By Lee Cataluna
Advertiser Columnist

It is said that a drug addict can't be helped until he or she wants to be helped.

Tell that to an addict's parents, to the mom and dad who desperately want their child to get clean and are willing to do absolutely anything to make that happen.

Colin and Diane have walked that path. Their daughter is 21 now and has been clean of crystal methamphetamine use for 15 months, though they think she's still drinking.

"It was so chaotic," Colin says. "We're caring and loving parents. If you can just imagine someone out of control and us trying everything we could think of."

"We thought we could talk her out of it, threaten her out of it, outsmart her," Diane says.

In between the threats and the pleading, Diane and Colin said they "walked on eggshells" around their daughter.

Colin knows now that their reaction was typical. "It's trying to force an outcome, taking care, trying to fix their disease, trying to take their pill for them."

After attending support groups for families of addicts, Colin and Diane realized that this kind of "taking care" and "fixing" only allows the addict to continue using by shielding them from consequences.

Diane remembers the exact day, Sept. 7, 1999, when things started to change. That was the day she changed the locks in the family home. That was the day that she hit bottom.

"Re-keying the locks was a real turning point," Diane says. "She knew I meant business. She called and I told her if she showed up on the property I'd call the police. I mentioned places she could go for food and shelter like I had been taught to do."

Colin and Diane attended the Thursday night meetings at Hina Mauka in Kane'ohe. The meetings at 7 are for anyone affected by the addiction of a family member or friend. Diane also became a member of Al-Anon, a 12-step program for family and friends of addicts and alcoholics.

"Most family members go to meetings because we have a lot of anger, a lot of anxiety and we don't know what to do," Colin says.

"It's amazing," Diane says. "Everyone thinks they're the only ones with the problem. Then you get there and you realize you're not alone."

Seeking comfort and answers in a group, they admit, was hard to do. They went when their desperation outweighed their shame.

"Shame is a big thing for local families," Colin says. "But the more you go, the shame goes away. We found that when we shared, there was relief. And everyone there has been through the same thing."

The family groups led Colin and Diane to see addiction as a disease and not a character flaw.

"It made us become aware that this disease was like diabetes," Colin says. "You couldn't cure the person, but like diabetes, you could manage the disease by behavior."

This allowed them to separate the addiction from their beloved daughter, to "not like the sin but love the sinner."

"At first I took it personally," Diane says. "I'm the mother. I'm supposed to be raising a child who's responsible. The guilt was immense."

They also accepted the idea that, though they couldn't fix their daughter, they could fix themselves.

"It's the courage to change that's the key," Diane says. "In order for the addict to make a change in their lives, how can we expect that of them if we don't change? What it really comes down to is you prepare yourself so that if and when the addict reaches their bottom, you're ready. You're informed and you're strong."

Change came for the family, but slowly, and the journey isn't over yet. Colin and Diane's daughter went through treatment four times. She started to want a better life for herself.

"She came a long way in the program," says Diane. "The gratitude, the appreciation, the growth. I see it."

Diane and Colin say their own lives are back in order, and though they hope it never happens, if their daughter should slip again, they know now how to handle it.

"We're getting better at it," says Colin. "We're learning. Two or three years ago, we couldn't talk like this. It was always confrontational."

"I feel that I'm more straight up with her than I've ever been," Diane says. "I used to worry about what I'd say to her. But it's different now, though I speak to her with kindness.

"I consider it a blessing that all this happened. I am a new person. Without all the sorrow and the pain, I wouldn't know all the good things ahead of me."

Lee Cataluna's column runs Tuesdays, Fridays and Sundays. Reach her at 535-8172 or lcataluna@honoluluadvertiser.com.