Recovery is not automatically a trip down paradise lane. People in recovery need to ditch bad habits as much as they did while addicted to drugs. The reason people break away from addiction is for a better life. Giving it up is a great start, but it is not enough to sustain sobriety. The person will have more work to do to ensure they establish the type of life they always wanted. When they ditch bad habits, they are well on their way to a journey of healing.
What Are Bad Habits
Everyone has habits they do on a daily basis. They get up, brush teeth, get dressed, go to work. Whatever routine they have, they often become a slave to that routine to the point they have a hard time moving away from it towards something new. Unconscious behavior can be good or bad. A bad habit is one of those behaviors that is detrimental to people’s physical or mental health, linked to a lack of self-control. Addiction brings it out in people but there are ways to get around them.
Links to Addiction
Addiction and bad habits go hand-in-hand, but since everyone has vices, there are some who just blow them off. They can actually be life-threatening for some people in recovery who need to recover from addiction and bad habits derail their journey. The need to use addictive substances to cope can cause serious issues for people in recovery. Some of the causes:
- Addictive personality with character traits like impulsive behaviors and deviant behavior
- Stuck in recovery and self-medicate with bad habits
- Staying sober is a challenge but people wait till they are established in recovery before they begin working on other bad habits
- Some re prepared to settle for less than their ideal life in recovery
- People fall into addiction have false beliefs that if some are good, more is better (chocolate, sex, etc)
Risks and Dangers
It may not seem detrimental to people in recovery, but there are inherent risks and dangers associated with addictive behaviors. Maladaptive behavior is defined as a type of behavior that inhibits a person’s ability to adjust to a certain situation. The reason why people choose it is that they are stuck in recovery. These behaviors make things easier, but it is also a means of avoiding dealing with life. Examples of this include exercise addiction, comfort eating, and more. Bad habits can lead to a negative perspective on recovery and steps back on the journey. They may impact mental health and physical well-being. In order to overcome bad habits in recovery, a person needs to overcome the characteristics of addiction that make it easy to fall into bad habits. This means:
- Picking something to make better (not doing it all at once)
- Feeling guilty about bad habits does not solve problems of low self-esteem
- Mindfulness can be good for helping people come to grips with bad habits
- Writing down benefits of giving it up can have a powerful impact
- Tell other people for accountability
Effective ways of coping with this would include therapy, support groups, medication changes, or any of the above. It is hard to know what to do but adjusting expectations and figuring out how to find the right help can mean the difference between spiraling into the rabbit hole and finding the right support that kicks recovery into a new gear.
The Guest House will help you recover your life from addiction. If you do drugs or drink, you can come here without fear of stigma or shame to healing. We offer lots of individual programs for support. Our program provides special focus for professionals including chiropractors, nurses, doctors, lawyers, and more who need help with addiction recovery. Call us to find out more: 855-483-7800.