cherish myself in it.

To “let go” is not to regret the past, 
but to grow and live for the future.

To “let go” is to fear less and love more…”author unknown”