About brandi mac
Brandi Mac is a critical care nurse practitioner, author, and addiction reform advocate whose work bridges the gap between clinical expertise and the raw reality of loving someone in active addiction. Her writing has been endorsed by Caron treatment centers, and she has partnered with organizations including Partnership to End Addiction to reshape how families are supported through crisis.
She is the author of Do What You Can Live, a practical guide for families navigating addiction that rejects shame-based approaches in favor of harm reduction, honest communication, and sustainable boundaries.
Why I do this work
I spent years drowning in advice that did not match the reality of my daughter's addiction. Tough love. Detaching. Cutting her off. Letting her "hit bottom." None of it made sense to the part of me that still loved her and refused to abandon her.
The turning point came the morning I shaved my head after another brutal night shift in the ICU. Everything I had been holding together fell apart. In that moment, I realized the question I had been living with was not "How do I save her?" It was: What can I live with if tomorrow brings the worst possible call?
That question shaped everything that came next. It shaped my boundaries, my relationship with my daughter, my advocacy, and eventually my book. I am here because families deserve more than slogans and fear tactics. They deserve practical tools, emotional validation, and support that does not break them open even further.
Clinical background
I have spent over a decade in critical care caring for some of the sickest and most vulnerable patients. I understand the medical side of addiction; the physiology, the trauma, the withdrawal, the complications. I also understand the human side, which is often much harder.
My advocacy and education work bridges these worlds. I write, speak, and teach using a trauma-informed, harm reduction approach that honors the realities families actually face. I use my clinical background to translate complex medical concepts into something real and usable, and I speak for the families who feel invisible in a system that was not designed with them in mind.
Lived Experiences
I am the mother of a daughter in long-term recovery. I have stood in the doorways of fear, grief, and hope more times than I can count. I have parented through active fentanyl use, homelessness, pregnancy, detox, relapse, and recovery. I walked through the darkest parts of this journey and somehow found my way back to myself.
My advocacy exists because she survived. It exists because I learned how to stay connected without destroying myself. It exists because families deserve the kind of support I never had.
Professional Work
MSN, AG-ACNP board-certified nurse practitioner
10+ years in critical care, trauma, and emergency medicine
Writer behind Prescribed Chaos on Substack
Author of Do What You Can Live: A Survival Guide for Families Navigating Addiction, Grief and Impossible Choices
Podcast Host: Do What You Can Live With
My why
I’m not here because it’s trendy. I’m here because it was either this or break apart completely.
If you’re in the middle of the storm—grieving, confused, exhausted—I just want you to know:
You’re not crazy. You’re not weak.
You’re just trying to do what you can live with.
And I can help.