After Drug Rehab: Do You Have to Change Your Friends?
In Eugene, Oregon, Wendy Jo Whitaker successfully beat a methamphetamine addiction. Unfortunately, though she managed to change her lifestyle and her drug habits, she didn’t change her friends and, as a result, she ended up the victim of a drive-by shooting.
The September 2008, drive-by shooting wasn’t intended for Wendy Jo. The bullets were meant for her boyfriend, Jesse Anderson. The reason? A drug deal gone bad. The two shooters, Ronald Smith and Michael Wesley, Jr., later testified to that fact in a Lane County, Oregon, courtroom. It was Smith who fired the shots that killed Wendy Jo.
Says Wendy Jo’s Mother, Lynda Whitaker: “I think the fact she overcame her drug use finally, and the irony that it ended up killing her after all just because she didn’t change her friends.”
Do You Have To Change Your Friends After Drug Rehab?
Obviously there are situations in which you not only don’t have to change your friends, but it’s a better choice for your sobriety to remain in contact with the people in your life. If your friends are clean and sober, if they encouraged you to go to rehab and get help, then these are good people to keep around. They knew you before the addiction, they loved you despite the addiction and they are dependable and trustworthy people. But if you lost all your non-addict friends long ago, then the answer is a resounding yes. You have to change your friends. Few people will be able to avoid relapse for long when they are still hanging out with the same people and doing the same things that they did during addiction.
After Drug Rehab: The Choice of Friends is Yours
Choosing whether or not to make new friends or to stick with the ones you already have is one of the first decisions that you will have to make after you return home. You can offset the loss of old friends who continue to use drugs by making new ones. Though this sounds daunting, it is easy to meet new people at 12-step meetings and local support groups for recovering drug addicts. Getting involved in school or at work will help as well. If these suggestions doesn’t cause you to cross paths with anyone who you click with, consider taking up a sport, looking for an exercise partner online, or getting involved in a hobby or hobby class.
Make the Right Choice For You
As for Wendy Jo, this is no longer a choice she has. The 30-year prison sentence for Wesley and the 25-year prison term for Smith won’t bring her back.
Lynda Whitaker commented on her daughter’s strength in quitting meth and added a word of caution for those in the same situation: “It’s just an incredibly, incredibly difficult thing to do. She quit the drugs but she didn’t quit her friends. I think that’s equally as important. That’s what ended up killing her.”
