• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer
 

Anaheim Lighthouse

Your Beacon of Hope!

Questions? Call Now(877) 959-5909
  • About Us
  • What We Treat
  • Treatment Options
  • Our Facility
  • Admissions
  • Learn About
  • Contact Us
  • Our Team
  • Awards & Recognitions
  • Yelp & Google Reviews
  • Client Testimonials
  • Accreditation & Licensing
  • Employment Opportunities
  • Press Releases
  • Alchohol Abuse
  • Drug Addiction
  • Dual Diagnosis
  • Trauma Victims
  • Veterans Program
  • Holistic Treatment
  • Specialties
  • Detox Alcohol & Drugs
  • