It can be hard for neighbors to know how to deal with drug addicts living near them. It’s not something that comes up often, but all it takes is one time of getting up early in the morning after a noisy party and finding your front lawn damaged by a massive hole dug by someone on drugs to understand the couple’s view of this issue. This article will cover ways to deal with drug addict neighbors and will help you decide what you should do in the event of such a situation.
What Is Substance Abuse?
Substance abuse is a broad term that refers to any substance a person uses and causes damage to their life. It may be alcohol, tobacco, or any other drug – and it could also be an action such as gambling.
What qualifies as a drug addict?
Drug addicts are people who are addicted to legal or illegal drugs. They have an intense urge to use these drugs and do so compulsively despite the consequences of their actions. A drug addict can be anyone from your neighbor to your child’s music teacher, who might be a perfectly normal person when they aren’t under the influence of this addiction.
Drug addicts can be
- drunks
- reefers
- smokers
- druggies
- junkies or anyone else for that matter.
Addiction and Alcoholism
• Alcoholic is a term used to describe a person who over-indulges in alcohol. It’s not necessarily a term applied to people who are addicted to alcohol, although many do develop an addiction problem as well. Alcoholism can be severe enough to cause serious health problems like liver disease and, in some cases, can result in death. • Addiction is the state that results from taking something over long periods, such as tobacco, drugs, or alcohol. It’s characterized by a marked physical and emotional dependence on the substance.
What methods do you use to evict your drug addict neighbors?
• Complaint It To Your Landlord
If you have a good relationship with your landlord, then this is the quickest and easiest method of dealing with a drug addict neighbor. Let your landlord know you find their drug abuse unacceptable and that it’s affecting your property. Many landlords will take notice of this and deal with the situation themselves. In the meantime, the drug addict may be trying to ‘clean up,’ but their addiction isn’t going away even if they stop using. In this case, you should be patient and wait until the landlord deals with the situation.
• Talk To The Police
If your drug addict neighbors are doing something illegal, like growing marijuana plants in their back yard or having loud parties at 4 AM, then you should call the police. Maybe all they need is a warning to stop, and they will turn over a new leaf. But if you talk to them directly, in hopes of ‘saving’ them, and then nothing changes, you might find yourself changing your mind on your attempt to help.
• Ask For Help From The Housing Department
If the drug addicts are too much to deal with, even with police involvement, then you can report their problem to the local housing authority board. They will send investigators, and if the drug addiction is serious enough, they will contact the landlord and attempt to evict those tenants that are causing a problem for their neighbors. You don’t have to be afraid of this. It’s a legal process, and if they have a problem with drug addiction, their tenancy will be terminated.
• Killing Them
Some people may think that the best way to deal with drug addicts is to kill them. This is probably one of the worst ways you can go about dealing with them, though, since it just creates more problems than it solves. It also doesn’t solve anything. These are all just temporary fixes. The drug addict might move on to something else and return to their old habits; a new one will take their place, without the same problems.
• Ask Them Not To Smoke
Drug addicts aren’t exactly known for being responsible for smoking marijuana or cigarettes. If you ask them not to smoke around your property or areas near where they live, this is probably an acceptable method of dealing with drug addict neighbors. It’s a simple request, and if they are drug addicts who want to be left alone, they will comply.
Treatment of Addiction
Regardless of what you do, if you live under the same roof as someone with drug addiction, then chances are they will continue to be a problem. This is because addiction can be a tough thing to treat, and even once it’s treated, it can stay there months or years later. Once an addict has been dealt with, they will still be around in some form or another, either living near you or, even worse, doing something illegal again. In this case, you can even contact the police and ask them to help.
The only real solution to drug addict neighbors is getting professional treatment from a specialist. This will cost money but will help the situation in the long run since they won’t be around, creating problems anymore.
Recovery from Drugs and Alcohol
If you can’t get these people professional help, then at least you can try and get them to stop drinking. Many people with drug addictions are also alcoholics, so if you can get one of those under control, it will be a huge relief. It’s not necessarily like getting someone to stop smoking, though, because there is a wide specter of drugs and their use, including but not limited to cannabis and opiates. So it’s hard to state that if they stop drinking, they will stop or not.
You can try to get them to AA meetings, although this can be hard, and sometimes they want nothing to do with it. If you can find one that will go with you, then that’s great. If not, don’t force it on them. You can also try to get them to attend NA meetings, but these can be hit or miss as well.
When people are coming down from serious drug addiction, they have many habits and bad habits that they learned while using drugs. Speaking to an Addictions Counselor can get rid of these bad habits, but it may not cure the addiction. In some cases, it might take a while for them to change their habits, let alone the addiction itself.
If you are living with someone that’s a drug addict, then after they have been dealt with and have been stabilized on their medication, you may need to deal with some of the bad habits they pick up when they come down from the drugs. These are all temporary issues, and you don’t need to be stressed about them. Just follow the advice of the addiction specialist that helped with the treatment.
Call To Action
If you have dealt with a drug addict in the past and have found out that they are having problems with drug addiction, then share your story in the comments or on our Facebook page. Let us know what you think is the best way to deal with drug addict neighbors, or contact us today. Call 954-523-1167.