Hands Up If You’re Done Being Told You Just Need to Detach
People DO Change
And You CAN Help Them Do It
~Without Enabling or Constant Arguments
Introducing the
5 Ways to Have a Positive Influence On a Loved One’s Substance Use Program
COMING SOON!
JOIN THE WAITLIST TO BE THE FIRST TO BE NOTIFIED AND RECEIVE SPECIAL DISCOUNTS
An online group coaching program designed to teach families evidence-based strategies shown to positively influence the problem and improve substance use outcomes.
Madeleine is just amazing with family members. She is loving, kind and willing to be raw and vulnerable in her work. She clearly gets it. And she has this magical ability to shift seamlessly from knowledgeable facilitator to compassionate friend who is walking the same journey in the trenches of this horrible disease. I wish that I, and my family, had met her when I was still drinking.
I KNOW…
You’ve probably heard the following a million times:
- “You can’t control it. You just need to detach (with love).”
- “They have to hit rock bottom before they’ll change.”
- “What they really need is some tough love.”
- “If you try to help them, you’re just going to enable them.”
And you’ve probably tried:
- A million different ways to try to explain the problems they’re creating for themselves and others.
- A million different suggestions on what they should do to get help.
- And, barring that, yelling, arguing and silent treatments.
None of which have worked, and sometimes they’ve even made it worse.
I mean, some days you would move mountains to help your loved one. But they don’t want that.
Other days, you really start to hate them for all the problems they cause and wish they would just leave you alone.
But then you feel shame or guilt about that, because you know they’re struggling.
Either way, you feel like you just can’t take it anymore – you’re at a complete loss for what to do.
Let’s Stop That Pattern In It’s Tracks!
HERE’S THE REALITY: Much of What You’ve Been Taught About Responding to a Loved One’s Substance Use Is Wrong
Here’s what you probably already know:
Consequences are part of what motivates people to change.
This is why people so often say that someone misusing substances has to hit rock bottom before they’ll change.
Here’s just one of the problems with consequences, though:
Often those same consequences fall on you, too.
And all too often, through no fault of their own, family members have neither the support nor the resources necessary to be able to ride out those consequences.
So they get shamed for enabling.
But here’s what so many family members don’t know:
Rock bottom is a dangerous myth.
There are other ways to motivate people to change – other tools in the motivation toolbox.
And shaming family members for interfering with those consequences – especially when they have good reason to do so, can actually do more harm than good.
Because it leaves families believing they should not do anything to help, lest they end up enabling.
And this is honestly a travesty, because…
People can change at any time. And they do not have to hit rock bottom to do it.
And family members CAN help them do it.
Not to mention, rock bottom for many people is either death or some other totally horrific consequence.
And nobody wants that.
So you can either:
Sit back and wait for the problem – and the consequences – to get progressively worse,
OR learn the broad collection of tools family members can use to increase their loved one’s motivation to change.
While it’s true that you can’t control your loved one’s use, your loved one does not exist in a vacuum.
You do have influence.
Having any kind of relationship with your loved one, you’re influencing the problem no matter what you do.
If you’d like that influence to move the needle in the right direction…
Then I’m here to teach you what research and evidence has shown to work better than anything else out there.
The 5 Ways to Have a Positive Influence on Your Loved One’s Substance Use Program is designed to teach you targeted tools that will support you in using that influence to help motivate your loved one to change for the better.
This behavioral approach takes practice, but it has been shown to improve outcomes by 65-75%, which is 2-3 times higher than interventions or 12-Step approaches.
Why You Need to Learn These Tools From a Professionally Trained Life Coach
Hey, I’m Madeleine Craig
Here’s what I know to be true.
Getting your loved one to address their drug or alcohol use has nothing to do with how well you explain the problem to them, how many problems they’re causing or people they’re hurting, or how much you love them or they love you.
It’s about understanding how rewarding the substance feels in their brain, the immediate benefits the use provides, and the changes the substance use is making to the brain – and then working with, not against, that understanding.
