An active drug and alcohol addiction is a chronic condition. It takes time for an addiction to develope to it’s severe forms where all aspects of someone’s life revolves around procurring and using drugs and alcohol. Treating and reversing the damages of addiction is a similar process. It is a slower and more disiplined change than some of the other changes in one’s life. Going to a drug and alcohol rehab center is a one to three month journey. This becomes the launching point for a new life of growth and change, where work will continue for many more months.

Along this journey there will be marvelous days. This days will be easy. You know the change you are making is good for you and those around you. There will be a lot of average days. These ones you won’t feel so great, but they won’t be so bad either. There are also going to be a lot of pretty lousy days. Days you want to use badly. Days where your past behaviors still follow you and drag you down even though those behaviors are no longer with you.

Expect and prepare for the bad days. Just because you are sincerely commited to never using drugs and alcohol in your life again does not mean you life will be magically transformed to a place of peace. The life of sobriety means choosing different tools to handle these bad times. It means choosing different tools to have fun. A lot of times it means choosing different tools to make a living with. Drug and alcohol rehab is a safe place to start this process. Stay there long enough for these changes to become a habit. The frustating part is that treating an addiction is a lot like being a parent. You are never really done. Your child will need you less and less. However you never stop worrying about them.

No matter how long you have been on the path of sobriety there will still be bad days. The difference between and ordinary life and a truly great one, is going the extra distance on the bad days. Using the tools to improve your life on the days you don’t want to. A great drug rehab center can really help you with this, however it is still mostly up to you.

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 23rd, 2006 at 8:52 am and is filed under Drug Addiction, Drug Rehab. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.