Relapse Prevention Plan: How to Create a Solid Relapse Prevention Plan

A relapse prevention plan is a set of coping skills, interventions, and support strategies that can address stresses, triggers, and other risk factors and prevent a person from returning to past use of drugs or alcohol and the lifestyles that enabled their use. 

An effective relapse prevention plan combines evidence-based therapies, a robust support system that includes peer support, a family member, or a professional, and strategies for identifying potential triggers. These plans are meant to be used both daily and as a response to early warning signs of relapse to maintain a healthy daily life.

An effective relapse prevention plan can make all the difference in maintaining sobriety. Some specific examples of elements often incorporated into a relapse prevention plan include:

An effective relapse prevention plan will also include daily efforts to manage behavioral health and wellness. Daily meditation, journaling, mindfulness practices, physical exercise, and more are all part of the daily maintenance of an effective recovery plan. 

The five rules of relapse prevention are:

The Gorski-CENAPS model views relapse as a part of a process, rather than an isolated event. 

According to the Gorski-CENAPS model, a relapse is the result of stages of relapse, comprised not of a single stressful moment but rather of a multitude of physical, emotional, mental, and even spiritual stresses, each coming with its own warning signs before a person would engage with drug use or alcohol use again. 

In this model, mental relapse can occur before physical relapse, with a person’s thoughts and ideas of using drugs and alcohol returning before actually acting on these thoughts. 

Creating an effective relapse prevention plan requires working with professionals, peers, and a support network at a dedicated treatment facility. 

However, it is important to remember that these plans are never set in stone; rather, they can be adapted and updated throughout the recovery journey to address newly discovered stresses, triggers, or as personal goals evolve and change. Creating an effective relapse prevention plan means also taking time to determine what is working, what isn’t working, and what new strategies to try to keep these plans fresh and effective. 

A relapse prevention plan template should include daily maintenance strategies, mindfulness practices, key people and phone numbers, known triggers and warning signs, personal motivations, and active plans for navigating stressful situations, such as an exit plan or boundary-setting techniques. 

Working with professionals is the best way to explore not just a person’s history with drugs and alcohol, but also how underlying challenges like mental health disorders, stress, trauma, and more also affect this history to create a personalized treatment plan. 

Each person’s recovery goals will be a little different. Exploring personal motivations and ambitions beyond substance use is part of helping to build effective goals in recovery, with effective goal-setting and motivational interviewing (MI) being helpful approaches. 

Knowing not just what a person wants to do in sobriety and these motivations, but also where a person is in their journey at the present moment, is also part of creating attainable and effective goals. 

Yes. Self-care is a crucial part of relapse prevention and overall wellness in daily life. Recovery plans and relapse prevention plans should all incorporate consistent self-care.

The holidays present unique challenges and stresses for many, and dedicated relapse prevention plans are often necessary to address these unique situations. 

Having an escape plan, knowing how to navigate interactions with family members that may not understand sobriety and recovery, and challenging previously held traditions as they relate to substance use is often necessary. 

Curating guest lists for holiday festivities, trying new activities around the holidays, and knowing how to remove oneself from stressful situations are all part of successfully prioritizing ongoing sobriety throughout the holidays and should be considered. 

Yes. Alcohol addiction is a disease that can continue to affect an individual. Healing is an ongoing journey, and preventing alcohol relapse is part of this journey to sobriety. 

Yes. Just as having a relapse prevention plan for substance use is crucial, having a plan that addresses mental health can be just as important. 

Mental health needs like depression are intimately linked to substance use, so having comprehensive relapse prevention plans for both the use of drugs and alcohol and depression can be essential for sustainable success.

Preventive tools are daily exercises that can help prevent stress from developing and leading to relapse. These tools can include:

Addiction recovery and relapse prevention are ongoing journeys, and ongoing support groups after inpatient care or detox are essential to maintaining a healthy sobriety and adjusting to newfound stresses. 

Healing involves making entire lifestyle changes, and developing new structures can keep a person accountable for their success in recovery. These changes include:

Yes. Peers in recovery offer amazing support and a new perspective, and keeping each other accountable can be a great way to build camaraderie and trust while focusing on sobriety.

Yes. Professionals help not only to support healing but also to structure sustainable change while keeping each person honest with themselves in recovery. 

Effective relapse prevention strategies can be used to identify triggers, as well as how these triggers may impact a person’s mental health, behaviors, and thoughts about reengaging with addictive substances again. 

