Relapse Prevention...

For a while now I have felt compelled to write about spirituality in recovery. I think this comes from my study of the spiritual transformation that men can go through in recovery and how studying all the time on this can shift my focus away from other aspects of recovery. But, one can easily say that relapse prevention is an important topic in recovery and is something that many people put on the front burner of their recovery stove.

I strongly believe that, while ideas about relapse prevention are vital for anyone in recovery, these ideas alone are not sufficient to stay clean and sober. As Bill W. said in the AA Big Book, self-knowledge alone is insufficient. So too is knowledge about relapse warning signs, triggers and high risk situations that threaten recovery not sufficient to combat the cravings and urges to use. There is really only one, unchanging "device" that will ultimately defeat the cravings and urges to drink or take drugs...a spiritual transformation in a person's life. We've talked a lot about that here on The Happy Hour. But, there is room here also for talking about techniques that can help a person go through their days with ease and comfort rather than being tossed about by the forces of relapse.

These techniques are fairly well known. Generally, they are methods that a person considers for combating specific relapse warning signs, triggers and high risk situations that might erupt during a typical day. The methods themselves are usually not spectacular. Instead, they are each geared toward addressing a specific relapse warning sign in a simple, straight-forward, and speedy way. The source for knowing what  relapse warning signs are for me comes from my Step Four work whereby I do an inventory of my life and identify those things that were warning signs, triggers, or high risk situations in my past. Once armed with the list of things that threaten my recovery, I am in a place where I can construct a set of counter-measures that will defeat them. An example would be that I know certain people in my past are dangerous for me. I have honestly looked at these relationships and determined that associating with these people put me at high risk for relapse. Knowing this, I not only list them as risks, but I also have a plan as to how I am going to cut them out of my daily life and handle situations in which I might meet them (like as the grocery store). Another example might be red wine as a dangerous thing for me. When I find myself in situations in which I used to drink red wine, or times when I might be asked to drink a glass of red wine, or when I might be surrounded by people who are drinking red wine, I develop a plan to handle these temptations.

I developed my own relapse prevention plan many years ago under the tutelage of my first sponsor, Don, who taught me how to be aware of relapse warning signs, triggers, and high risk situations that can creep back into my life. I renew it once a year on an index card system I keep with me constantly. Don also taught me one valuable aspect to this system: The list of warning signs is based solely on what I know once happened to me to cause me to drink and take drugs, not on what might happen to me to make me do so. Any traditionally taught relapse prevention program emphasizes looking at the past for trouble that might arise in the future. While it is likely that old warning signs will undoubtedly return in a person's lifetime, the fact of the matter is that just thinking about the past issues is not sufficient. Any good relapse prevention plan must account for the unknown, and that is where most of this intellectual stuff about relapse prevention begins to break down. It is simply impossible to list out all the potential ways that I might relapse, so I am largely stuck with what I know about the past unless I invest in something else to augment a relapse prevention system.

That's where spirituality comes back into the picture. The only true way to ensure that I do not use drugs is to invest in a process of hope and faith in a power greater than myself that can guide me through a day in which I might get whacked with a whole series of new temptations to use. If I believe in this process - that I will find the power to overcome anything that threatens my recovery - then I am inoculated against the dangers of relapse, at least for today. Of course, when you combine the two processes of a relapse prevention scheme with spirituality, the possibilities of relapse decline exponentially. This is a good thing.

Today, I am thinking of Don (who died a few years ago clean and sober for 26 years) and what he taught me along with the principles of my Narcotics Anonymous program that is based on spiritual growth and accomplishment. So long as I follow those ways, I have nothing to fear.

All the best, Roger W.