It helps me to think of chronic addiction as a disease like a strange kind of cancer.
With the right treatment, and with the patient's courageous cooperation and commitment to FOLLOWING the treatment, many but not all cases, are cured.
(And when that does not happen with addiction, this means to me that this addiction in this person was one of those diseases that could not be cured. No point even in blaming the person, because we don't know the mysterious molecular-biological-psychological vulnerabilities that added up to...that person could not do the self-help part of their own cure.
Convoluted, but I think I'm trying to say that there is so much emphasis on the self, in addiction and recovery -- and on emotional and mental and spiritual things -- all of which our culture encourages us to believe we can control through sheer will or character ... that it's like, one can't see it as a part of nature ALSO. (Not instead of.)
In nature, there is random death, and disease, and wilt, and fungus, and incredible toxins, and as many mysterious ways for life to die, as for life to flourish.
So if a friend is victim of one of THOSE addictions -- as painful as it is, I think I get to a point when I begin to feel I can only look at that person as part of nature (not only part of the human community, but also an individual within a species that is suffering one of nature's cruel consequences.) And at some point, I recognize that if I continue to battle with their disease to the point of being burned out, drained, and exhausted -- I may fall victim to one of nature's nasty consequences too.
And though it's hard to accept when one cares, the truth is, it is okay for me as a natural being to honor my own drive to survive.
That's why I dropped a friend I loved, who was dying from his inability to fight his addiction disease. He has rallied now, and I hope it lasts forever, but I am unable to stay friends with him without becoming sick myself.
It was a terribly painful realization, but I am at peace with it now. I feel I know much about how you feel in this situation, TT.
You are good. And kind. And caring. To save your own serenity, is not unloving. It is honoring life.
love,
Hops