But given how much pain – and frankly, trauma – they’re inflicting on you and others, that approach can be really, really hard to wrap your head around.
Because all that trauma triggers families to respond in ways that are often counterproductive.
Turning that around requires education, support, practice, and tools to manage the fears and frustration that are raging in your head.
In other words, it requires emotional safety, putting yourself in a more resourced state so you can go the distance with this problem.
Which is why all of my work is a combination of education, coaching, and support.
Because you need skilled support to learn the tools, implement them, and manage those very real fears about your loved one’s use (that’s exactly what coaching’s for, BTW.)
And I’m very good at all of it.
I really am. If you’re questioning that, here’s a quick story about a father rolling his eyes as he assumed I had minimal skills at this work.
When I was the manager of family recovery in a local recovery center, the first night on the job, I was sitting at a table with some family members who were just starting the family program.
The father asked me how long I had been working there.
I was honest and told him it was my first day.
He got this look of horror on his face like, “Ohhhhh shit… We got the newbie…”
On the last day of the program, that same father humbly approached me and said, “You’re really good at this.”
I am really good at this.
The content I teach in this program is, of course, very important.
But progress requires emotional safety, support and understanding. I’m an emotional deep sea diver who can build the emotional safety we need to hold space for all the feels, no matter how real or how heavy, so I’ve got that in spades.
In other words, I'm the secret sauce that drives this whole approach home.
The 5 Ways to Have a Positive Influence on Your Loved One’s Substance Use is for you because you…
- Feel like people are asking you to amputate a limb when they say you need to detach,
- Don’t feel like you can give up, because you’re their parent, partner, child, sibling, etc.,
- But are completely stumped trying to figure out what else to try to get them to change.
Are You Ready to Start Having A Positive Influence So You Can...?
Discover how change happens and how you can increase your loved one’s motivation to change. And why they things you’ve tried so far – like explaining or arguing – haven’t worked.
Understand the biological process of addiction and the dynamics of family addiction so you’re less likely to get emotionally triggered by the ugly and mean things your loved one says or does.
Create a plan to increase your loved one’s motivation for positive change and allow yourself to be a significant positive influence your loved one’s change process. (AKA, pinpoint the exact scenarios in your loved one’s behavior which you can target to start having a positive influence.)
Avoid triggering your loved one’s defenses, communicate without fights and hostility, and lessen the tension and conflict that often serve as a pretext for use. Learn what to say to your loved one when they’re in the thick of it. And thereby stay sane, build more trust, and create more peace in your relationship – and increase your ability to have a positive influence even more.
Understand your limits, set appropriate, reasonable, and compassionate boundaries, manage any initial backlash, and make your situation more livable. Making sure your well-being remains fully in the picture and everything does not revolve around your loved one.
Identify how and when to let the natural consequences of the use do the work of positively influencing the problem.
Support yourself through the change process, have more faith in your ability to support your loved one, and finally feel hopeful and confident about your approach to supporting both your loved one and yourself.
Start Sowing the Seeds of Positive Influence with Your Loved One
What’s Included in the 5 Ways to Have a Positive Influence on Your Loved One’s Substance Use Program
6 Weeks of Positive Influence Training Modules: Layer by layer, shift both your perspective and behavior, and change the equation between you and your loved one. Access to the training modules for 1 year. (See module details below.)
Created for Every Learning Style: Video. Audio. Transcripts. With 1 year of access so you can work through the tools and practice, practice, practice with the continued support of the program.
1 Year of Bi-Weekly Group Coaching Calls: Bring your questions and learn from others’ experiences. Submit your questions ahead of time & watch the recording if you can’t attend. You get 1 year of bi-weekly calls because I know all too well that change takes time. (Please note, there will be 2 calls a month for a total of 24 calls in the year, which means there will be times where there are 3 weeks between calls rather than 2.)
Step-by-Step Coaching Workbooks: All the education in the world won’t help if you’re too overwhelmed with anxiety to use it. Which is why the Step-by-Step Coaching workbooks are chock full of transformational coaching exercises designed to quiet the amygdala in the brain so fear isn’t calling all the shots, and the pre-frontal cortex is free to creatively problem solve. These exercises allow you to customize the content to your own life and circumstances so you can take actions that align with your own situation.
