Many of us recovering from addiction find ourselves needing to complete treatment more than once, and we often find that there is some stigma involved in this. We’re looked down upon if we relapse. We’re frustrated with ourselves if we don’t recover quickly enough. We become increasingly impatient with ourselves when we feel we’ve let ourselves and others down by not ‘getting it right the first time. We can try and remind ourselves that there is no shame in needing treatment more than one time. It doesn’t mean that something is wrong with us or that we’re more likely to fail.
Often when we need to return to treatment it’s because there are still some important skills we have yet to master, such as relaxation techniques and mind-redirecting exercises to help ourselves cope with addictive urges. Relapsing doesn’t mean we’re bad people or that we’re not good enough, and many of us have a tendency to beat ourselves up and judge ourselves harshly. It simply means we need more practice, more support, and more resources. We might need to redesign our lifestyles and see where they are influencing our tendency to relapse. We might need to take a closer look at how our habits and routines are impacting our ability to get sober. We might need to work on certain life skills. We might need to incorporate more healing practices such as meditation and energy healing into our self-care routines.
Very often there are still unhealed issues fueling our difficulties. We might have traumatic experiences we haven’t fully confronted. There might be relationships that are still particularly troublesome or triggering for us. There might be things or people in our lives we still feel the need to escape from, using a drug or addictive behavior. When we need to return to treatment, we’re being invited to do more self-exploration. We’re being asked to look deeper into the ways in which we need to work on our self-love. We’re being encouraged to ask ourselves why we’re still feeling self-destructive, and why we’re still feeling overpowered by our addictions. Often these things are subconscious, so we want to look not only at the conscious thoughts and feelings we have that we’re already aware of, but what the underlying ones are that are causing us pain. We have to go deep into the various layers of these issues, otherwise, we might always find ourselves back where we started, dealing with our addictive urges and deep mental and emotional pain, and caught in recurring cycles of self-harm.
The Guest House is a welcoming and supportive recovery home where you will be met with open arms, wherever where you are on your journey, without judgment or expectation. Call 855-483-7800 today for more information.