Transcript The families’ role in recovery

The families’ role in recovery
Vivienne Evans
Scale
• Approximately 7 million people are affected
by someone else’s substance misuse
Scale
• There are 250,000
children of
problematic drug
users…
• …and 1 million
children affected by
parental alcohol
misuse
Scale
• 150,000 people are
affected by drug use
in prison
Policy context: everyone’s business
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Models of Care 2006
Drugs Strategy 2008
Carers Strategy 2008
NICE guidance 2007
Hidden Harm 2003
Social Exclusion Task Force: Think Family 2007
Aiming High for Every Child: HM Treasury 2007
Children’s Plan: DCSF 2007
Impact
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Social
Financial
Physical
Psychological
Criminality
Stigma
Personal and societal
Why support families?
• They provide practical, emotional and financial support to the
substance user, improving the likelihood of successful treatment and
retention in treatment
• Health and welfare of family members is improved if they are given
support
• Engaging families in a prison setting can reduce drug supply and reoffending
• Isolation and stigma increases stress and its related problems, placing
added strain on statutory services
• Economic advantages
Recovery
• Unrealistic goals
• Equated with abstinence
• Health
• Job
• Home
• Family support
Recovering from a drug or alcohol problem is more
complex than not having a substance in your
system any more
Emerging dilemmas
•
•
•
•
Interventions
Involvement and support
Insecure contracts
Parents and children/prevention and
resilience
Key messages
• Families are relied upon to provide support without being
adequately supported themselves
• Families subsidise treatment provision
• The welfare system penalises families
• Families do not get support when they want to disengage with
the drug user
• Families need to recover too
• The role of the family needs to be recognised at grassroots
level, not just with policy circles
• Families want more information
• There is a great deal we do not know about the family's role
Key issues
• Rebuilding family relationships is a key
constituent of recovery
• Families provide vital recovery capital
• Families are well placed to help map
individualised routes away from drug
dependency
• Families need to recover too
• www.adfam.org.uk