About

Addiction and Family FAQ is an ongoing project developed by The Meadows Addiction Center dedicated to providing information about how addiction affects families.  Our goal is to share answers to common questions about how families and children are affected, cope and recover from the problems of an addicted family member.  We hope to expand both the range and depth of topics here in the future.

Important information regarding Family and Addiction

• Combined data from Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration’s 2002 to 2007 National Surveys on Drug Use and Health provide average annual estimates of the number of children under age 18 living with a substance-abusing parent, i.e., a parent dependent on/abusing alcohol or an illicit drug.
• More than 8.3 million children (11.9%) lived with at least one parent who was dependent on/abusing alcohol or an illicit drug during the past year.
• Of the children living with a substance-abusing parent, almost 7.3 million (10.3%) lived with a parent who was dependent on or abused alcohol, and about 2.1 million (3.0%) lived with a parent who was dependent on/abusing illicit drugs.
• About 5.4 million children under 18 years of age lived with a father who met the criteria for past-year substance dependence or abuse, and 3.4 million lived with a mother who met the criteria.

Source: http://samhsa.hhs.gov/

For more information about The Meadows:

We invite you to read more about our Family Treatment Program on our website, or to call 800-MEADOWS (800-632-3697). You can also contact us by email at info@themeadows.org.