1 Year of Program Community Access: Connect with your peers to offer and receive mutual support. Support for the long haul!
Plus these FAB Bonuses!
FREE TRAINING: Navigating the Treatment Industry
If you’ve already sent your loved one through multiple rounds of treatment or detox, then you know what a mess the treatment industry can be. It’s a s#*t show, to be honest. And unsuspecting families so often get taken on a wild, heartbreaking – and bank-breaking, ride. This is why I added what I feel is a really important bonus to this program. This is a training on all the things the treatment industry likely doesn’t want you to know, because they benefit greatly from your ignorance in these matters. This training is so important, because what good is being able to motivate your loved one to change if you then unwittingly hand them off to a service provider that is ill-equipped to fully address their needs? Or even worse, predatory, with a business model that relies on the continued relapse of clients, knowing, if you have insurance, it’ll keep paying for it. All while you have no clue what’s going on. This training will pull the curtain back on all of that.
You’ll learn about the different types treatment available, the different phases of treatment, how your insurance – if you have it – might dictate what types of treatment your loved one can get right out of the gate. In addition, you’ll learn how the treatment industry operates in a poorly regulated environment, what the best practices are and how they’re probably not being followed, and what pitfalls to avoid. You’ll learn actions you need take to stay informed about your loved one’s treatment if they are legally an adult – actions that are more likely to be successful is you use the tools of the core program as a guide when taking them. And finally, you’ll get a list of questions you need to ask, and the kinds of answers you should watch out for as red flags, when researching treatment options.
FREE MINI TRAINING: Understanding the Differences Between Addictive Substances
The recreational drug landscape is changing rapidly. How worried do you need to be about the different substances your loved one might be using? What about medicinal/therapeutic uses of these drugs? And how long will it take for your loved one to detox from each of these substances? Learn the answers to these questions in this brief training.
10% Off 1:1 Coaching Packages
5% Off Membership to the Family Addiction Support Community
Program Modules
(Open each toggle to learn more.)
MODULE 1: Introduction + Positive Influence #1
Educate Yourself
Get oriented to the 5 Ways to Have a Positive Influence on Your Loved One’s Substance Use program. Then learn the basics of how and why people change, and how your influence works – for better or for worse. Understand the importance of building emotional safety for both yourself and your loved one – which is what each of the 5 ways support you in doing. Finally, learn the basics of both addiction and codependency, to help you stop taking the substance use personally, and understand how our most innate responses to the problem can actually be counterproductive.
MODULE 2: Positive Influence #2
Commit to Your Own Self-Care & Healing
Having a positive influence is an endurance sport that requires both time and practice, practice, and more practice. All in the face of a problem which can have tragic consequences. You didn’t choose to have this problem, but you can choose how you respond and who you want to be. Especially if you’re feeling like somehow you may have caused this. So, having a positive influence requires you to proverbially “put your own oxygen mask on first.” None of the rest of the program is possible if you’re drowning in anxiety over the chaos of your loved one’s use, or berating yourself for your own human flaws, or for not doing this work perfectly. Because how you treat yourself and how you take care of yourself in the face of this problem will also be reflected in your ability to have a positive influence. Which is why it’s one of the ways you can have a positive influence.
MODULE 3: Positive Influence #3
Analyze Your Loved One’s Use & Identify Your Opportunities to Influence
Learn two tools for gauging the severity of your loved one’s use. Apply a behavioral analysis framework to zero in on opportunities for having a positive influence. Use the same analysis to reveal the plausible reasons why your loved one uses. And then use that understanding of why they use to identify healthy alternative ways to meet the legitimate needs the substance use meets (but meets in an unhealthy way.)
