How Drug Abuse Puts Your Relationship at Risk?

Drug abuse is not an isolated phenomenon. It's composed of myriad threats that are directly or indirectly influencing an individual’s life. This influence has a largely negative connotation. When it comes to an individual’s relationship the effect of drug abuse is even worse.

Multiple aspects of one’s relationship are put to the test and often lead to its eventual demise. Drug abuse can affect the relationship psychologically, emotionally, economically, and physically:

Couples who do drugs together stay together?

The title should not be considered positively as such situations become something that is bound to take you nowhere but downhill. A relationship that intoxicates both the partners can do no good, and if the ones running the bond are not in their sound state of mind what else can be expected from a relationship other than complete failure?

New couples are casual about the impact that drugs would have on the relationship initially but with the passage of time, if they do not get the timely dose of realization, a person's relationship with drugs takes the front seat and all else becomes secondary.

You might try too just for the fun of it and start a liking for a drug that you have no idea is killing you slowly. Soon you will find yourself only doing drugs with your partner and craving for the next whiff. In the end, a day will come when you will realize you don't even care about the person you were dating but only want the drug. 

Realization is rare; the day does not come for many because saying no to that euphoric feeling makes you delusional that you are having a good time and your life is not in your hands anymore and only revolves around that drug. To help overcome this situation, you might need to seek therapists help.

You wake up and want it, you are happy, you are craving for it, you are sad and now you gotta have it, you must have it before you sleep. Only because you said yes to having a partner who was into drugs. So, choose carefully, either the partner or the dead-end towards codependency.

Drug dependency can make you aggressive 

This can be considered as one of the earliest but most dangerous signs of drug dependency. Let us paint a picture for you. You might meet a partner who drinks and you casually drink with them too. 

Relationships can get tough and your partner might turn to alcohol for comfort. But instead of comfort, it gets violent. Research by the American Society of Addiction Medicine has found out that 40-60% of the cases of domestic violence are linked to drug abuse and its impacts.

You can never guarantee how heated an argument can get and how many senses one can lose once intoxicated. According to a report by WHO, in the United States of America, England and Wales, victims believed their partners to have been drinking before a physical assault in 55% and 32%. 

That is not the end of it, in Australia 36% and in Russia 10.5% of intimate partner homicide offenders that were life partners were drunk. But the most shocking of it all is in South Africa, sadly 65% of women experiencing physical abuse at the hands of their spousal partners have used alcohol before an assault. 

You cannot save them!

Codependency as studies show is usually in relationships where a woman marries a drug-abusive man. It's because a woman might think she can save her partner, but instead, she gets involved or in other instances, any of the two partners are too cautious for the bond to survive even if it is at the cost of drug abuse.

Love can be used as a manipulative tool against such men and women who help addicts in acquiring drugs, skipping appointments, and avoiding medications; lack of awareness and commitment can create long-term problems just giving temporary relief.

Not just partners, other members of their family might want to be able to relate with the addicted family member and start doing drugs along with them. Codependency not only makes the chances of withdrawal rare for both partners, but it also entails effects for the generations to come.

Having too many secrets

If you or someone you know is getting attached to someone who occasionally likes to drink or smoke. To impress their love interest, addicts might not share that information. Because let’s face it, drugs are bad for us. If you overdo them. 

To sustain a healthy relationship you need to be with a grown-up who does not run to drugs. 

• Drugs can lead to less intimacy.
• Drug addiction affects mental health.

Dependency on opioids such as Heroin and Morphine make one throw up more than usual, have slower reflexes, be anxious and dull. 

When faith is lost all is lost…

Most importantly, you become doubtful of your partner. Trust and respect are the foundations of any perfect relationship. The constant lying and sneaking around will change you as a person. You need surety from a relationship not to become the CIA and keep a check of your partner’s every move. 

Drug abuse and distrustfulness sometimes push people towards illicit means of obtaining resources to get the craving fulfilled and thus indulge them in other crimes as well.

In a relationship, if you are not concerned enough to take charge of getting away with the problem of addiction and drug abuse, you are sponsoring it! One way or the other you provide money, support, or even approval for something that might prove fatal.

Finding a solution for the problem

To help your addicted partner or someone you know, the best ways are:

• Try not to be protective of the addicted person. 
• Do not take part in anything affiliated with drugs with them.
• Remember, some people cannot be saved, it's not your responsibility to try to mend broken people.
• Seek counseling for yourself and ask for honest treatment out of them if they want to continue a healthy relationship.