7 Ways Family Members Can Help In Addiction Recovery Treatments
Successful Addiction Recovery Rarely Happens Without The Help Of Loved Ones!
If someone in your family is suffering from addiction, he or she will need you and other family members to be involved in every stage of the addiction recovery and rehab process.
Drugs and substance use can affect the family at the same level as the person suffering from the addiction. Often, the person who is closer to the patients suffers the most.
- Spouses stop trusting each other.
- Children feel neglected.
- And friendships fall apart.
– Healing emotional damages that can take time to recover.
– That’s one of the main reasons why families need to be involved in the recovery process.
In addition, family support helps the patients feel at ease that they are not alone in the fight. In fact, it furthermore motivates the patients to complete their recovery process faster.
Today, in this article, we will talk about the importance of family in the addiction recovery process and how family can help in addiction recovery treatments.
Addiction Is Family Disease
Before we can start with the ways in which family members can help treat addiction, you must understand that every family is different. Every family member treats each other differently.
Therefore, changes in the family structure can change how the family interacts with each other, especially during addiction.
Addiction can cause feelings of anger, resentment, depression, districts, and isolation. As a result, family members living in an addiction-affected environment are often not honest with their communication.
This dishonesty results in a Lack of family support when one family member needs help. The home environment quickly becomes unstable, and the faces can be compromised.
When such a scenario is in place, it is advisable that you seek help from a professional. If you need professional help, visit https://www.oceanrecovery.com/.
How Can Family Members Helps In The Addiction Recovery Treatment
No matter what the addiction is, it can change your family dynamics. However, that doesn’t mean it will remain the same way. If your family members are suffering from any addiction, you can help them recover from addiction.
Here we have listed down what you can do for your family members suffering from addiction.
1. Convince The Patient For The Treatment
The first thing every family member can do for their family member is to convince them about their addiction. One of the dark sides of addiction is that people suffering from it consider it normal and never pay importance to its adverse effect.
In fact, even if people confront them telling them how bad their addiction has become, they simply ignore their warning. Hence, as responsible family members, the first step towards helping is to make them aware of their current situation and how you are trying to help them.
2. Establish Healthy Boundaries
Once you have started talking with your family members suffering from addiction, you must maintain a healthy boundary. This is to ensure that the patient doesn’t feel pressured or feel you are making fun of them.
To ensure this never happens, you must talk with them just like you would talk with any normal person. Try to get close to them without affecting their comfort circle. Once you are close enough, you can start talking about their addiction problem and how it affects the family.
3. Let Them Know Why You Are Concerned
Most people confront their family members suffering from addiction straight forward and start lecturing them about what they are doing is wrong and so on and so forth. This does not help the patient. Instead, it makes them feel you are trying to belittle them. This can backfire, and the addiction can even become strong.
What you must do is to take a different approach, an approach where you showcase your worry and show them how concerned you are for their health. This will help them understand the consequences of their addiction.
4. Encourage Total Abstinence From Addiction Elements
People with mental health disorders are highly sensitive to any addiction elements. Even the consumption of small amounts triggers relapse. In that case, you must encourage your family members to stay as far as possible from the addictive elements.
- You can do so by supporting Abstinence.
- Expressing your thoughts as Abstinence is the only way towards complete recovery.
- Help the family members with their family recreational activities.
- Support the patients in developing social networks.
5. Reduce Family Friction
High levels of family friction can be unpleasant for every family member in the household. This becomes especially chaotic when you have an addicted patient to look after. In addition, excessive conflict among the family members can trigger a relapse.
You can reduce the tension by:
- Supporting good communication.
- Being resourceful while facing any problem.
- Let other family members know how much you care.
- Spending more time together.
6. Know The Sign Of Relapses
Knowing the signs of relapse can help you support recovery. Relapse are symptoms that show that patience is reverting to its old self. Know the early signs of relapse and have plans for each when they appear.
You can help prevent relapse by:
- Knowing the warning signs.
- Keeping track of their behavior.
- Developing a family plan in advance.
- Involving people who influence the patients.
7. Be Patients With The Recovery Process
You must understand that recovery doesn’t happen overnight; it takes time. Therefore, you must show patience with the recovery process and offer your full support.
Continue to check up on the patient throughout the treatment, and make them aware that you are there for them.
Provide Unconditional Love & Support
Being involved with the patients in their recovery process helps them see how much you love and support them.
Detoxing, attending a counseling session, and treatment sessions can be lonely experiences. And when a patient feels like they are alone, they might lose their motivation to recover.
Hence, attending all the sessions and treatment programs makes them happy and helps them realize that their entire family is moving forward together.