Well, I'll give an example. When I was twenty, my mom decided to marry this guy. I really didn't know him that well. Didn't really want to. Thought it was a bad idea because I didn't think she knew him all that well either.
They were married for about 15 years. He had substance abuse issues off an on the whole time. He drove my car, with my kids in it on more than one occasion because I didn't realize he was stoned until he started driving funny -- I haven't been around druggies that much and was naive. And once, while my husband was driving over the road, he (step-dad) made me miss seeing him (husband) on a holiday because he (step-dad) was faking chest pains at the ER in order to get pills.
After the divorce the drug abuse got worse and I felt bad for him because I think my mom broke his heart, and also, he is my youngest brother's father and I want to help him for my brother's sake.
He had a house of his own, but he would tell me it was so lonely there alone and I thought he was clean, so I let him live with us several times. Each time, he ended up falling off the wagon. The last time was almost a year ago.
I often don't sleep well at night, so I was taking a nap while the kids were in school. When I woke up, I thought it smelled like someone was cooking something. I went into the kitchen and found that two burners on the stove were left on, had been from what I could tell, for hours.
My step-dad had gotten his weekly meds from the local mental health center (they came in a bubble pack each week to make it easy for him) and he was sitting on the sofa out of his head, practically drooling. When I checked his meds, I saw that he had taken out the entire week's worth of certain pills. Apparently he had eaten the good ones all up -- yum yum!
I had to call the mental health center and ask what I should do because I was worried he was in danger of overdose. I tried rousing him and was able to get a response, but I had frankly had enough. Years of this stuff was just enough. It was beyond what I was able to cope with. It was beyond what I wanted my family exposed to.
So I told him he had to go. He had been staying at the homeless shelter before he came to our house, so I asked him if he wanted to go to the hospital or to the shelter. He was begging me not to make him leave -- made me feel horrible -- but I couldn't do it anymore. It wasn't helping him and it was hurting myself and my family and had the potential to be a real danger to us. He chose the shelter, so my husband and I took him and his car to the shelter. While he was talking to the staff to see if he could go back, I took my house key off his key ring -- I'd had things go missing and didn't really want to give him access to my house.
I haven't talked to him since. I don't hate him. I hope very much that he gets well -- especially for my brother's sake. But the thing is, oftentimes substance abusers develop very good manipulation skills and my step-dad knew all the buttons to push. He was really good at talking me into stuff -- like giving him money, etc. I didn't want to keep that pattern up and I was also just really tired of dealing with it. I mean, I've known this man for twenty years now and it's been the same song and dance that whole time, he's in his late fifties and not likely to change. Also, I'm not qualified to help someone like that. I have a husband and four kids -- I don't have the resources to deal with it.
So, yeah, I doorslammed him. If, at some point, I have credible evidence of him being clean for an extended period of time, I would be willing to resume the relationship. Until them, I just can't do it. Not only can't, but won't. If that means I have issues, I can live with having issues, you know?