MODULE 4: Positive Influence #4
Practice Positive Communication
Now that you’ve done the work to better understand your loved one’s use, you can use that intel to start communicating collaboratively. Understand why arguing doesn’t work and learn 3 frameworks and additional tips for communicating positively and minimizing contention. Identify the triggers where you want to yell, argue, or take a nasty tone, and the cues your loved one is giving you about how receptive they are (or are not) in the current moment, to identify both opportunities for and roadblocks to avoid for healthy discussion.
MODULE 5: Positive Influence #5
Establish Rewards & Consequences
Understand the essential elements of positive reinforcement, why harsh strategies don’t work in the long run, and why positive reinforcement does not constitute enabling. Learn how to notice the positive behavior you often overlook and determine rewards for that behavior that will increase your loved one’s motivation to change. Alternately, identify your boundaries and the behavior that crosses them, plan how you will respond when they’re crossed, and use positive communication strategies to communicate your limits. Then identify behavior that will rebuild trust after limits are crossed and restore rewards when your loved one’s behavior changes in a positive direction. Determine if and when you should allow natural consequences to happen, and use positive communication strategies to communicate your intentions around those natural consequences.
MODULE 6: The Cycle of Change
The 5 Ways to Influence & the Cycle of Change
Learn the elements of the change process and what the 5 Ways to Influence look like at each step in the process. Understand the importance of self-care and living your own life at each step of the process and why that is a powerful influence of its own. Learn how to talk to your loved about treatment and identify next steps for your journey with your loved one.
The program was super informative. I so appreciated your vulnerability in sharing your story, too.
Think You Might Need Extra Guidance & Support?
If you’re overwhelmed and feel like you’re totally in over your head with your loved one’s substance use, I can help.
With an upgrade to the 5 Ways to Have a Positive Influence Program you’ll get 1:1 personal guidance and support from me in the safe and encouraging environment of 1:1 coaching calls or Voxer access to me.
These additional levels of support can be purchased separately at a later date, but without the discounts noted below.
These upgrade packages include all the trainings, calls and bonuses of the 5 Ways to Have a Positive Influence Program plus:
5 Ways Program + Behavior Analysis Coaching Package
- It can be hard to think outside of the box of the ways you’ve currently been responding to your loved one’s use.
- With the Behavior Analysis Package, you get:
- The complete 5 Ways to Have a Positive Influence program
- PLUS A 50-Minute 1:1 Coaching Session to walk you through the behavioral analysis from Module 3 and help you identify potential alternative responses to those situations that can help you have a positive influence.
- To be used within 4 months of program purchase.
- $649 total if Behavior Analysis Coaching session is purchased separately from the program.
5 Ways Program + 1:1 Coaching Package
- Need the targeted strategies to bypass your fears around you loved one’s use, so you can fully implement the tools of the program?
- With the 1:1 Coaching Package, you get:
- The complete 5 Ways to Have a Positive Influence program
- PLUS 4 50-Minute 1:1 Coaching Sessions using the best of coaching strategies and neurolinguistic programming, plus my deep knowledge of family addiction, to help get you to a more resourced state, and provide personalized, targeted support for issues and questions that come up in the program and on your journey with your loved one. One of these sessions can be devoted to the Behavioral Analysis exercise, or they can all be devoted to other issues or questions, as you choose.
- To be used within 4 months of program purchase.
- $1089 total if 1:1 Coaching Package is purchased separately from the program.
5 Ways Program + (Almost) Instant Support Package
- Looking for immediate feedback and support? Freaking out over the latest crisis with your loved one and don’t know what to do next? Can’t think your way out of the last argument with your loved one?
- With the (Almost) Instant Support Package, you get:
- The complete 5 Ways to Have a Positive Influence program
- PLUS Voxer access to me for up to 6 months. This means you get to ask additional questions to me directly and get (almost) instant support.
- Limited to an average of 30 minutes of support per week over 6 months. Must be used within 6 months of program purchase.
- $1699 total if (Almost) Instant Support Package is purchased separately from the program.
Naturally, You Might Have Some Questions…
Let me answer them for you right now. Just click the toggle on each question to learn more.
Will this program REALLY make my loved one change?
