Life After Addiction: Everything Is Easier

Life after addiction is different.  Once that addiction is overcome, there’s less stress. Fewer money worries. No fear of being “found out.” No fear of disappointing loved ones.

Many addicts fight a daily battle with alcoholism or struggle with heroin addiction. They develop a dependence on marijuana, or dangerous substances cooked up in a lab. Early on, many addicts turn to substances to escape stress.

Now those drugs are a huge cause of stress in an addict’s life. “I need money. I need to score. Stress is building. I need relief.” Drug dependence doesn’t improve life. Anyone struggling with an addiction, or living with an addict, knows the impact addiction has on everyday life.

Addicts in withdrawal may experience physical and emotional pain that is physically and emotionally taxing. Anxiety levels may increase as an addict prepares to enter a rehabilitation facility to get the targeted, professional help needed to discover the underlying cause of addiction.

Addiction is a disease. It manifests itself in a range of behaviors, from the happy-go-lucky drunk to the toxic heroin addict who abuses members of the household. The disease changes the chemistry of the body, affecting physical drives and internal needs.

Addiction is not a moral defect any more than the flu is a sign of weakness. However, identifying the addiction, and developing a life strategy compatible with individual needs, is sometimes difficult, no matter how motivated the addict is to improve life.

Then there’s the uncertainty.

Can I do this? Maybe you’ve tried before without success. Maybe the pull of the drug was more than you were prepared to take on. Perhaps you needed to develop coping skills to remove the symptoms of addiction from your life and the lives of others.

The road to recovery is not easy but these former addicts confirm that life after substance abuse is definitely possible, and so much better.

Reclaiming self-esteem after depression and isolation

“I was very depressed and very isolated for a long time…I started taking more and more Xanax. I tried substituting Xanax with alcohol…but the next day I would still fall for Xanax. When I got here (at Hawaii Island Recovery) I got lots of issues to work on,” Shannon, a resident at Hawaii Island Recovery explained to those considering changing life for the better.

Like many HIR residents, Shannon enjoys a customized program to treat her Xanax addiction. After testing four therapies at HIR, including wild dolphin-assisted therapy, Shannon developed the mindset to change life for the better – to make life easier and more satisfying.

Shannon explains, “If there’s anything about my life that’s changed that was very important, aside from getting off Xanax, it’s my self-esteem. My self-esteem has changed immensely so I feel like I can go out into the world to be myself and put my head up and be confident.”

Self-esteem is how you evaluate at you’re worth to yourself, family, friends, and neighbors – we all examine our behaviors and contributions to life’s quality.
Positive self-esteem develops when the inner you like who you are and what you’re doing. A person with low self-esteem becomes easily depressed and tolerates abusive relationships and situations.
A person with low self-esteem blames himself, criticizes himself, and puts others down by making them feel guilty, blaming them, and finding fault with their behaviors so they don’t have to examine their own behaviors.
A lot of drug addicts have low self-esteem before they become drug addicts and it worsens during addiction because they can’t control drug
use or the negative consequences that come with it.

You can reclaim your self-esteem after kicking those harmful addictions that can destroy lives. The highly-trained, dedicated HIR therapists encourage daily affirmations.

Some look at themselves and quietly affirm, “I am worth loving.” Other residents put sticky notes on the mirror that affirm acceptance and love of self – for who you are.

You have to forgive yourself for what your addiction has done to your body, relationships, and career so you can accept and improve yourself. There are also therapies at HIR to heal painful memories with coping mechanisms for long- and short-term success.

A lawyer and client of HIR says,

After seeking treatment at HIR, this one-time addict is recovered and now works at HIR.

“Those of us that have been there known it takes quite a leap of faith to trust someone to help you but that’s what we’re here for. We can give you a chance to get your life back to regenerate mind body and soul to the point where you’re happy”, he ends.

When you finally kicked off drugs, you have a good chance of becoming emotionally stable because you can be happy without using drugs. The Drug addicts’ ultimate and only source of happiness is the addictive drug of their choice and nothing else. They feel that they cannot live without it, and it’s the only obsession they have.

After addiction, drug addicts often realize that there’s more to life than drugs. They can enjoy the company of others and focus on the things that they really want to do. They can go back to work or school, possibly rebuild a broken relationship and pursue their dreams.

“I dealt with addiction for 22 years of my life. I was broken, I was hopeless. I was an absolute mess. You know the behaviors, the thinking, that I was a programmed addict. Everything about me was about getting what I need, more than I needed it, no matter what I had to do, who I had
to hurt. It was just about addiction. I was something else when I came here. I was angry, I would just get screaming. It was horrible. And they (HIR staff) showed me love and patience and they loved me through. Coming from that darkness, I feel like I’m seeing the benefits of doing the work, and staying clean and sober. And, the freedom that I feel today is what I was looking for in drugs and alcohol. But this freedom is better; it’s a peace of mind, a calmness that I’ve never experienced in my life” says Bria, a former drug addict who’s now working as a residential manager of Hawaii Island Recovery.

For many individuals under the control of addiction, the hardest step toward recovery is making the decision to change.

A lot of drug addicts want to stop using. It’s causing big problems in their lives but their cravings are too strong. So, while Briana wanted to numb her memories so she wouldn’t be forced to recall her painful past, she also realized how her life was falling apart “living” with an addiction.

So, she moved into HIR with a staff that never gave up on her until she achieved sobriety.

A person does not recover from addiction simply by quitting. Recovery starts when addicts live a new life without drugs.

If you don’t change your lifestyle, then all the things that led to your drug abuse may catch up with you sooner or later. A quality, evidence-based recovery center teaches coping skills while addressing negative behaviors that have caused an addiction.

Until you learn to let go of your old behaviors, they will continue to lead you back to drug abuse.

Hawaii Island Recovery not only helps you recover from the physical effects of addiction; our treatment programs also enable you to see life from a different perspective.

No more alcoholism. No more heroin addiction. No more dependence on a substance that harms physical health and emotional well-being by creating a dependence on a substance or behavior.