Intervention from the Heartbreak

by Steven Gledhill for FREEdom from MEdom Project

It is Monday, July 5th today. Here in the US of A we just celebrated our independence (yesterday). I spent some time earlier today cleaning out my garage. Temperatures were in the upper 80s and sweeping out the leaves, winter residue that had built up on the floor, dust, and the miscellaneous collection of garbage, made for some work that wasn’t exactly a fun time. I thought that seeing the fruits of my labor would feel rewarding. I suppose it did to an extent, but it didn’t necessarily bolt me into some sense of inspirational disposition.

I had some time to myself after my wife, Cindy, left for work. I spent my time watching parts of five episodes of the A & E series, “Intervention”. As good of an addiction recovery counselor as I might espouse to be, I might not be the most stable interventionist in the world. If you haven’t seen the show “Intervention”, what happens is that people suffering from addiction believe they are involved in a documentary about addiction, which I suppose in actuality they are. But what they do not know is that they will be confronted with an intervention from family and friends facilitated by a licensed interventionist hired by “Intervention”. They are then given an all-expenses-paid opportunity for rehabilitation treatment for their addiction.

The episodes I watched today involved alcoholism and drug addiction, prescribed medication addiction and two forms of eating disorders, anorexia (starvation) and bulemia (binging and purging). The reason I think I might struggle as an interventionist is that I find myself in tears by the conclusion of each episode. If the recovering addict embraces and sustains a disciplined lifestyle of sober recovery, I am moved to tears as it touches me deeply to see someone go after the new life to be experienced in recovery.

But then there is the other side. The recovering addicts are interviewed some 70 or 80 days into their treatment and they look so good. Sometimes you barely recognize them the change has been so dramatic. But then, after the end credits have finished rolling by, “Intervention” gives you the current status the people profiled, and you read that they have relapsed. And you read that the family that so enabled them in their addiction has also relapsed into their codependent behavior as though the intervention never occurred at all. It breaks my heart each and every time. Again, I am deeply touched and moved to tears.

One episode that I watched from start to finish involved a 26-year-old man named Shane, whose addiction was snorting pain medications. His primary drug of choice was OxyContin, a narcotic which essentially operates in the body and brain like heroin. It is twice as potent as morphine, activating the morphine neuro receptors in the brain. What this means is that the narcotic component of the drug delivers a dopamine rush that, when used properly carries out its purpose to relieve pain. For Shane, he had been prescribed the drug OxyContin eight years ago for pain for a neck injury from a car accident. Now he was using it for the momentary highs he needed merely to survive. The withdrawal from opiate dependency is awful, as though one is violently ill for a few days—vomiting, convulsions, diarrhea, severe cramping, nausea, fever and chills.

Shane’s family was already devastated once by the horror of addiction to pain medications a few years ago when the Shane’s father overdosed on his narcotic medications. These drugs are central nervous system (CNS) depressants. The dopamine rush has a direct impact on the endorphin system, which in the case of these medications, depresses the CNS function that regulates breathing and the production of carbondioxide. Narcotics (opiates, opioids) also depress CNS functions that regulate blood pressure and heart rate. In other words, overdose can lead to respiratory system depression (one stop’s breathing) and heart failure. Shane was impacted severely by his father’s death and now he was taking on the same risks his father did using the same drugs.

The interventionist for this episode was Jeff Van Vonderen from somewhere in California. Not only is he a featured interventionist on “Intervention” but also facilitated an intervention on the Oprah Winfrey Show. Five years ago, I had the opportunity meet Mr. Van Vonderen at a pre-intervention meeting for a friend of mine’s then 18-year-old stepdaughter. (Note: a pre-intervention is where the interventionist meets with the family to prepare for the intervention, usually the following day). While I did not attend the intervention since I was not personally involved with this family, I did get a strong sense of how Mr. Van Vonderen works. I was also quite impressed with his Christ/God-centered position as the most powerful, effective, and sensible vehicle to recovery. Unlike the seven or eights minutes usually committed to the video footage on the show, these interventions can take hours. My friend’s stepdaughter’s took some seven or eight hours.

At Shane’s intervention on the show, his twin sister and grandmother (chief enabler and with whom he lived with after his mom kicked him out) read their letters describing both the good times and bad, listing potential consequences if Shane refuses treatment. Shane agreed to go to treatment. It’s a good thing, too, since it did not seem as though his grandmother would be willing to actually follow through with the consequences she had indicated. After enduring what was likely four to seven days of detoxification, Shane completed his 90 day rehab assignment. I got the impression that Shane attended a program with a 12-step emphasis. He then moved into a sober living facility. It seems as though the light turned on for Shane. It made sense to him that a sober life of recovery was what he needed to live again. Today, Shane remains sober. He lives near his twin sister. He has restored relationships with his mother and family that are “normal” and healthy. And wow, it really got to me. 

Shane, the anorexic sisters, and the cocaine addict from a preacher’s family, that built their recovery from a well-rooted and grounded 12-step foundation sustained in a lifestyle of recovery. The others reportedly relapsed of the episodes I watched today. I share this experience with you because it is in a relationship with God that you and the people you know and love can access divine authority and power to beat addiction and conquer the symptomatic forces that promote and provoke obsessive thinking and compulsive destructive behavior.

My prayer is that you will avail yourself to the articles and resources within and throughout FREEdom from MEdom Project and discover revelation of the truth about where you’re at today and where you need to be—where you know you ought to be if you are being honest with yourself. If you are in trouble (and if you are, you know what I mean), tell someone immediately. For sure, tell God that you need His help today, right now! Then, find someone you trust and tell them you need help. Then, when you are in the right situation to get appropriate help, commit yourself to trusting your helper, even though emotionally there is an inner voice whispering, or perhaps screaming at you, to run away and back into the arms of that “drug” of choice that in reality is betraying you, wanting to kill you and destroy everything. 

Ask God to show up and reveal truth to you about who He is and what He can and, most importantly, WILL do for you and in you, if you let Him. He stands at the door of your heart and knocks. Let Him in. When you really think about it, sensibly, what choice do you have? The choice is to live the new life given by God and empowered by Him to live, or to die alone in your addiction. Give God the opportunity to turn the light back on in your life.