When Does Sobriety Get Easy?
Sobriety does get easier. When it does really depends on your attitude and if you’re working to treat your addiction.
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On Chronic Relapsers
If you are someone who has been saturated with alcohol or drugs, then it will take longer than someone who has been sober for several years and had a brief relapse. PAWs, or post-acute withdrawal syndrome, are withdrawal symptoms that can last months. Even though alcohol and drugs can leave your body after a week, you might still experience depression, anger, or anxiety.
If you have been saturated with alcohol or drugs, then sobriety could be challenging in the beginning, especially if you are trying to get sober cold turkey, going it alone is extremely challenging, especially if you’re a chronic relapser. Chronic relapsers have had multiple stays at treatment centers and get high or drunk almost as soon as they leave treatment or jail.
Often they will leave treatment against staff advice. Being saturated with drugs or alcohol makes it challenging. At our long-term treatment center, Burning Tree Ranch, we have seen clients have PAWs symptoms for over 90 days. Our clinical team has said that at about 90 days, it’s as if a fog has lifted and our clients can truly begin working on their sobriety.
Underlying Mental Issues
Another factor that can make sobriety difficult is that underlying mental health issues are not being treated. Often, mental health and substance use disorder are so intertwined that it’s difficult to separate the two. If mental health issues — like trauma, depression or anxiety — are not being treated, it can lead to relapse. The same is true for substance use disorder.
If when you leave treatment, you stop treating your addiction, then sobriety is going to be difficult. Our shorter-term treatment facility, Renewal Lodge near Austin, uses mindfulness and the 12 Steps to retrain the mind. We train people to restructure their mind, body, and attention through mindfulness while using the 12 steps of recovery.
This restructuring does not happen overnight. It is similar to creating a new path in a forest. You first must clear a path, and then continuously walk on it. If you stop walking on it, then the forest will grow back.
The same is true for addiction and mental health issues. If you stop treating both, then the symptoms and problems will return. Part of the answer to, “Does sobriety get easier is?” Yes but only if you continue to treat your addiction. Usually, progress is gradual and other people will notice before you do.
Life Can Still Be Hard
Some people confuse sobriety with life. Sobriety is living free of alcohol and drugs. It’s also having the obsession with alcoholism and drugs completely removed. You’re not white-knuckling it. You’re not fighting the desire to stay stopped. It’s just gone. You are free.
However, life will still happen. Painful events will still happen. The difference is that if you are continuing to treat both mental health and substance abuse, you’ll be able to respond in a useful, loving, and helpful way. But you will still feel feelings.
Finding Help to Stay Clean and Sober
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