How to Handle Family While You’re in Withdrawal

I'm glad you're here.

I would love to talk with you again about relationships and withdrawal. I'm kind of doing a series right now, because there are so many ways withdrawal can affect our lives and relationships, and there are all kinds of different relationships we have. So I thought it would be helpful to just go ahead and do a series about that and to share what I've experienced.

And I would also love to hear in the comments what kinds of things you all have experienced and what would be helpful to you as you're on this healing journey.

My Personal Experience With Withdrawal and Family

For me, I was pretty much keeping in the house a lot and doing very little socially. And so I felt very stressed about how to manage family relationships. I'd love to share with you the different things that I've learned that have helped me along the way. It was a lot of muddling through and figuring it out as I went, but it was definitely a challenge.

If you're feeling like your relationships are strained or breaking or falling apart, just know that's kind of par for the course with withdrawal. You're going through so much, and it's really hard to maintain normal life and normal expectations and relationships. You're not alone, and you can come through this and still have really good connections that are meaningful to you.

Managing Family Relationships in Withdrawal

There are different categories I think of when it comes to family and withdrawal. There's your family members who maybe don't get it and just aren't very helpful to you personally.

When Family Doesn’t Understand

My stance in this situation—and what I came to—was that they don’t have to know. Or at least, I don't have to share everything. I did a lot of explaining things simply, like: if there were situations that would've been good to show up at but I just couldn't, I explained it as “I'm just dealing with a lot of fatigue right now, and I just can't come. But thanks for inviting me.”

Saying No to Social Expectations

If there are social expectations that you just can't manage right now, or they make your symptoms way worse, give yourself permission to say no. Just share what feels safe to share. Some family members can't understand or aren't able to be helpful about it, and it's okay to lower your responsibilities a notch so that you can focus on healing and recovery.

It's okay that we can't do everything. That’s part of being human—but especially in withdrawal, it really is okay.

There are just going to be things you’re not able to show up to, and that’s okay. You can let people know:

“Hey, I'm dealing with a chronic illness and it's getting better, but I'm just not back to my full energy.”

That way, you don’t feel like you’re exposing yourself to people who maybe can’t understand or who you don’t trust with all the details of what withdrawal has been like.

Supportive Family Members Who Don’t Fully Get It

You might have some family members who care and are trustworthy, but they just don’t get it. Maybe they can’t say anything helpful, or they’ve never experienced anything like this before, so they don’t know what to say.

If they're caring people and want to be involved, you can still give them a role that helps. For example, my mother-in-law kind of knew I was healing and getting off meds—she didn’t know the full details—but I let her know to be praying for me. And she spent time with the kids. So that helped.

If you have some good, loving people in your life, they may not understand all of what you’re going through, but maybe they can help in practical ways. You can offer a nutshell version of what’s going on and let them do something concrete. Just showing appreciation for that is plenty.

When You Have Truly Supportive Family

If you're one of the people who has family members who really get withdrawal—like they’ve read up on it, or went to a talk, or watched a documentary, or maybe even went through it themselves—then you are one of the rare few. And thank God for that.

That is amazing. If someone is really helpful and able to show up for you in an understanding way, that’s a huge gift. Just remember to thank them.

For me, that was my husband and a close friend. There were a couple others, but I had to remember to thank them and also to pace it.

Pacing for the Sake of Your Caregivers

I was so high-demand and needy. I had to remember to space it out between different people and to give them breaks. It was hard to get through even one day.

Caregivers can get burnt out too. That doesn’t mean you’re doing something wrong—it just means this is a really hard thing, and you need help. But giving your supporters time and space, checking in to see how they’re doing, and encouraging them to care for themselves too… it all really helps.

You’re Not Alone

Those are some of the things I’ve learned. And I’d love to hear from you—anything you've learned in your journey, any questions or comments or thoughts. It really is such a learning process.

If you're in those long days that are hard to survive, just know that it's going to get so much better. You're going to feel better one day. You're going to be able to give back with so much more depth and clarity and joy. You’ll be able to do normal life again—work, see people, go out.

Life does come back.

❤️‍🩹 Joanna