These meetings are not for children

Recently my cousin, who I considered to be my “older brother” because of the month age difference and the similarities we share, came to my family for help.  He came to my family in need of help because he is battling the addiction to the dangerous world of pills, especially Percocet and Oxycodone. In his brief recovery process so far I have accompanied him to many narcotic anonymous meetings throughout the city of Worcester and have seen the same problem that bothers me and is causing me to write about in this blog entry.

The problem in which I see in these narcotic anonymous meetings aren’t the various amount of people that are here battling addiction. It’s the young children that are in these meetings that are doing the same I am doing, accompanying their drug abused parents. Though by having your child there in your recovery process seems to make you feel more comfortable. This isn’t the environment or place your child should be for various reasons.

There are many problems I see with having your child come to narcotic anonymous meetings start with the environment during these meetings. These meetings are filled with people who have nowhere else to turn and have lost everything including family. So when these children hear about these tragic stories of how addicts like their parents have lost their kids due to addiction this puts nightmares in the kid’s heads that they could possibly lose their parents.  In addition children shouldn’t be there because they don’t deserve to see their “role model” go through some of the toughest time of their live and admit they need help in controlling their lives. With all the different topics of addiction and drugs that are talked about in these meetings, this is  very inappropriate for younger children to hear is another reason I believe this is not a good environment for children to be in. In closing this environment just is not the place for your child to be because of all the events and things that are going on during these meetings, it is just too much for a young child to process and understand.

If I were to offer an alternative it would be the obvious choice of having these people drop their child off with a baby sitter or family member before they go to these meetings. But I also need to remember that some of these addicts have no money for a baby sitter or no other family because of their drug problems they are getting help with. The other solution I would have is for the attics to find meetings during the day when there child is in class, rather than taking them to meetings late at night and keeping them up past their bed times.