Struggling? Practical ways to stay healthy and to aid recovery.

Struggling With Recovery? PUBLIC HEALTH ALERT

Are you feeling tired? Are you overly stressed? Are you counting the days as they go by? Nobody said recovery was going to be easy, as it’s a long-term process that involves creating a new life free from the risk of relapse. However, while traditional therapies have their merits, they may not go all the way in reaching the sense of well-being and purpose needed to reinvent yourself. If you’ve been down in the doldrums for too long, here are some ways to give your efforts a boost.

Exercise

You’ll get the blood flowing, along with endorphins, dopamine and serotonin. These feel-good hormones create a buzz following intense exercise that leads you to seek a more physically rewarding high than drugs or alcohol could ever produce. What’s more, scheduling workouts in between going to work and support-group meetings adds useful structure to what was once a chaotic lifestyle, keeping you away from temptation and on the right track to wellness.

Swimming

You’ll get all the benefits of exercise mentioned above, with a few bonuses. The warmth dilates your blood vessels to promote improved circulation while moving through the water, a sort of gentle massage that does wonders in relieving stress.

Some even find the elemental motion of kicking with your legs and stroking with your arms to have a calming effect similar to meditation, helping to free your mind of worry and relieve anxiety.

Yoga

Another way to find the benefits of meditation is through yoga, an ancient Indian art form in which practitioners work through a sequence of poses while breathing rhythmically. According to Rage Yoga, it can help addicts in recovery through “mindfulness,” or experiencing the moment free of judgment, which helps ward off stress and depression, both of which can trigger relapse if not dealt with.

Drama

Way off Broadway, you’ll find trained drama therapists helping patients get to the root of their addictions through a variety of performing arts from plays to puppetry. Participants are able to expel negative emotions through a

cathartic process that involves re-enacting scenarios that occurred while they were under the influence or that led up to their life of abuse. This allows them to analyze their actions and understand how these events impacted their lives, a necessary step on the road to recovery.

Art

Another way of expelling negative emotions is through creative arts such as drawing, painting, sculpting and collaging. An expert at Verywell Mind says these activities foster healing and mental well-being by helping participants to tap into their inner world of emotions and resolve their conflicts and fears through the creative process, ultimately leading to increased self-esteem, self-awareness and insight, all powerful tools in overcoming addiction.

Adventure

Sometimes, you need to go someplace you’ve never been to find out who you really are. That’s the transformative power of wilderness therapy, which involves a variety of activities from mountain climbing to camping and fishing. According to the Active fitness website, it’s effective in elevating your mood, while relieving stress and even helping to learn about teamwork while finding renewed purpose in tackling the physical challenges that the outdoors throw at you.

Holistic Therapy

This combines many of the therapies mentioned above in addition to massage, acupuncture and other practices in a multi-faceted effort to treat the body and mind as a whole, and overcome all of the physical and mental obstacles to successful recovery. An increasing number of treatment centers have adopted this approach in recent years to address their patients’ full range of emotional and physical needs.

Remember to talk to a therapist before embarking on any of these methods. Increased physical activity may put you at risk of injury, while digging into your emotions through drama or artistic endeavours may be too much for your psyche to handle at certain stages of recovery. The right decision, however, will see you moving forward to a brighter future at a faster pace and with some swing in your step.

Author

Kimberly Hayes enjoys writing about health and wellness and created PublicHealthAlert.info to help keep the public informed about the latest developments in popular health issues and concerns. In addition to studying to become a crisis intervention counselor, Kimberly is hard at work on her new book, which discusses the ins and outs of alternative addiction treatments.