The normal person who has a disease goes to a doctor. We go to a program. But how to choose and be successful in treatment? First off there are a few different treatment options. The usual method is going through detox. Most detox centers give you 3-5 days to clean out your system and rest your body. There is medications such as Ativan and Valium to help the alcoholic and addict be a little more comfortable. The first thing to remember is whatever your drug of choice was the detox will be the opposite. Opiate and Alcoholics tend to be jittery and have racing hearts and thoughts. Stimulant folks tend to crash and sleep a lot. It is OK your body is adjusting to not having the drugs in you. Contrary to some beliefs unless you are an heavy alcoholic you can't die from detox, you may wish you would die but you won't. It is important to feel the detox and keep it in your memory because if you relapse the next detox will be worse and the one after that even more so. Recovery is about tools and memory is a big tool. When the cravings and triggers come and they will something as simple as remembering the detox may sway your urge. Humans avoid pain at all cost which is why we use. The pain of our lives become so overwhelming we escape with chemicals until the chemicals become a problem. After a day or two your mind will become clear and every bit of damage you have ever done to everyone will begin to overwhelm you with shame and guilt. This is also normal. You may have a desire to pick up a phone and apologize to everyone you ever wronged don't. First off you need to fell the shame and guilt and put it next to the detox memory for further use. Second you aren't ready to face the emotional response others may have. It takes time to learn the skills to stay sober. The more time you have the better chance of people responding to you especially if you have relapsed before. The shame and guilt pass as you begin to see who you can be not who you were.

    At this point some people will begin to talk to you about treatment options and there are a lot. Inpatient, Outpatient, Residential, Transitional, Support Groups, Therapy and on and on. The treatment that is right for you is a personal decision that if you are honest about you will find. Chances are you are now looking at all the things you absolutely have to do right now since you have ignored them for the last 30 yrs. The best treatment is the residential, it gives 90 days to a yr to get yourself together. It removes you from your environment and allows you to take a honest look at yourself. It is normally staffed by both addiction counselor and professionals. The counselors tend to be in recovery themselves. A word here about the professional;s don't discount them because they haven't been there and done that. You can learn from everyone if you are willing to hear the words rather then the speaker. Many of us are resistant to people who are different. It is one of the biggest mistakes people make in recovery. The scientific, and psychiatric worlds have done a lot of very good research on what makes us tick. Some of the best counselors I have known were not addicts they were doing a job that interests them. Residential treatment also has the advantage of peer support 24 hrs a day. Going through your journey you will find comfort in knowing you are not alone. 28 day programs are made more for those who haven't lost everything. It is good to step back from the stressors of life and learn new tools. From Residential or Inpatient you should move on to Outpatient or a transitional house. Outpatient usually meets 3 or 4 days a week for several hours to help maintain focus and structure. In outpatient most people learn skills that will further there recovery in the real world. Transitional Houses are also mildly structured but give greater freedom to practice what you have learned in a supportive environment. Support groups such as AA, NA, SOS and Life Ring allow you to build new relationships with a variety of people. The more people you have in your support system the better it is to maintain your recovery.

There will be several obstacles you may or may not encounter. They can be damaging or a learning experience. The biggest one is romance. When you get sober things start working again, you start to have feelings and emotions that need fed. Don't do it. Step back and look at reality. Your track record with relationships probably isn't so good. And the other persons isn't either. Two emotionally damaged people so not make a good relationship. It is recommended a year before jumping in to a relationship. I believe 3-6 months of heavy treatment and you may be ready. Maybe. Chances are if you are honest you will be enjoying your own company and feelings that you may wish to wait. Another obstacle is the Pink Cloud Syndrome/. After a few weeks we will get a overwhelming sense of good feeling. We will begin to see things in a new way. Things will finally go our way and we will ride that feeling thinking that recovery is all roses and happiness. Then invariably irrevocably the bottom falls out and we are left facing the hard part of sobriety the part that makes us use again. The thing to remember is we have a maladaptive outlook on life. If things don't go our way we say screw it why bother. We don't understand that life is full of challenges that allow us to grow or stagnate depending on our spiritual condition. This is why learning acceptance in early recovery is so important. I tell clients that if they are comfortable in early recovery they are doing it wrong. Early recovery is a major change and all change is uncomfortable. To prove this point I would have my clients change the way they put on there shoes in the morning. The first few days it was uncomfortable after that it became a habit. Recovery is nothing more then changing our habits of, thought, action, perception and emotional response. The more we change the easier it becomes but the first few months or years can be uncomfortable. Another obstacle you may run into is the I can't relate syndrome. You may be at a meeting or group and someone who came from a completely different lifestyle will speak and you will feel you have nothing in common with them. This is another place where changing our thinking will allow us to grow in ways we never imagined. All human feeling and emotions trigger the same biological and mental response. Therefore how I feel anger is exactly the way you do just to varying degrees. So maybe you can't relate to the event that caused the anger but instead relate to the anger. You will then be able to open your mind to suggestions. Another syndrome you will no doubt encounter is the fix it now syndrome. A few weeks sober and you may feel you have to fix your life right away. You didn't destroy your life in a week and you won't fix it in a week. You may have relationships that you feel absolutely horrible about but early recovery is not the time. It takes time to heal wounds on both ends and you are a raw emotional sore that doesn't need any more damage. Thinking that we have a couple weeks sober is proof we are better and that everyone we love and care about should put aside the damage we caused them and be happy and excited for us is a fallacy. I remember clients coming in expecting to be trusted. No one gives there trust to a addict it is earned sometime after years of doing the right thing. So we need to take it easy, live well one day at a time and learn that thoughts don't have to be actions.