Knowing the triggers and how they can potentially impact a person is crucial information for having dedicated strategies to manage their effects or establish ways to avoid these stresses in the first place. Journaling, working with professionals, peers, and loved ones, and being honest with oneself and others can all help develop a clear understanding of personal triggers in recovery. 

Urges and cravings to re-engage with drugs and alcohol can be intense. Effectively using coping strategies means practicing them beforehand and sticking to the plan even when things are difficult, without making compromises. 

Yes. Maintenance plans are most effective when they are an embedded part of a daily routine. 

This can also help to improve mindfulness awareness and empower each person to identify when new stresses may be affecting their wellness before turning to drugs or alcohol. 

Some relapse prevention plans can set up strategies for avoiding unnecessary triggers. 

Yet, these plans also include elements for navigating stress when they are unavoidable. While there is no way to eliminate cravings, knowing what to expect and sticking to a plan when they do arise can improve a person’s ability to overcome them until they pass. 

Both peers and professionals offer crucial insight and perspectives when developing a relapse prevention plan. Consulting both can provide a robust and effective approach to creating your relapse prevention strategies. 

Outpatient group therapy and support groups are a great way to get involved with others to find each person’s best approach to maintaining their hard-earned sobriety.

Absolutely. Family members can be key parts of an effective relapse prevention plan, from offering new perspectives to accountability, being integral supports in enacting escape plans, improving communication, and much more. 

Most relapses occur early on in the recovery journey, either soon after detox or leaving residential treatment. 

During detox, withdrawal symptoms are at their most intense, and some may use drugs or alcohol again to get these symptoms to stop. Likewise, transitioning to outpatient care can expose a person to previously unknown stresses and challenges that can be difficult to navigate. 

However, there can also be an increased risk of relapse surrounding major life events, such as moving to a new residence, getting into or out of a new romantic relationship, or taking on a new job that comes with its own culture and expectations. 

Mindfulness practices support addiction recovery by helping those using these strategies be more aware of their own needs and stresses in the present moment. 

Identifying stress, anxiety, depression, anger, and other challenges can help those in recovery address these problems while contextualizing urges and cravings, providing a clearer method of overcoming them while maintaining sobriety. 

Dedicated detox programs can support a person while navigating withdrawal, while residential treatment can be essential in having a safe and curated sober space to practice coping strategies. 

Ongoing outpatient care can provide a community of ongoing support to focus on sobriety even when surrounded by the stress of the “real world.” Committing to the entire continuum of care across these programs can help reduce relapse rates and support a healthy and sustainable sobriety. 

Coping strategies are best used on the first sign of relapse, such as in emotional or mental relapse, when a person identifies stress or that they are romanticizing substance use again, but before they have actually used these substances. 

Absolutely! Proper nutrition is a form of self-care and ensures that the body and mind have the nutrients and energy needed to enact relapse prevention strategies, manage emotional health, and improve emotional resilience in the face of stress. 

Unmanaged stress or difficult emotional states being bottled up, like anger, sadness, anxiety, and more, can lead to self-destructive outlets, including relapse in recovery. 

However, other causes of relapse include feelings of isolation, lack of self-care or personal boundaries, ineffective goal-setting techniques that make recovery feel impossible, or overconfidence in recovery skills that lead to a person putting themselves in unnecessarily high-risk situations, such as going to a party thinking that they won’t have much trouble managing themselves. 

The warning signs of relapse come in distinct stages, from emotional and mental relapse to physical relapse. 

In emotional relapse, the warning signs are:

During this phase, a person may not yet be thinking of returning to active substance use, though resilience may be beginning to be compromised.

Next is mental relapse, where the use of drugs or alcohol typically begins to reenter a person’s mind. These warning signs include:

While a person may not have yet used drugs or alcohol again, enacting relapse prevention plans during this phase is crucial to prevent physical relapse. 

If unaddressed, these can lead to physical relapse, which is the active return to substance use. This typically occurs alongside a return to the lifestyles that enabled such use in the first place, including daily routines, habits, and social groups tied to past substance use. 

At Hawaii Island Recovery, we are committed to lasting change and wellness, dedicated to your sobriety both inside and outside of our walls. We offer robust detox and residential programs, with outpatient and aftercare options to help you maintain this important sober change. For more information on how we can support you at any stage of recovery, call us today at (866) 390-5070.