I always say to my clients: You don’t have control, but you do have influence. While I can’t guarantee any specific outcome when it comes to your loved one’s substance use – there are just too many variables – I can guarantee that if you do the work in this program, and keep practicing again and again, it will change your interactions with your loved one for the better. And research has shown that these approaches improve outcomes. If you think of your relationship with your loved one as the most basic of equations, A+B=C, where you’re A, your loved one is B, and the relationship experience is C, then changing only one of those first two variables will change your relationship experience. And quite often, that change in the experience of the relationship will also have an impact on B. Furthermore, if you’ve seen my free video series, The 5 Actions Required for Substance Use Recovery (which you can access on the Resources tab), you know that improved relationships are essential to recovery from a substance use disorder. And this is the area in which families can have the biggest influence on the problem – for better or for worse. This program will give you the tools and the support to help your relationship influence the problem for the better. You won’t do this perfectly, but you don’t have to. The data shows that if you only implement a few of these strategies – even if you fail at them sometimes, which you will – the shifts in your behavior still help.
Nothing I’ve tried has worked. Why is this different?
If you know anything about my work, you’ve heard me say repeatedly there is no one answer to resolving a loved one’s substance use. Some things work for some people, others work for others. We know some approaches have better outcomes than others, but there is no magic bullet. In addition, families are always navigating two competing realities: the fact that substance use disorders and addiction are a disease, and the fact that people active in addiction/substance use disorders hurt people -and they hurt them badly. Just as there is no one right answer to substance use disorders, there is no one right way to navigate between those two realities. Some families will have the emotional capacity and inner resources to be able to put more of their efforts toward helping resolve the substance use disorder. Other families will need to put more of their efforts toward taking care of themselves in the face of the harm their loved ones do. And different people in the same family will have different needs and capacities when it comes to facing these two competing realities. This program is designed with all of these situations in mind. While the program relies heavily on the cognitive behavioral and motivational strategies of the CRAFT model, it also intersperses tools from Somatic Experiencing, Internal Family Systems, trauma informed practices, as well as principles from 12-Step recovery. On top of that, I add the transformational coaching exercises featured in the Step-by-Step Coaching Guides with each Module that allow you to identify and clarify your own needs and next steps in this work, so you can more easily find what works for you. I’m pretty confident you’ve never come across a program quite like this before.
I need to get my loved one help NOW. Why is this program 6 weeks long?
I definitely feel your pain. And this is a question that weighed heavy on me as I was designing the program. But as and an educator and a coach, here’s what I know. Addiction and family addiction are complicated issues. And overwhelming you with too much information at once will actually make it less likely that you will be able to do the work this program suggests. And the program can’t actually help you if you are too overwhelmed to do the work. Plus, each module is already packed with information. You may need more than a week to get through the content in each module – which is why you have access to the program for a year. (You can purchase continued access at a reduced fee if you feel you still need it at the end of that year.) Finally, I know you will have information and tools you can start using to have a positive influence now, and in each successive module. For example, understanding how addiction changes the brain, and how the dynamics of family addiction lead us to cope and react in ways that aren’t healthy in the long run will help you stop taking your loved one’s behavior personally, which will put you in a more resourced state, which is essential for positive change. And identifying some of your coping mechanisms that aren’t healthy in the long run will already give you a sense of things you can shift in your relationship for the better – all in Module 1.
How much time do I need to commit to do this program?
If you want to complete one module per week as they are released, I recommend committing 3-4 hours per week to working through this program. As I mentioned in the answer to the previous question, I’ve staggered the content to give you the time to watch the training videos, and work through the Step-by-Step Coaching Guides for each module, and attend the group coaching calls or watch the recording. Now, that doesn’t mean you have to complete the work for each module in a single week! There are plenty of valid reasons you may want to take longer. Maybe much longer. You have access to this content for a year, so you can go through this program at whatever pace suits you. And you can purchase continued access to the content and group coaching calls at a reduced fee if you feel you need to at the end of that year. You are totally free to do you in this program. You are never behind.
My loved one doesn't live with me. Will this program still help me?
