My daughter is smoking crack and I don’t know what to do

[MummyInTheNecropolis]

She is 19 and has ADHD and borderline personality disorder, both only recently diagnosed. She struggled so much to come to terms with the diagnosis, particularly the BPD. She has a long history of self harm, suicide attempts and addictive behaviours. She had been doing so well, she’s holding down a good job, working full time but has always found relationships and friendships difficult and doesn’t have many people in her life.

She recently started seeing a much older man who is a drug dealer and abuser with a long criminal record. He started providing her with cocaine and alcohol and she’s been using both heavily. I have been doing my best to support her and get her away from him. Today I came home and the house smelt weird, like she’d been smoking cigarettes but a stronger burning smell. I went and snooped in her room and found lots of crack paraphernalia. She is asleep and doesn’t know I have found it. I need to talk to her when she wakes up but I’m so scared of what to say and how she’ll react. She is extremely volatile and often verbally abusive. I have spoken to the Frank helpline and will follow their advice but I just know it won’t go down well. I desperately want to help her, she is so lovely and beautiful and worth so much more than this. I just don’t know where to start.

I would really appreciate any advice.

so Sorry to read this. It sounds exactly how my sister was 20 plus years ago.

for my sister my family tried absolutely everything and the only single thing that helped her over the years was being in prison. She is there now and has never looked and acted better as is finally clean. She will be out soon and that is where things have always gone wrong.

my sister is a worse case scenario.

sadly I think they only thing you can do is be there for your daughter. Yes make your feelings clear you strongly disagree with the drugs she is using and the dangers that come with that life stuff. You want your daughter to be able to go to you when her relationship breaks down.

We tried everything. All professional help included. My sister was an extreme case very quickly and we were repeatedly told we can’t do anything until she wants help and wants to stop.

Your daughter is very early days and there is so much hope this lifestyle ends before she gets in too deep. There are so many support groups out there with advice.

Unfortunately until she wants to engage with any services and help herself there is very little you can do except continue to be there for her and love her as the daughter she is

Get her to rehab. Put in some boundaries. She will be pimped out next.

Honestly, I never advise to ring the police but if she won’t listen this maybe the only option from stopping her becoming sex trafficked. This is the beginning of a lucrative relationship for the older drug dealer guy. He is grooming her to become a sex worker.

Na meetings
Hide everything she will start selling your stuff.
Do not trust her.
Read online helping vs enabling.
Is she on adhd meds if not they may help but she can't have them if she's on crack. Does she smoke weed that's calming for adhd.

I’d be telling her to move out for starters.

I wouldn’t have any drugs or drug addicts in my house, my child or not.

You’re putting your whole family at risk by allowing your daughter to stay there, because of the types she’s engaging with. Do you have other children? Because your responsibility should be towards them. She’d an adult, she needs to take responsibility for herself. But until she does there’s nothing you can do.

I didn’t want to read and run but gosh this sounds so so hard. Be kind to yourself, it’s very hard to love an addict. Does she want to change at all?? I think the change needs to come from her wanting it first; then you can support her. Best of luck to you and your family xox

These older men often prey on young, vulnerable women and girls to force them into prostitution. Almost happened to me. Not sure what you can do. I got out of it as I was stubborn and as soon as he started trying to tell me what to do I rebelled and told him to fuck off, didn't find out his plan until later. He was quite open about it to a couple of people! Arseholes never told me.

Thank you for the kind replies. There are no other children, it’s just me and her, always has been. She is on medication for her ADHD. I want to report the older man to the police, I am worried about repercussions for her, but I think I can do it anonymously so I will do that today. I haven’t spoken to her yet, she’s still asleep and I want to plan how to go about it first. I have spoken to Frank and have details of a local organisation that can help. My mum is coming over later to add her support to the conversation. I am absolutely not kicking her out, she is my child and she is vulnerable, I am not going to wash my hands of her or send her even deeper into this lifestyle. It’s still early days for her, surely it’s not too late to help her? It can’t be 😢.

Do you have access to her devices? I dont know if its strictly legal (its not) but can you take her phone and laptop/tablet away from her so she has no contact with this person?

Would she become violent if you did this, would she consent if you did this?

Is money an issue for you as if not, i would say to her we're packing some small bags, going away for a few weeks, just put yourselves in an airbnb somewhere in the middle of no where, no bus stops or train stations nearby, scanty cab network.

That sort of thing

This relies on her compliance of course.

It also relies on you not needing to work or being able to get off work very short notice.

We both work full time so neither of us would be able to just pack up and go at short notice unfortunately. I’m a single parent so we rely solely on my income and DD’s job is the only good thing in her life right now so don’t want her to lose that (though I know that might be inevitable anyway at this stage). At the moment she is still fully functioning, no one would be able to guess from looking at or talking to her that this is what she is doing.

