Understanding Addiction as a Chronic Disease To understand why using drugs “successfully” may not be realistic for individuals with addiction, it’s important to recognize addiction as a chronic brain disease. Similar to conditions like diabetes or hypertension, addiction involves long-term changes in the brain that impair decision-making, impulse control, and reward processing. These changes make […]
How to Stop Your Habitual Lying in Recovery
1. To Hide Substance Use Addiction often leads individuals to deceive loved ones about their drug or alcohol use. They may lie about how much they drink or use, where they’ve been, or what they’re doing to avoid confrontation or judgment. 2. To Avoid Consequences Lying allows individuals to escape accountability. Whether it’s calling in […]
What to Expect in Your First Year of Sobriety
For most of us, sobriety is not something we’ve had experience with before. Culture doesn’t allow it. In fact, a large percentage of American teenagers start drinking and never stop. 5.6 million Americans aged 12-20 drink and they drink 3.2% of all alcohol consumed in the United States. From there, it never stops, and alcohol […]
How to Use Your Addiction Recovery as an Example for Your Kids
For most of us, family is one of the major reasons that we go into recovery. Wanting to be a good partner, a good parent, a good friend is more pressing to recovery than wanting to take care of ourselves. While it’s important for our perspective to shift and for us to learn the value […]
