Why You Need Relapse Prevention and Aftercare

After checking into an addiction treatment program, it is essential that you work on your relapse prevention and aftercare plan. By so doing, you will have enough time to prepare for life after rehab.

Even so, you might want to complete your treatment program and restart your life. However, you should know that hurrying your treatment could increase your risk of relapse. If you relapse, you would find yourself back in a treatment program.

Instead, it is advised that you ensure that you receive ongoing support from your drug rehab program after you have completed your treatment regimen. This support should come in the form of relapse prevention and aftercare plans that are convenient for you so that you can continue working on your recovery even as you transition to your normal day to day life.

Understanding Relapse Prevention and Aftercare

At its most basic, relapse prevention and aftercare refers to the service that could help you maintain your sobriety in the long term after completing inpatient or outpatient addiction treatment. The goal of this plan would be to ensure that you do not go back to drug and alcohol abuse once you transition from a treatment program.

As a patient in a continuing care program, you would typically be expected to continue strengthening your coping skills. The program will also require that you keep up with the tools that you need to help you sustain your recovery in the long term and prevent yourself from relapsing.

Typically, relapse prevention and aftercare plans would be individualized and made as unique as possible. As such, the duration of the continuing care program will vary depending on various factors. However, you can expect it to last anywhere between 52 weeks and 2 years, or even longer if you are struggling in your recovery.

The Need for Relapse Prevention and Aftercare Plans

Relapse prevention and aftercare plans are an essential component of long term recovery. This is because they can help reduce your risk of relapse, which would typically be high in the first few weeks and months after your treatment program has come to an end.

Through these plans, you will be able to learn how to create a comfortable and supportive environment around you. Through this environment, you will get the opportunity to speak honestly about your strengths, weaknesses, temptations, and struggles in recovery, as well as how you feel about the entire process.

By remaining connected to your recovery community as well as the support system that you have, you may be able to maintain your sobriety and prevent yourself from succumbing to the triggers that could threaten your recovery success.

The relapse prevention and aftercare program would also encourage you to be more honest and open about your slip-ups, temptations, feelings, and thoughts. The sooner that you are able to admit that you feel like relapsing or you have already relapsed, the easier it would be for you to get the right kind of treatment to get you back on the road to recovery.

Family Involvement in Relapse Prevention

Although relapsing would set back your progress in recovery, it does not necessarily mean that your sobriety is untenable or that your addiction treatment program was not successful. Instead, it would mean that you still need to get back on your feet, receive the help that you need, and continue working on your long term recovery.

Many relapse prevention and aftercare plans will involve your family in your recovery. This is because the family plays an important role in long term recovery, and you can count on yours to maintain your abstinence in the long term.

Your friends and family would also continue encouraging you to participate in the relapse prevention and aftercare program. For instance, they might motivate you to keep following your recovery plan and attending support group meetings.

In the same way, they could also participate in family therapy with you so that they can heal from the wounds that your addiction caused. During these therapy sessions, they would also learn about the other things that they can do to encourage your sobriety and support your progress in recovery.

Getting Help

As you can see, continuing care programs are essential to your long term recovery. While you are still enrolled in an addiction treatment program, you should meet with your case managers, counselors, and therapists to formulate a workable relapse prevention and aftercare plan for you. By following this plan, making adjustments where necessary, and continuing to get help for your addiction, you may be able to maintain your sobriety over the long term or even for the rest of your life.

CITATIONS

http://www2.uwstout.edu/content/lib/thesis/2010/2010callenderk.pdf

https://jpo.wrlc.org/bitstream/handle/11204/3747/Webinar%20Brief_Aftercare%2C%20Relapse%20Prevention%20and%20Continuing%20Care_Applying%20Research%20Findings%20to%20Practice.pdf?sequence=3

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12084137

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/11291453_Process_and_outcome_changes_with_relapse_prevention_versus_12-Step_aftercare_programs_for_substance_abusers

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/260249478_Recovery_Training_and_Self-help_Relapse_Prevention_and_Aftercare_for_Drug_Addicts

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