Sober Living

Identifying and taking the necessary preventative measures to avoid potential triggers will make up a large part of the recovery efforts for patients with addictive disorders. This will involve increasing self-awareness about the shifting moods and emotional responses to activities, locations, people, and even television programs and movies. Once transitioned into their independent sober living…

For many patients in addiction recovery, their pre-treatment lives might have been about substance misuse and unhealthy behaviors that fed their addictive disorder. Even simple daily experiences like going to work might have been disrupted by urges to misuse substances as an addictive disorder began to monopolize their time. This type of constant disruption is…

When addiction recovery patients initially achieve and maintain a period of short-term sobriety, they often experience intense highs and extreme lows. The addictive mindsets that lean toward the extreme perceive their feelings unrealistically and dramatically — the lows will feel that much more depressing and the highs too euphoric. Experiencing these fluctuations in mood and…

As addiction recovery patients re-enter society, maintaining their sobriety should remain as their primary goal. Everything you have accomplished from work to re-establishing personal relationships will eventually topple if you are unable to maintain consistent, long-term sobriety. This is not to suggest an all-or-nothing approach to continued sobriety. Relapses happen and the stigma surrounding what…

Whether you are being discharged from an extended stay at inpatient services or are receiving ongoing outpatient treatment for addiction recovery, learning how to navigate friendships both old and new can be a crucial lesson for maintaining sobriety in the long-term. Once addiction recovery patients begin to acclimate to transitioning into their more independent, sober…

Several realizations can come to light after you have achieved newfound sobriety; these can be both small and large in scale from realizing you have been parting your hair on the wrong side to coming to grips with the emotional trauma that has fueled your addictive behavior. Once the cloud of confusion from the veritably…

Perhaps the only form of therapy that is not suited to the ongoing sobriety maintenance so necessary in the addiction recovery process would be no therapy at all. Achieving sobriety through abstaining from addictive substances is one aspect of addiction recovery treatment, but the ongoing and lifelong sobriety maintenance that addiction recovery patients will need…

From Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) to Smart Recovery, gratitude is known as an essential pillar to any addiction recovery process. Understanding and being able to express how grateful you are for not only a chance at being sober but also for all that is good in your life is an important step in re-entering society as…

One of the more common problems for recovery patients revolves around rates of success based on the percentage of patients who maintain long-term sobriety in contrast to those who may have relapsed after leaving treatment. Although we shouldn’t see it in such black-and-white terms, rehab facilities and the medical community have found few other ways…