Christian Addiction Services Provider Lighthouse Network Offers Parents of Addicts Tools and Resources to Help Themselves and Their Hurting Kids
Key Facts:
New Years is a time of taking stock and planning changes in life.
For parents of addicts, the New Year offers the resolve needed to make fresh starts and get help, both for the addict themselves and for their parent who needs healing, to possibly learn boundaries, and especially understand new patterns of interaction with their addicted child.
Parents also need help in overcoming the stigma and shame of having an addicted child, navigating a very complex and stressful behavioral healthcare landscape, as well as finding hard to locate and understand Christian options for addiction treatment.
Lighthouse Network, a Christian addiction and mental health helpline provider, offers guidance, support, and dedicated resources to help parents of addicts get the help they need to make positive changes in 2013.
PHILADELPHIA – The fireworks are over, the confetti swept up and noisemakers put away. The New Year 2013 has begun and with it comes a time of resolve and renewal in which many people try to establish new patterns of behavior that will improve their lives and make a positive impact in their family or community. For parents of addicts, New Year’s resolutions may include stopping enablement of their addicted child, setting new boundaries, establishing new interaction behaviors, or even the staging of an intervention for the addict who is ready to receive help.
For these parents, Lighthouse Network can offer
Care Guides who provide compassion, prayer, understanding, answers to many questions, and one-on-one referrals for help or treatment,
Printed, audio, or video resources to help change old interaction and create healthier patterns, coupled with prayer and unique, encouraging devotions to help guide parents on the journey of helping a family recover from addiction, and
A specialist called a Parenting Coach who talks with and coaches the parents to access help for themselves that teaches them how to love their addicted child in a more healthy way.
Because Lighthouse Network bases its services on traditional medical approaches coupled with emotional and spiritual healing through the power of Jesus Christ, the organization often sees more lasting life changes than those who choose to rely on medicine alone.
“When I started Lighthouse, having been an addict myself while also having a medical degree and practical expertise in psychiatry, I recognized that while medicine and mental health treatment can help an addict who wants to recover, addiction begins in response to deeper issues that can only be completely healed by God through the power of Christ,” said Dr. Karl Benzio, psychiatrist, founder and executive director of Lighthouse Network. “In launching Lighthouse Network, I wanted to offer referrals to the best possible addiction treatment facilities, including ones that would include the healing power that Jesus Christ can have on a person’s life. I designed curriculum that incorporates the practical life and heart management wisdom of the Bible and delivers it using scientifically sound therapy modalities so all three spheres – spirit, mind, and body – are deeply addressed. We, along with our partner facilities, have been able to design programs that offer the best that medicine has to offer combined with healing that only Christ can offer.”
Lighthouse Network offers a variety of resources to help the hurting and addicted, as well as those who love them. The organization’s free, 24-hour Lighthouse Network Addiction and Counseling Helpline at (844) 543-3242 offers personal guidance to resources, therapy, or treatment facilities that best meet the needs of each unique caller based on their individual situations. Care Guides will link patients or loved ones to a counseling, addiction, or psychiatric care facility through Lighthouse Network’s national database of treatment centers, counselors, and therapists. They successfully manage complicated cases, especially of acute addiction, and provide help from a holistic (spirit, mind, and body) perspective, based on biblical principles.
In addition to guidance and treatment referrals, Lighthouse Network’s Not Alone short radio feature is designed specifically for parents of addicts, and offers insight, advice and encouragement for parents of addicts who feel alone or as though their situation is unique.
“In addition to our unique, free, national Addiction and Counseling Helpline, we’re so pleased to offer Not Alone to parents of addicts, who often feel alone, isolated, and as though they’ve failed their child,” said Benzio. “Between the book Hit By a Ton of Bricks, resources and information in Not Alone and our ‘Parenting Addicts’ section on our website, and a professional counselor who has parented addicts himself, we can offer parents a beacon to help them navigate the storm of having an addicted child using Biblical principles to guide the process.”
In addition to its uniquely personalized helpline and the Not Alone short radio feature, Lighthouse Network also provides a variety of web-based resources. Stepping Stones is a free, daily devotional for managing life’s stressors and storms and equipping readers with healthy decision-making skills. Lighthouse Network also offers videos, articles, and other resources related to addiction, relationships with addicts, and about coping with other mental health struggles on its website. For more information on Lighthouse Network, visit www.lighthousenetwork.org or call the Lighthouse Network Addiction and Counseling Helpline toll-free at (844) 543-3242.
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