As the great poet Mary Oliver wrote in the last line of her poem, The Summer Day, “Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?” Surely in recovery you don’t want to be a bitter, resentful, mean man or woman! LOL, just so you know this is...
Defense mechanisms are used by people to distance themselves from feelings and reality in which they don’t want to look. There are are a number of defense mechanisms which exact a desired result. A defensive person may not be aware as to why they sometimes react in...
When you have an addiction, your children, no matter their age, already know that something is off with you. They have learned to survive lack of care, unpredictability, chaos and in some cases physical, emotional and sexual abuse. Living and growing up in a home...
According to the National Center for Health Statistics’ December 2017 report, unintentional injuries, the fourth leading cause of deaths in 2015, became the third leading cause in 2016, while chronic lower respiratory diseases became the fourth. In lieu of the opioid...
What’s so bad about feeling sorry for yourself? Put more compassionately, what’s so bad about grieving? When we get sober, at some point we may recognize how much of our lives we have wasted away with alcohol or drugs. This realization encompasses a huge loss, so...
There’s an often repeated verse from the Bible, It is more blessed to give than to receive. While this may be true, the opposite is also true, because you give someone else the opportunity to feel good. Feeling good is what recovery is all about, and of course there’s...
The therapeutic technique of Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) was developed in 1987 by Francine Shapiro, Ph.D. It has since become a empirically proven treatment for people suffering from trauma. Before practicing EMDR, therapists must learn the...
When coming into a rehab or our first fellowship meeting, we may feel shut down, angry or defeated. It’s normal because our world has been turned upside down and inside out. It takes time to let go and admit that alcohol or an opioid controlled our lives. We may be...
Codependency can impede your recovery because of its innate symptoms of insecurity, denial, control, and manipulation. More signs of codependency include: attracted to needy people, feel angry, victimized, unappreciated and used; come from troubled, repressed, or...
We come into recovery with preconceived notions, behaviors, regrets, guilt and shame. We also come into recovery with the wounded part of ourselves that needs compassion and understanding. All parts that make up the whole of our feelings and behaviors need to be...
