3 Things to Never Do in Early Sobriety

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Step One

Addiction is a hard issue to tackle and truly handle. Step one is finding a good place for rehabilitation, next is going through the programme fully, getting clean and ideally addressing the root cause of why the person turned to drugs. You are now ready to get back to daily life. Having just completed rehabilitation the next big challenge is keeping that sobriety, despite the temptations of regular life.

Many addicts come out of rehab feeling very positive and in control of their addiction. Although that is a good thing, of course, unless that confidence is built on a firm foundation, it can occasionally leave the person open to situations that become very difficult to handle, that could be easily avoided.

From experience these are the top three things to avoid in early sobriety:

Don’t Start Hanging Out With the Old Crowd

It is often with positive intentions that the recovering addict goes back to the old group, with ideas of potentially helping some friends, being a positive influence or helping get them to rehab too. Unfortunately, more often than not, those good intentions die a death and those ‘friends’ end up encouraging one to get back onto the drugs or drink and start all again.

Friends talking

The true friends that wanted to help you and get you clean probably drifted apart as the addiction got worse. If you do have any of them around, cherish them and build up stronger ties with those who are going to lift you up.

Don’t Drink

It is easy to feel that just an occasional drink, only one, is not going to do any harm. It is legal and socially acceptable. This can be even more true for those who are not recovering alcoholics but rather other drugs. ’I was a coke addict not an alcoholic, what does one drink matter?’ But the thing is, alcohol lowers inhibitions and reduces judgement. That means that even if you started with excellent intentions of staying drug free, after a small amount of alcohol those thoughts can turn to, ‘Ah just one hit is not going to hurt’ and so on. Friends and family often don’t discourage one from having a drink; it seems commonplace and maybe a way of getting back to normality, so it is a good thing to discuss with them at early stage.

Don’t Get Bored

Being bored and unproductive can be one of the fastest causes of turning back to drugs. It is easy to think that the drugs were fun, or that you need some excitement back in your day and so on. When getting back to normal life, it is vital to stay busy and motivated, take up new hobbies, spend time finding a job, meeting up with new, clean friends and family, etc. See if you can rekindle some dreams, activities or hobbies that got left when drugs took over.


Sobriety does not have to be difficult, tricky or boring but there are pitfalls. By avoiding them, you make it that much more possible to continue through the tougher months and onto a totally drug-free life.

The beginning few months are the hardest to get through, the most difficult transition period. So stay strong on these points, work on building up your new life and in not so long you can have a new life to be proud of.

AUTHOR
NU

Narconon UK

Welcome to Narconon United Kingdom At Narconon, we are dedicated to one thing: helping you overcome addiction for good. Part of what makes this possible is the Narconon environment. Every detail has been taken into account to give you the stability and comfort to help you free yourself from addiction and rebuild your life without drugs.

NARCONON UNITED KINGDOM

DRUG EDUCATION AND REHABILITATION