The holidays are a time to be spent with friends and family, eating too much, and being thankful for what you have in life. It is a favorite time of year for many, but with the excitement comes the difficulty of staying sober. Odds are, many people will spend their holidays toasting with champagne or
Thanksgiving is a day we associate with being with family, eating delicious food, and being thankful. Rarely do we think of Thanksgiving as a time to help those in recovery avoid relapse. Your assistance to a loved one in recovery is an incredibly important part of their process in getting healthy. With just a simple
Windward Way Recovery is only as good as it’s staff and in an effort to highlight their individual efforts, we interviewed a few of our all star cast of employees in this version of Employee Heartbeat. This interview with John Ryan Bennett illustrates his passions and background in his own words. First we asked Ryan what
The holiday season is a time for reflection on the previous year and to be thankful, which can be tough for recovering addicts. With family gatherings, cold weather, and memories of past holidays, it’s easy to understand how important relapse prevention is in the later months of the year. In an effort to combat addiction
The former heroin user recovered under impossible conditions and is now sharing the message that others can, too…
It is often suggested that individuals struggling with addiction consider therapy as a resource for their treatment and recovery. Individual therapy offers tremendous benefits in processing past, present, and potential future events, uncovering unconscious defenses and working to change negative behaviors. Individual therapy builds itself upon openness and compassion- it is a dynamic process that entails deep trust and intimacy between the client and therapist. Family therapy, however, offers a different angle to addiction issues. This kind of work activates and engages each member, defines individual parts within the addiction cycle, and creates a recipe for familial, rather than just individual, change.
With the firm warning from my sponsor and the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous – “Nothing counted but thoroughness and honesty.” He handed me a notebook to write in and a couple pens. He asked if I had a quiet place I could spend the time I would need to get it done. Of course, I had the time and place. He had made it very clear to me that my very life was on the line. Knowing how many times I had been face to face with the “Reaper”, I certainly did not have any doubts about that. Guys like me don’t get to knock on death’s door as many as I had. I should have been dust years ago.
Effective treatment for substance abuse disorder takes the whole person into account. After all, alcoholism and addiction are complicated issues, with a physical component as well as a psychological one. Sometimes described as a “spiritual malady” because of its complexity, substance abuse disorder is a spectrum disorder that responds to a combination of different treatment modalities.
