Key Takeaways
- Enabling means removing the natural consequences of someone's substance use, which allows the addiction to continue.
- Helping means supporting recovery-oriented actions while allowing the person to experience the consequences of their choices.
- Common enabling behaviors include making excuses, paying bills, calling in sick for them, bailing them out, and avoiding confrontation.
- The distinction is simple: helping supports recovery; enabling supports continued use.
- Families often enable out of love, fear, guilt, or the desire to maintain peace — it is not a character flaw.
- Learning to stop enabling requires support — Al-Anon, Nar-Anon, and family therapy can help.
Understanding the Difference
Enabling Examples
- Calling their employer to excuse an absence caused by substance use
- Paying their rent or bills while they spend money on drugs
- Making excuses to family or friends about their behavior
- Bailing them out of jail
- Giving them money without accountability
- Avoiding talking about the problem to keep peace
- Taking over their responsibilities
- Minimizing the severity of the situation
Helping Examples
- Offering to drive them to a treatment center or support meeting
- Setting clear boundaries about what you will and will not tolerate
- Allowing natural consequences to occur
- Expressing concern with specific, non-judgmental observations
- Researching treatment options and presenting them
- Taking care of your own mental health
- Attending family support groups
- Following through on stated boundaries
Why Families Enable
- Love: You do not want to see your loved one suffer
- Fear: Fear of what will happen if you stop cushioning the fall
- Guilt: Feeling somehow responsible for their addiction
- Shame: Not wanting others to know about the problem
- Hope: Believing this time will be different
- Exhaustion: It is easier to enable than to enforce boundaries
How to Stop Enabling
- Educate yourself about addiction and enabling
- Attend Al-Anon, Nar-Anon, or SMART Recovery Family & Friends
- Work with a therapist on your own patterns
- Set specific, enforceable boundaries
- Follow through — inconsistency undermines boundaries
- Accept that you cannot control their addiction
- Remember: allowing consequences is an act of love, not cruelty
If you or a loved one is facing these challenges, learn more about family resources and guidance through our admissions team available at Trailhead Treatment Center in Salem, NH.
Trailhead Treatment Center provides how we involve families in the recovery process to support lasting recovery and wellness.
Conclusion
The line between helping and enabling can be blurry, but understanding the distinction is crucial for your loved one's recovery and your own wellbeing. Trailhead Treatment Center offers family support resources to help you navigate this difficult terrain.