Principles of Resilience in Recovery 2020
COVID-19 has brought significant upheaval and challenges to millions of families in our country and throughout the rest of the world. In your life situation, as you are reading this article, it’s likely that on top of COVID-19, you have a special person in your life with a substance use disorder. Or you are […]
Family Recovery – Holiday Survival Guide 2020
Here we are, holidays 2020, and living through our second COVID-19 surge. Things are battening down again, and it remains challenging to find safe connection with others in recovery. But there is no closing down for addictive disease progression. And there is no closure for the angst experienced by family members who love a person […]
Manipulation – The Fourth Defense of Addiction
This is the fourth and final article in a series on understanding and dealing with the primary defenses of addictive disease. Please notice my choice of words, “the defenses of addictive disease”. Not, “the defenses of the person you love”. There is a difference between the person you love and the disease process in […]
Deception as a Defense in Addiction – Third Stage of Change
This article is the 3rd in our series of 4 articles on the primary defenses of addiction. In this article we will focus on deception as a defense in addiction. Families and loved ones are the brunt of deception by those developing a substance use disorder (SUD). This defense is not only acted out […]
Justification of Addiction – The Second Stage of Change
This is the second article in our series on the defenses of addictive disease. There has been an unintended distance between our first article and this one, so please go back and review the article Denial of Addiction – the First Step of Acceptance to refresh your thoughts. This will put your head in […]
Denial of Addiction – the First Stage of Acceptance
In our last article, we reviewed what it feels like to be a person developing a substance use disorder (SUD). We are now beginning a series discussing the dynamics and defenses used by people as they develop an SUD. The primary defenses used as addictive disease progresses are denial, justification, deception, and manipulation. Denial, […]
Do You Know How Active Addiction Feels?
As an adult, in a family with a member who has an active addiction, it is likely you are having feelings and thoughts reported by many other family members who deal with addiction in their midst. You feel hurt, anger, frustration, self-doubt, confusion, anxiety, fear, sadness, and hopelessness. You might also believe you have tried […]
Sheltering at Home with a Substance Misusing Loved One?
So, all these weeks of staying at home have answered those nagging questions in the back of your mind about a loved one’s behavior changes. Your spouse, significant other, child, friend has been misusing a substance of some sort and likely has a substance use disorder (SUD). Substance Misusing Loved One … Everyone […]
Relapse! Does Addiction Treatment Work?
Family members in the Sanford Family Program often ask, “Why is there so much relapse with addiction?” Right along with the first question, I hear, “My loved one went to treatment and we all participated in the programs. Why did this relapse happen? Doesn’t treatment work?” Relapse! Does Addiction Treatment Work? The truth of […]
Family Support Group at Sanford – Making a Connection
Here are the facts about the Sanford Family Support Group: The group is for family members and friends (F&F) of clients or former clients of Sanford. It does not matter what level of care the family member has been treated in. Any F&F who has been through our 4-session Family Program or a previous […]