Has she got away from
this older drug dealer yet or not? It’s unclear from your posts. I think that would be my step one as he’ll be a strong influence on her hindering any good work you try to do x

No she is still under his control sadly, he lives a few feet away from us. They are not officially in a relationship and never have been, they regularly argue and stop talking but she always goes back. I want to confront him but I’m scared he would take it out on her. He is a very dangerous man.

I’d love any advice on how to get her away from him. I’m hoping the police might do something? I know he was in court recently for drug charges and is under some sort of conditions. Maybe if they find drugs in his flat now he will go to prison? Or is that wishful thinking?

My god crack! I’m sorry but I’ve never met someone who stopped smoking crack ever!

My brother in law is a crack head and has been since the 90’s when he was 15. He has ruined my MIL life.

When he was younger he would steal and sell everything, get stabbed, go to jail, repeat. He stopped briefly for a few months here and there but would go back with a vengence.

One stab too many and now a part of his skull is missing but he won’t give up the crack. He is on disability and also takes my MIL disability money. He can’t steal anymore so he a crack dealer living in his bedroom, selling crack from their house.

She is in delusion that one day he will stop, make everything happy and nice for him and he will have an epiphany. He is in his 40’s now. He ain’t gunna stop. Sorry, I just feel so passionate for my hatred of this drug.

He has ruined my dh childhood and family. No one wants to go to see mil as she will be hinting for money for him.

If I was you I would kidnap her and take her to rehab or to another country, if you know anyone that lives abroad that will help. Stay there a few months until she is fully off it.

Oh right sorry to hear that. I don’t have any suggestions but if I think of any I will let you know. I don’t know enough about drugs / what the police could do, sorry.
I expect if he is a drug dealer, older, and a heavy drug user he’ll be quite manipulative at getting her back when he wants her. She is lucky to have your support x

Call crime stoppers and report him to the police with any info you have about his car his home where he keeps the drugs etc. don't tell her you did it. Hopefully he'll get locked up

Can you afford to get her into some kind of rehab facility? She can take the time off work as sick.

I'm so sorry your going through this but I don't know anyone who has overcome this without moving far away from the people that facilitate the habit. You need to get her away from them ASAP. Even if she stops taking crack these people are way too close to her

If she’s smoking crack, eventually she will end up losing her job. You need to do everything to get her off it now.

Whilst I would love to just up and leave and take her away from it all that just isn’t realistic for us unfortunately. I don’t have much money and I don’t know how I’d survive without any income plus we’d have nowhere to live.

You need to tell her you know what’s happening, explain how worried you are and how crack cocaine addiction can be incredibly difficult to overcome the longer it goes on, explain your support will always be there but set boundaries that she is not to use in your home or keep any drugs or paraphernalia in your home. She then needs a local drug service to support her, which may include some kind of medication to help her manage any withdrawal, but only if she actually wants to stop otherwise it’s a waste of time. With regards to the partner you can say you’re worried about his past and support her to make a Claire’s law application. That will at least show any domestic abuse and hopefully make her more wary of him.

Thank you, this is exactly the plan for today, as advised by Frank. I also have details of local organisations to give to her and will be contacting them myself for tomorrow, even if she won’t accept help just yet they might be able to help me in dealing with this.

I have already encouraged her to do a Claire’s law application but she won’t, she already knows that she won’t like what she sees. We already know some details of his hideous crimes against women, some can be found simply by googling his name, which I have already shown her. Sadly this wasn’t enough to put her off. She just has such little self worth 😞.

So sorry you're going through this, what an appalling man. I hope a report to police that he is dealing from his home will result in him being back in prison, to cut off her supply.

Your daughter will be able to kick this addiction if she's committed to getting off it, and she's lucky to have such support from you.

Well we had the conversation on Sunday and it went as terribly as I expected. She just lost it, wouldn’t speak to us about it, just screamed at us both to fuck off, called us cunts and threatened to punch me if I didn’t leave her alone. Then she ran out of the house, went straight to the older man’s place and hasn’t been home since 😞.

i have spoken to her via text messages since and she has calmed down and understands I’m just trying to help but she is massively minimising the whole thing. Says I don’t understand, she’s not a crackhead, it’s really helping her at the moment but she’ll stop soon etc. clearly hasn’t accepted that she’s addicted or how serious this is. Doesn’t want to access any help or support.

I’m not sure where this leaves me really. I’ve spoken to a few organisations but of course there’s nothing they can do for someone who doesn’t want to be helped 😞.

I’d be grateful if anyone has any suggestions on where to go from here?

Read about helping vs enabling. Don't repoet him your basically asking for your car or windows to get put through if he's a dealer shes prob doing sexual favours for drugs.