by Sally Rosa | Mar 24, 2014 | Addiction Articles, Sobriety For Women
Why Do Women In Recovery Relapse?
Relapse is too often a part of women’s recovery stories. This doesn’t have to be the case though! It’s possible for addicts to go a lifetime without relapsing!
Even if a woman in recovery does relapse, hope isn’t lost. In fact, valuable lessons can be learned after relapsing! We can take our slip and turn it into a stronger, more vigorous, program of spiritual action!
1) Stress
While we’re in our active addictions, we’re usually using or drinking to suppress negative emotions. One of these is stress. Raise your hand if you like stress. I don’t see any hands!
Early recovery isn’t easy. Staying sober is overwhelming. Finding and keeping a job is overwhelming. Making sober friends is overwhelming. Life is overwhelming! Working a strong recovery program (aka being spiritually fit) provides us with the foundation and support network we need. Without this support, it’s easy to deal with stress in negative, harmful ways.
2) Not Changing People, Places, and Things
People– Being surrounded by old friends isn’t healthy. They may remind you of old habits, be negative towards your recovery, or just generally be assh**es. Hanging around old people is one of the easiest ways to justify a relapse. “Everyone else is drinking, why can’t I?,” you might ask yourself. To put it another way, people can change our motives and early-recovery is all about motives.
Places – Many women try to get sober in the same area they used in. This usually doesn’t work too well. It’s hard to stay sober when you know you can get high within five minutes. In early-recovery, it’s important to stay away from places that trigger strong thoughts of using.
Things – Getting rid of anything that reminds us of drinking or getting high is key! Holding onto paraphernalia and objects associated with active addiction isn’t a good idea. Imagine if someone kept a crack pipe with them during early-recovery. They’d probably end up smoking crack. Duh!
3) Occasions
Holidays, celebrations, and family get-togethers are some of the happiest occasions around. However, for addicts in early-recovery, they can be tough to get through sober. I know I’ve been guilty of thinking “you mean I can’t drink on my wedding day? What kind of crap is this!”
Holidays and celebrations require a strong support system to get through. Without people to talk to, without an active spiritual connection, it’s easy to justify one glass of wine. We all know what just one glass of wine leads to!
Then there are funerals. Funerals are stressful, emotionally challenging, and plain-old suck! Who wants to deal with emotional pain when they could get high instead? Without an active and strong support systems, we can easily relapse into harmful behaviors.
4) Relationships
In early-recovery, us addicts often swap addictions. Oh, you’re a pill addict? Well, now you’re codependent. I know that was true for me!
We reach for anything that makes us feel better. Getting into a relationship in early-sobriety is pretty dangerous. I mean, we hear it all the time! It’s commonly recommended to stay away from relationships (that means sex too!) until we’ve finished our steps. At that point, we’re spiritually fit and have a firm understanding on what’s appropriate and inappropriate.
One final reason to stay away from relationships in early-sobriety is that the people we seek out are usually sick. Imagine if you’re dating a boy and he relapses. It becomes that much easier to justify getting high with him.
5) Not Working a Program of Recovery
This is probably the biggest reason women, of all lengths of sobriety, relapse. Going to meetings, getting a sponsor, working the twelve-steps, and sponsoring other women, is a vital part of recovery. Hell, that is recovery!
Graduating a women’s treatment center is also pretty important. Us addicts are good at staring things, but pretty lousy at finishing them. Let’s finish something!
Going to treatment and working a program of recovery is what keeps women sober. Without these things, we’re often miserable and depressed, which makes getting high look like a pretty good option.
Although relapse in a part of many women’s stories, it doesn’t have to be! If you do relapse, hopefully you’ll learn some valuable lessons and make it back to the rooms of recovery. To avoid relapse, shut up and listen to the women who came before you! Take a few suggestions and grow into a woman of grace and dignity!
by Sally Rosa | Jan 25, 2013 | Addiction Treatment, Recovery
Treatment is just the beginning. I used to hate when people told me that! It didn’t matter if they were therapists, family, or friends. I didn’t want to hear it! Turns out they were telling me the truth though.
Moving into a sober-living house (a halfway or three-quarter house) after treatment is incredibly helpful. Early sobriety is tough. Being in a structured, safe, and sober environment makes the transition from treatment to real-life easier. Simple as that.
Most newly sober women don’t know what to expect from a halfway house. They think it’s going to be dark, dank, and depressing. Or they think it’ll be a place to use without anyone knowing. Or they think something else crazy. I thought all those things and more!
The truth is that living in a halfway house provides strong community support. It’s yet another safety net against relapse.
The Top 10 Things You Should Do in a Halfway House
1) Follow the rules
2) Go to meetings
3) Get a sponsor
4) Make friends with other sober women
5) Get a job and begin to become self-sufficient
6) Get honest – ask for help if you think about using
7) Start praying and building your relationship with God
8) Be grateful for this opportunity at a second chance
9) Be respectful of your roommates – that means clean up after yourself!
10) Become a productive members of society – get in a routine and stick with it
The Top 10 Things You Shouldn’t Do in a Halfway House
1) Don’t use drugs or drink!
