When you get home from medically supervised detox and inpatient rehab, you will start about the business of creating a life set up to support a sober and healthy you. There will be a lot of trial and error. You’ll find that you surprise yourself with how you struggle and where you succeed. There are many ways to go about customizing your life to fit your needs. Here are some useful ways to make this difficult transition easier on you. If you implement these habits, you’ll find that it’s easier to stick to your priorities and have the willpower to shut cravings and triggers down. Everytime you face a trigger and a craving and turn away toward sobriety it gets easier to continue doing just that. These tips can help you stick to your guns, every time.
Accentuate The Positive
Just as you begin to intentionally focus on when you feel negative or begin to act out your negativity, start to also pay attention to what makes you feel positive, and hopeful. If you know what causes you to feel good about living you can use it as a tool in your tool belt when you’re feeling unhappy, nervous or hopeless, and of course, ultimately when you are facing a trigger. Positive things might be, small as knowing that a hug from your partner helps you calm your anxiety to as big as knowing that a trip to the woods can help you feel relief from a trigger.
Eliminate The Negative
When you were in rehab it’s likely that you reflected extensively on your life of addiction. You may have noticed as you looked from a more objective and sober distance from your everyday life, that part of what led to addiction were a set of negative based habits: negative self talk, negative outlook for the future, negative attitude toward others. One of the best things you can do is try to intentionally notice those negative inward moments. Just start to pay attention to them. Once you’ve become aware of them you’ll be able to pause in the moment and react more intentionally to whatever the stimulus in the moment is. Sometimes negative emotions, or outlook can be understandable even necessary. But when our mood starts to turn from logically negative, to hopeless or bitter we need to pay attention. Watch for and try to weed out habitual negativity.
Don’t Let Yourself Get Bored
When people get bored after rehab they often let their mind wander and find themselves feeling lonely and depressed. They may begin to spiral into anxiety and fear and then find themselves in the middle of a craving or trigger. Fill your time with your responsibilities, and that which inspires you to live well.
Let Yourself Rest
Don’t get too busy. There’s a happy medium with most things, and staying busy is no different. Embrace the in between. You need to fill your time with people and activities that make you feel loved, supportive, confident, mentally, physically, and emotionally stretched yet cared for. But you also need to let yourself have good peaceful rest. Let yourself have time for yourself to recharge. Figure out what gives you energy. Are you an extrovert or an introvert? Do you need time secluded to recover from being around a lot of people? Plan that time away. Put it on your calendar. Your defenses will be down if you don’t rest.
Create A List of Priorities
Why did you get sober? Someday when you’re feeling positive and hopeful, sit down and write a list of the reasons you know how vital it is that you stay sober. Write down the ways you love life, what you love to do, who you love and what is important to you. It’s a lot, but try to make it all fit on one sheet of paper. Or you can even get a white board to write it on. Either way you should put these reminders and priorities somewhere you can see them when you need inspiration to keep up the hard work. There’s nothing more motivating than seeing the names of your children, or parents, or your dreams in your own handwriting when you’re struggling from putting the glass to your mouth.
If you or someone you know is or has been addicted to drugs or alcohol you may already know some of the scary ways it can affect the whole life of the addicted person, from halting productivity to deteriorating the most important relationships. If you are suffering from addiction, call us now at (833) 596-3502 to learn more about our intensive inpatient treatment or outpatient detox center in South Florida. We are dedicated to healing each and every one of our patients, including you or your loved one.