Whether you are considering treatment for addiction, are in the middle of treatment, or have already completed treatment but now don’t know what to expect, it’s natural to wonder about life in sobriety, what it looks like, what you can expect, and whether or not it’s rewarding.
What Does Life in Sobriety Look Like?
Life in sobriety may or may not look very similar to how your life was before but with some key changes.
Where You Live
Where you live is often something that looks slightly different with regard to life after sobriety. This could be:
- Sober Living: If you don’t have a stable living environment when you leave a treatment center, life in sobriety might start with sober living facilities before you are able to get a new home
- New City: Where you live might also extend to a new city if you are making significant changes and extricating yourself from an environment that you know is full of triggers or toxicity
You might very well choose to move because of a new career or simply as a change of scenery, or because you have friends and family in another location.
Life Skills
For others, life and sobriety looks like an opportunity to not only live somewhere else or with other people, but to develop new life skills.
Many people who are in recovery have either lost or never had the opportunity to develop critical life skills like:
- Empathy
- Resilience
- Good decision making
- Adaptability
- Critical thinking
- Time management
- Good communication
- Financial management
- Self-care
So your life in sobriety might look very similar to life before but with key changes. Let’s look at an example:
Thomas had a relationship with his family but it was a little rocky, damaged from his years of lies and drug addiction. He didn’t really know how to make a budget so while he had a job and he would make money, he never put money into savings and he was very impulsive about what he bought. Thomas didn’t put a lot of time into cooking; He never learned how growing up because his parents made quick freezer meals so that’s what he made.
In sobriety, Thomas was ready to rebuild that relationship through family therapy and this helps to improve his communication and his empathy toward his family. He learned how to make a budget, how to save money and shop accordingly. He was no longer making impulse purchases. He was also saving more because he took a basic cooking class and now knew how to cook for himself.
In this example, Thomas’s life has the same key elements:
- A relationship with his family
- Money management
- Communication
- Self-care
But as you can see, it wasn’t a good relationship during addiction, and his money management was limited. He didn’t have good communication and he didn’t practice healthy and sustainable self-care through things like cooking, cleaning, and hygiene. Now all of that has changed for the better.
Relationships and Communication
So what does life in sobriety look like on a personal basis?
For many people, their relationships start to pivot away from people who are not supportive of their decision to remain sober and toward people who have a positive impact on life. This can mean changes to existing relationships through better communication, like Thomas, or new relationships.
Tangentially, this often leads to outpatient rehab and support groups, as well as sober activities.
Again, the activities in which you participate may not be entirely different from what you once did. You might still, for example:
- Go on hikes
- Go skiing or snowboarding
- Go out to dinner
- Go to parties
Only now you don’t drink or use drugs during those events.
Starting a Life of Sobriety with Sequoia Detox Centers
At Sequoia Detox, we can help you learn how to live a life of sobriety at any level you need. We offer a range of care, making it easy for clients to move through each program level in a step-down approach.
For every level of care, clients get treatment for present conditions, like dual diagnosis situations, and get preparation for what’s to come: life in sobriety.
This extends to critical life skills, coping mechanisms, improved relationships, individual and group therapy.