When you’re recovering from drug or alcohol addiction you may notice that your emotions and reactions to different situations feel strange to you. It may feel like you can’t even recognize yourself in your feelings. Addiction to most drugs and alcohol alters your mood, causes depression and anxiety, alters the intensity of the moment and often skews reality. Now that you’re sober, it may be difficult to feel the emotional highs and lows of your true emotions. Here are some questions you can ask yourself to process your emotions after any given situation.
Start With What Happened: After an event, be it an argument, an embarrassing moment, a mistake you made at work, or anything that you feel like you need to pull apart and understand better
What Was The Catalyst: What do you think led to the situation to begin with. It’s important to understand the context of a situation before you can fully understand what happened
How Do You Feel: Now that you have a little distance from the situation in question, try to remember your immediate reaction. What did you feel emotionally, right away? Also pay attention to the way your body felt immediately. As the situation or moment bore on, how did those emotions change? How did your body feel as your emotions changed?
Then What Did You Do: What actions did you take as a result of the way the situation made you feel? If you felt angry, did it cause you to create a scene? Did you have an outburst or worse, get violent? If you felt sad, did you cry, did you find yourself hysterical? Did you hide or run away? Were you anxious? Did your body tighten up and did you have a panic attack? Did something make you feel elated and so you screamed or jumped about?
How About Now: Now how do you feel? Are your emotions and actions from the situation in question still affecting you? Are there long term consequences to your reactions to the situation that you’re trying to understand? Will your life be altered for the better or worse?
It’s important to understand the way your emotions motivate your actions. This exercise will help you as you try to improve your relationships and your own peace of mind. It can help you grow into the kind of person who not only processes emotional baggage, but also engages in difficult situations in a healthy and sober way.
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, and are seeking out addiction recovery in Florida, 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 the health and wellbeing of our patients. Let us help guide you to the path of sober living.
