I don't talk about my brother very often. Because I'm disappointed.
I'm disappointed. I am a psychiatric nurse practitioner. I am trying to teach and share mental strength with so many people. And my own brother, I'm losing him to drugs. I even posted on my first personal Facebook recently, a picture of Wayne holding my disabled son Reggie and I said I lost one to death and one to drugs.
So Wayne is still here. He is very much alive. But he is choosing to continue to use substances, and I feel like I could help him, I have all these resources, but am I enabling him because he has me as a lifeline? Is he not ever really hitting rock bottom? But I don't know if I believe in rock bottom. I mean, a lot of people say where they have to hit rock bottom to turn around, and there's a couple times in his life that I thought he hit rock bottom. I thought he hit rock bottom when he went to prison. I thought he hit rock bottom when he was shot in the chest and airlifted to the trauma center.
And so, what do I do with this grief? And in my belief that you never give up, you don't give up on relationships. You don't give up on people. And I really believe that. But I also believe in boundaries and so how do I juggle all of those truths a little bit about Wayne?
He is my biological cousin adopted into our family. So is genetics a part of it? I feel like I have addictive personality type things. Thankfully, I've never actually been addicted to a substance. With him it was mostly alcohol. And then when Reggie passed away in October of 2016. I don't know if he had previously used meth or not, but that's when it became evident to us that he was using substances more than just alcohol. And it became that his drug of choice was meth, methamphetamine and as a professional I know that that's one of the worst substances. It actually changes. The dopamine receptors, burns them out, and we know that that there's so much damage that's going on in the brain.
We are now at the anniversary of five years since Reggie's death, so probably using methamphetamines for five years, I treat people with substance abuse problems. I empower people to learn the mentally strong method and make positive choices and hang my brother day after day is making poor choices and poor choices, and the drugs are winning the battle. And so, I'm going to do a whole series on addiction in 2022, so look for that. Today is a series about grief.
I've lost my brother to an addiction, but he's still here.
How do I manage that? and so I'm taking the time, we talk a lot about taking time to grieve, I'd say you've got to take the time to grieve, and so I am mourning the loss of the brother that I knew.
But still providing some sort of lifeline. These are choices that I made and there is no absolute right answer, and this is. You know there's a lot of support systems that say, oh, you have to cut them off and just take care of yourself.
Or, you know, you have to keep helping or you know, don't enable like everyone has a very black and white kind of do this and this will help. And I don't know. But I'm not giving him cash so that you know my money is not contributing to his substance use and I began drug testing. You know, for him to be in my house. And that's where I am today.
And when I do the addiction series and next year, maybe I'll be in a different place.
But I have stopped to take the time to grieve.
And I may have made some bad choices. Maybe I was letting him. Maybe I was enabling him by knowing he was using drugs and still paying him for odd jobs. I don't know.
But you know, and maybe at one point he will be ready if you remember the person that we interviewed for the award nominee, where you know after 20 years, he got himself clean from meth.
So, if you're out there watching and you have a family member addicted.
Take care of yourself first, like that oxygen to yourself before.
Don't give up.
Continue to try to help with realistic boundaries for yourself.
I’m not saying it's easy. It's very hard.
I love you Wayne and I will continue to be here for you.
I believe that you can find your mental strength and I will continue to find mine because I believe that we all have that in us.
That we are all Mentally STRONG
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Dr. Cristi Bundukamara, Ed.D, PMHNP-BC --- A Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner and a Doctor of Healthcare Education has experienced unimaginable trials that have caused many feelings such as depression, anxiety, anger, & overwhelming stress.
However, she has developed a new pathway to becoming Mentally Strong & Choosing to be Happy. With purpose, Dr. B has developed the phases that were refined within the Mentally STRONG Method that she created and wants to share with you.
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mentally_strong_
@MentallySTRONG4
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