The only way to help a troubled kid is unconditional love. You respect the person but you dont have to respect his choices. You support him in his sobriety but never his addiction. You can offer him food but never money that he can use for drugs. You love but never trust. You listen to understand. You ask him what kind of support he needs? You ask him what kind of support you can offer him.
You never leave your car keys or money where he can be tempted to steal them. You invite him for dinner or lunch. You make sure he has a warm coat but if he loses it (sold it for drugs) then you don’t ask him what happened to it or offer to buy him another one. You tell him that you care about him and that you are his friend and whether you think he hears you or not he does. It will mean a lot to him. He will remember your words when he is alone and hurting. It is very important for kids who are hurting and are in pain to know that they are NOT alone and NOT forgotten; That people care about them and there is a reason for them to care about themselves and work towards getting help and climb out of the dark place.
The most important thing to remember is who YOU are and that YOU have to keep moving up and not let his pain and his problems bring you down. Misery loves company so make sure YOU are NOT the company. It is very easy to fall into the trap of feeling another’s very real and very agonizing pain and trying to be in the moment with them to understand them. That is NOT how you are supposed to understand them. You are supposed to understand that their pain is very real, but you are supposed to also understand that self medicating that pain to avoid the causes of the pain is destructive and detrimental to his emotional and physical well being. The right way to handle it is to seek therapeutic assistance. Most kids don’t know how to ask for help or how to find the assistance they need to heal from such pain. The more support a kid has to find the appropriate help they need the more chance they have to reach out to get the appropriate help they need to recover from their demons and their issues that cause their burdens and their pain.