While you’re going through treatment, it is vital you take advantage of connecting with your therapists and staff in your residential treatment center. This means not only listening to them and sitting for sessions, but actively connecting and reaching out to them throughout the process. Being an active participant with them can help keep you accountable and become more serious about your sobriety.

You don’t have to go through it alone

Going through the addiction recovery process leaves you with about a million unknowns. How will you feel throughout detox? How long will it last? How do I control my temptations? Can I really do this?

While in active addiction, your brain is chemically wired to depend on your substance of choice. When you stop taking the substance, your body goes into withdrawal symptoms and cravings are at a maximum. Essentially, your brain isn’t going to make the recovery process easy on you, since it is requiring you to give it more of the substance you’ve been addicted to. Being in a treatment center with resources to help you through this process can help greatly. Not only available medication to help make you more comfortable, but people to talk to about their experiences with detox and what to expect. Knowing that what you’re feeling is normal and can be overcome can be very comforting. Chances are, most staff have walked in your shoes and can offer valuable advice and guidance.

Learning from others’ experiences are very helpful, because navigating a new sober life after addiction can be pretty lonely and confusing. While it is a relief and an accomplishment to be sober, it can also be stressful when you’re ready to return home and start living your new life. Having people to turn to will help keep you on track and give you a safe space to vent about any emotions you may be feeling.

Get to the root cause

Addiction recovery is so much more than just becoming sober. The key to long lasting recovery is to get to the root cause of the addiction, and treat that with just as much importance as becoming physically sober. Treating one without the other will exacerbate the other, and it will eventually reignite the cycle of use. Many times people enter treatment without knowing what the root cause of their addiction is, so being able to connect with your therapist to dig deep and figure it out will allow you to heal.

Many times, people who suffer from addiction also suffer from some sort of depression, anxiety or even trauma. This can include PTSD from growing up in an uncomfortable or volatile home, having a parent who suffered (or is currently suffering) from addiction, having experienced war combat, sexual abuse, physical abuse and much more. Drug or alcohol use is an escape for people who are suffering from trauma, so being able to treat the trauma will help give clients healthy coping skills that do not involve drugs or alcohol. The same can be said for anxiety, depression and many other dual diagnosis and co-occurring disorders. Connecting with your therapists and staff can help you overcome these issues, since they know ways to help you. They will offer a safe environment for you to open up about your past, and likely be able to relate to you in many ways.

They can help heal your relationships

A major issue with addiction is that it tends to fracture a lot of important relationships in your life. Often times when people enter treatment, they leave behind a lot of resentment and anger with people close to them. This is because families are left to pick up the pieces left behind from addiction, and have likely had negative and damaging experiences from their behaviors. Having a great relationship with your family and supportive friends are really important in recovery, so it is essential to work on fixing these relationships.

Working closely with a therapist can help improve these relationships, so that you can go home to a healthier, happier environment than when you left to enter treatment. Therapists and staff can help give you advice and tools to work on with rebuilding trust and love with the ones you care about the most. Staff and therapists can help you navigate difficult conversations, answering any questions you may have in anticipation and being there for you if your family isn’t ready to receive it yet.

About Cliffside Malibu

Going through the recovery process leaves clients with a lot of unknowns. Learning and growing from connecting with therapists and staff will help take your recovery to the next level. We are here for you to not only listen and talk to, but to be an emotional support system to connect with.

Each patient is then matched with one of these five stages of the Transtheoretical Model: Precontemplation, Contemplation, Preparation, Action and Maintenance. An individualized treatment plan is created based on their current stage of change. This process is in place to ensure that all our patients receive the best treatment path possible for their own specific need. Our goal is to move individuals through their treatment by assessing their readiness for change and formulating stage-matched interventions in order to move them through their respective stage.

It is the policy of Cliffside Malibu to ensure that all individuals who present with chemical dependency issues are assessed for the appropriate level of care. We strive to provide continuum of care including medically supervised detox, residential treatment, day treatment and outpatient services. Services are provided to individuals with a primary diagnosis of substance abuse and/or alcohol addiction. Individuals seeking treatment are assessed by qualified staff to ensure program criteria are met and that each individual admitted is placed in the appropriate level of care for treatment. The program is designed and structured for individuals who are in need of a supportive environment in order to maintain Sobriety.

For more information on Cliffside Malibu, visit cliffsidemalibu.com