If you maintain fairly regular contact with your loved one, then yes. The more contact you have with your loved one, the more opportunities you will have to have a positive influence. Also, if you are still offering any kind of financial support for your loved one, this is an additional area where you can use the tools and the strategies I teach in this program to have a positive influence. Also, if you are considering restoring contact with your loved one, this program will help you resume that relationship in healthier ways and ensure your renewed interactions with your loved one are constructive and peaceful.
My loved one is a minor child. Will this program still help me?
Yes. In fact, as a parent of a minor child, your ability to have a positive influence is greater than anyone’s.
When are the group coaching calls scheduled?
The group coaching calls will shift each bi-weekly period to help ensure participants in different locations can participate live in at least some of the group coaching calls. They will also rotate from different weekday evenings to a weekend day each bi-weekly period. You will find a schedule of the group coaching calls in the Group Coaching Calls section of the program. If you are not able to attend a group coaching call live, you can submit your question ahead of time, and I will try to answer that during the call as well. And just a reminder, you can purchase one of the upgrade packages if you feel you need more 1:1 support.
My loved one also has other mental disorders. Will this program also help this situation?
Yes. The strategies in this workshop are designed to create emotional safety for both you and your loved one. Emotional safety is essential for positive change regardless of the problem. In addition, you will also learn about navigating your loved one’s triggers to use. Mental health disorders also often have triggers, so this part of the training will also support you with your loved one’s mental health disorder. That said, you may also need additional professional resources specifically targeted toward addressing your loved one’s specific mental disorder, depending on the mental disorder and its severity. In addition to this program, I would recommend you also work with either a certified therapist and/or attend any of the free family support groups offered by NAMI. You can learn more about the NAMI family support groups here.
Is there a guarantee or is the program fee refundable?
The program fee is non-refundable. Please be ready to do some good, and deep, work with me.
I don’t do guarantees. Here’s why: I encourage, and help you, apply this work and the learning in this program to your specific needs so you can customize it in a way that works for you. That is what both the Step-By-Step Coaching Guides for each module and our Group Coaching Calls are intended to help you do. Everyone comes to this work with different life experiences and you will need to make this program your own. Everyone’s process will be different and follow it’s own timeline.
Telling you exactly what will happen for you, and forcing your hand in order to meet an arbitrary guarantee, isn’t how I do my work, nor how I want you to do your own work in this program.
What I promise is that I show up, and deliver, a program which I am immensely proud of because I know it can help you in profound and life-altering ways. And… you have to do your part in doing the deep work and applying it in ways that work for you.
Make No Mistake
You CAN have a positive influence on your loved one’s substance use and increase they chance they will choose recovery, or at the very least change in a positive direction.
You care about your loved one.
You wouldn’t be reading this if you didn’t.
Being stuck in a cycle of pleading, yelling, and endless explanations keeps you from having a positive influence on your loved one’s motivation to change.
And the fear of what might happen and the panic that drives don’t help.
That’s where this program can help.
The strategies I teach in this program are not always easy, but the data shows they are the most effective way to promote change.
And this program offers you the support to carry them through.
Which leaves you with three choices…
You can continue pleading, yelling, and explaining ad nauseum (or perhaps secretly praying they end up in jail, because you feel like at least there, they’ll be relatively safe.)
You can deplete all your savings sending your loved one to one treatment program after the other – very few of which are evidence-backed or effectively regulated – hoping one of them sticks, but with little clue about what they actually do there.
OR… You can follow the evidence-based approach already forged for you in this program that allows you to have a more positive influence than you ever thought you could, and feel far more hopeful about potential outcomes than you ever have up to this point.
If you want ensure you’ve done everything you can on your end to support your loved one’s recovery, and potentially end up with a stronger relationship with your loved one than you even had before the substance use started, and #3 is calling out to you…
…then I want to thank you for allowing me to offer you the system and support to turn the relationship dynamic with your loved one around and have the impact on the problem you’ve always been trying desperately to have.
I can’t wait to help you make it happen!
Your training really hit close to home. I really appreciate everything you shared, your understanding, and your support.