2) Don’t continue to act out (on an eating disorder, sexually, excessive shopping, etc.)
3) Don’t sleep all day
4) Don’t relay on everyone else to support you
5) Don’t only hang out with newly sober people – get some old-timers in your life!
6) Don’t be disrespectful to your roommates or house managers
7) Don’t get violent in the house
8) Don’t fall too far behind on rent
9) Don’t continue to do the same things and expect different results!
10) Don’t think you can do this on your own – if everyone else needs help, so do you!
Follow these lists to guarantee your success while living in a halfway house!
by A Women in Sobriety | Dec 21, 2012 | Addiction Treatment, Sobriety For Women
One Woman’s Story of Taking Suggestions
As a scared eighteen year old girl entering treatment for alcoholism and an eating disorder, I had no idea what to expect. I had no idea what to expect from treatment. I had no idea what to expect from my life. I had no idea what to expect in so many ways!
I tried to convince myself I only needed help for “debilitating anxiety.” I had no plan to stay sober from any of my addictions. I was looking for a temporary break, a bit of peace and quiet. After staying in a hospital and slowly putting together a few days, I took my first suggestion. I came to an extended care treatment center in Florida.
Extended Care in Florida
I’d call my parents everyday, anxious to tell them how well I was doing. Of course, I was lying, I just wanted to get out! I sat in groups, saw doctors, and had individual therapy. I smoked cigarettes with my roommates and talked s**t.
I liked going to outside meetings and getting a glimpse of the real world the most. I couldn’t wait to have what everyone on the outside had. I didn’t want someone checking on me every half-hour. I didn’t want someone verifying if I could go to Starbucks. I didn’t want someone telling me I couldn’t use the phone.
Most of my peers from treatment moved out and roomed together. Some went to “three-quarter houses,” which were loosely organized and should have been called crack houses! I wanted that freedom. I wanted a car. I wanted no curfew. I debated going back to college. I wanted to join a sorority, drink in moderation, and get my life back. I wanted what I wanted when I wanted it.
Today, most of my peers from treatment aren’t sober. Two are dead. Of the fifty confused, young women I was in treatment with, only myself and one other are still sober.
Today, I thank God I got what I needed, NOT what I wanted.
What the Hell is a Halfway House Anyway?
That one other girl who’s still sober, well, her and I chose to go to halfway houses after treatment. When my treatment center suggested a halfway house, I reaction was dismal at best. I didn’t even know what a halfway house was!
One of my childhood friends lived next door to a halfway house. She always told me not to make eye contact with the residents and to go inside when they were smoking. I asked her why and she responded, “they’re all crazy people who do crack all day and have mental diseases.” So, when my treatment center suggested I go to a halfway, I wasn’t sure I wanted any part of it.
I finally learned what a halfway house really was. I was still skeptical. Bed-checks? Curfews? Been there, done that. I was pretty fed up with people running my life.
Taking Suggestions Saved My Life!
Today, I look at going to a halfway house as the best decisions I ever made. Sure, I didn’t want authority, but I was willing to try it out for a few months.
My thinking went something like this, “sure, authority sucks. What other option do I have though? If I start using again, I’ll probably die. Even if I don’t, I’ll be separated from my family and everyone else…”
Sharing a house with six women and sleeping in a twin-bed was never my idea of luxury. The feeling of belonging, hope, and happiness I experienced was better than anything else I’d ever felt. See, through living in a halfway house, I was introduced to Alcoholics Anonymous. I was introduced to young women in recovery. I was introduced to a new life.
Women with time took me to AA meetings my treatment center didn’t go to. I loved these meetings! There were women I could relate to. There were women talking about the Big Book and “recovering from a seemingly hopeless state of mind and body.” There were women talking about sponsorship and the twelve-steps.
Above all, my halfway house kept me accountable. I met my sponsor at a meeting the halfway house brought in. My halfway house manger consistently asked me where I was with my step work. When I wasn’t doing it, she pushed me to. I finished the twelve-steps. I felt, for the first time in my life, a real difference. I didn’t want to go home and try to drink in moderation. I wasn’t obsessed with getting high. I was taught how to live my life!
I started working part-time and taking college classes. I had the love and support of other girls doing the same thing. Sure, there were times I wanted to drink. If I hadn’t been in a halfway house, if I was in my own apartment, the chances are high that I would have. To put it another way, I never lacked a shoulder to lean on. Anytime I needed to vent (which, in early sobriety, was always!), there was someone there.
A Sober Woman
My experience in a halfway house allowed me to get reacquainted with life and all the responsibilities it entails.
Today, I have a full life. I’m a college graduate. I’m a sponsor. I’m still sober. These are high milestones for an addict and alcoholic!
I frequently remember my time in the halfway house with a bittersweet smile. I remember the ups and downs, the times I wanted to leave. I remember the end of my commitment, when I was actually ready to leave. I don’t have any regrets.
The women from my halfway house shaped me from a scared nineteen year old girl, to a mature and sober woman. Today, I can accept life’s hardships. Today, life is good, but only because I did the necessary work!
