Battling addiction is never easy, especially when the victim doesn’t have support. When your loved one enters a treatment facility, there are plenty of ways to help them along the road to recovery. Start with these five tips.
Be Available
Let your loved one know they can talk to you. Show your respect for them by listening to what your loved one has to say. Listen to their stories, ranging from time they spent in rehabilitation to just how they’re feeling in the here and now. Whether it’s a quick phone call, a visit, or a meeting for lunch at a local deli, allowing them to share their thoughts and emotions with you will only strengthen your relationship and help prevent them from slipping back into the slump of addiction.
Offer a Place to Stay
In addition to opening your availability to your loved one who is recovering from substance abuse, opening your home also demonstrates how much their life means to you. In times of trouble, they need to know they have someone they can turn to, a beacon of light, a sliver of hope in their crazy, mixed up life when they have nowhere else to go. You don’t need a spare room—even your couch can be a safe haven for your loved one struggling to live a normal life.
Explore Hobbies Together
Keeping busy helps distracting the mind and pushing current struggles to the back. Hence, it is important for those who are recovering from substance abuse to pick up again the activities they used to enjoy before the addiction. Taking up a hobby is an excellent way for your loved one to get involved in outdoor activities and make friends with people who have similar interests. Hobbies that are mentally stimulating and/or physically challenging are particularly beneficial.
Looking for suggestions? From painting to bowling, this huge list of hobbies is useful for people of any personalities.
Suggest Support Groups
It may sound cheesy at first, but it might be a good idea to encourage your loved one to attend meetings or programs especially orchestrated for recovering substance abusers. Sometimes people need support from those who are facing similar situations. It’s important for them to discover that they’re not the only ones struggling with addiction. Who knows? Attending a support group may help your loved one find other, more effective methods of surviving the recovery process.
Love Them Unconditionally
This is a crucial time in your loved one’s life. Even though they may not admit it, they need you. They need you to walk with them through darkness and help them live a substance-free life.
Sometimes it is easy for us to be judgmental. But this can blind our ability to genuinely care for others. If you condemn your loved one for mistakes that they’ve made, the previous life they’ve led, you will only push them further away, increasing their risk of turning back to drugs and alcohol.
If substance abuse damaged your relationship in the past, it’s time to move on, because nothing compares to the sting of regret, the excruciating pain of wishing you’d fixed things before it was too late.
Addiction can have a major effect on family relationship. Incorporating these five ideas in your relationship with your loved one will help preventing them from becoming part of that statistic.
Featured photo credit: Credit: johnhope14 via imcreator.com
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