Deb, played masterfully by Glenn Close, has spent years trying to help Molly (Mila Kunis) get clean. When Molly shows up at her door again, begging for help after years of relapses and failed attempts at sobriety, Deb lets her in—but with strict boundaries. Molly writhes in agony on a bare mattress in a spare room while Deb watches, torn between heartbreak and resolve.

This decision—to help but not coddle—is what society often calls "tough love." But for a parent, it’s nothing short of agonizing. Every instinct in Deb screams to ease her child’s suffering, to comfort her, to protect her. Yet, she knows from experience that giving Molly too much will only make it easier for her to keep using.

What Deb is doing here, without realizing it, is trying to override her natural impulses in favor of a longer-term goal: helping Molly break free from her addiction. Our instincts as parents are deeply wired—designed to prioritize a child’s immediate survival and comfort. But when addiction enters the picture, those instincts can backfire. Giving money, offering unconditional shelter, or smoothing over painful situations might feel like the "loving" thing to do in the moment, but it can enable the behaviors that keep an addict stuck.

Deb’s decision-making in this moment is an example of a kind of mental tug-of-war. On one side is her emotional, gut-level instinct as a mother, and on the other is the hard, rational knowledge of what Molly needs to survive in the long run. Choosing the latter—choosing to say no or set boundaries—requires an incredible amount of effort, self-control, and emotional resilience.

Parenting an addict is so brutal because addiction twists the typical parent-child dynamic. In most situations, helping your child is the right thing to do. If your child is hungry, you feed them. If they’re sick, you nurse them back to health. But addiction changes the rules. Giving too much to a child in the grip of drugs can make their situation worse, even though your instincts scream at you to protect them at all costs.

This conflict happens because our decision-making systems are built to prioritize short-term rewards—like easing a child’s suffering in the moment—over the longer-term consequences, which feel uncertain and distant. For Deb, the immediate reward of comforting Molly is deeply tempting. It would ease her guilt, soften the tension, and provide a small emotional relief in an unbearably painful situation. But Deb knows from years of experience that these small, short-term fixes have often enabled Molly to continue using.

In order to stick to "tough love," Deb has to focus on the bigger picture and resist the pull of immediate comfort. That’s why parents often describe tough love as being harder on them than it is on the child. They aren’t just denying their child’s wants; they’re actively fighting against their own instincts to protect and provide.

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The effort it takes to override those instincts is exhausting, and Deb carries that exhaustion in every scene of the film. You can see it in the way she locks her wallet in her drawer, hides her car keys, and hesitates before answering Molly’s desperate pleas. It’s not that she doesn’t care—she cares more than anything. But she knows that giving in would be easier for both of them in the moment, even as it risks further harm in the future.

The emotional toll of these choices can’t be overstated. Deb is faced with guilt no matter what she decides. If she helps too much, she risks enabling Molly’s addiction and blaming herself for every setback. If she draws too firm a line, she risks pushing Molly away and blaming herself if Molly doesn’t make it.

This is why the weight of these decisions can feel crushing. Parents like Deb aren’t just trying to save their child—they’re trying to do so in a way that won’t completely break them, emotionally or financially. Every decision feels like a gamble, and the stakes couldn’t be higher.

What drives Deb to keep trying, even after so much pain, is the hope that this time, things might be different. In Four Good Days, Molly has four days to stay clean so she can qualify for an injection that may curb her cravings. For Deb, these four days represent a fragile flicker of hope. She wants so badly to believe Molly can make it, but after years of relapses, she knows better than to let herself fully trust again.

And yet, she continues to hope. Parents of addicts know this feeling all too well. Hope is what keeps them going, but it’s also what makes the heartbreak so unbearable. Every time Molly says, "This time is different," Deb feels the pull to believe her. But every broken promise has left scars that make it harder to fully lean into that hope.

What Deb shows us is that loving an addict is often about living in that space between hope and realism. It’s about holding on just tightly enough that you don’t lose them, but not so tightly that you lose yourself.

Four Good Days lays bare the heartbreaking decisions parents of addicts face every day. Deb’s story is one of love stretched to its limits, where every choice feels like the wrong one, and every boundary comes with a cost.

For parents like Deb, loving a child through addiction means battling against their own instincts, fighting guilt at every turn, and holding onto hope even when it feels impossible. It’s a reminder that there is no "right" way to parent an addict—only the next hard choice, and the hope that someday, somehow, it might lead to healing.