Why I Want to Become a Substance Abuse Counselor

So i never really have given much depth as to what i wanted to do in terms as a life goal of mine. If everything in life goes well for me i'd like to become a substance abuse counselor and although this image says drugs, substance abuse could also be alcohol and different forms of substance abuse could also include other addictions like eating. Tonight i want to share why exactly i want to become a substance abuse counselor and what led me to this path.

My older brother is actually an alcoholic and most of my life i think i just ignored that fact, i didn't have much of a reaction as to how i felt about it because i would often be blind-sighted of what was happening around me, even though i'm sure i could pick up on cues and see the patterns that were happening, i chose to ignore them instead. As i got older it was more prevalent and it was hard to ignore because often times that was all that was talked about in family conversations. This is sort of an on going battle, because although i love my brother dearly, i'm not exactly sure what will happen in the future for him, not much has progressed in terms of him wanting help for himself, and i think it's safe to say that it is clearly needed, but you can't force someone to get better, until it gets into serious pressing issues. I was really fascinated of what addictions were and why people have certain addictions. I'm someone that personally doesn't smoke, i really don't drink often and i don't even enjoy caffeine. So i'm very polar opposite of the actual subject and although i don't have any personal experiences of what it feels like to be high or drunk or just under the influence of any substance, i've gained a lot of knowledge of what substance abuse looks like from my brother's actions. In some way i feel as though i can't really help out my brother even though i would really want to, and at times i feel really guilty because of that so in a way having this as my career choice i want to give back to others that are also struggling from addictions that they may have.

Photo Cred: https://www.wernative.org/my-life/my-body/substance-abuse

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