Beautiful Boy

Recovery is a long process, and “time in treatment—time measured in many months if not years—is usually required for dramatic change” (239). Indeed, it is a lifelong process, and the risk of relapse always remains present. As Sheff reflects, it is “so easy to forget that addiction is not curable. It is a lifelong disease that can go into remission, that is manageable if the one who is stricken does the hard, hard work, but it is incurable” (295). 

Nic’s “astonishment” (262) that he has relapsed reveals why relapse remains an ongoing possibility. As Nic explains, “I got cocky. It’s this trick of addiction. You think, My life isn’t unmanageable. I’m doing fine. You lose your humbleness” (262). That is to say, even the process of recovery and the addict’s belief that he is overcoming his dependency can trigger another relapse. 

More optimistically, the book also explores the idea that “often ‘relapse is part of recovery’” (191). Sheff acknowledges that this is a “counterintuitive concept” (190) but explains that “if treatment is conceived of as an ongoing process rather than a cure, a different, more optimistic—and far more realistic—notion of success emerges” (192). At the last rehab Nic attends, his counselor refutes that Nic’s problem is drug use, stating, “No […] that’s how you have been treating your problem. What is your problem? Why are you here?” (340). This important shift in perspective highlights the fact that addicts frequently use drugs to “treat” an underlying issue. 

Although Sheff learns relatively early of “Al-Anon’s Three Cs: ‘You didn’t cause it, you can’t control it, you can’t cure it’” (152), Sheff remains fixated on saving his son throughout most of the book. He spends a great deal of time trying “to fathom what is happening—not only to Nic, but to our lives, which are preoccupied by him” (162) and slowly growing to recognize the damage this preoccupation is causing. An educational session at Nic’s rehab sheds light on this as the speaker explains that often “family members’ moods become dependent on how the addict is doing […] [and] people lose their identity because nothing matters except their addicted spouse or child or parent or whoever it is. There is no joy left in their life” (176). 

Sheff eventually admits that the status of his own well-being depends on Nic’s well-being (263). This is extremely damaging for Sheff and the rest of the family, who all become caught up in Nic’s struggles, failing to truly look after each other or themselves. Sheff does eventually begin to address the issue and accept that he cannot save his son, finally feeling “confident that I have done everything I could do to help Nic. Now it’s up to him” (357). As Nic struggles through recovery, Sheff embarks on a recovery of his own, eventually accepting that he and Nic’s mother must “step back, be supportive, but let Nic’s recovery be his recovery as we work on disentangling and have healthy […] loving and supportive, but independent relationships” (350).

An Al-Anon leaflet Sheff reads contains a “Letter from an Addict” that includes the warning not to believe addicts because: “Denial of reality is a symptom of my illness” (241). This is reality certainly present in Nic’s case, starting from his first assessment at rehab. Sometime later, in a journal entry, Nic expresses surprise that he could not see what was happening to him and at how “[a]t the time it all seemed so positive and harmless” (186). However, Nic is not the only one in denial. 

Throughout much of the book, Sheff refuses to accept the severity of his son’s addiction. After Nic has already been in trouble for smoking marijuana, he accepts Nic’s offer to smoke a joint with him, “thinking—rationalizing—that it’s not unlike a father in a previous generation sharing a beer with his seventeen-year-old son, a harmless, bonding moment” (104). As Nic’s drug use escalates, so does the extent of Sheff’s denial. He frequently references that he “still want[s] to believe him” (108) and repeatedly returns to his “academic fantasy” (190) that Nic “is on track again on the inevitable (in my view) path that will lead back to college” (116). He also employs stereotypes of addicts to feed his denial, insisting that Nic is different (86). Even while visiting Nic in rehab, Sheff still cannot accept that his son is an addict and believes that he will be fine. (160).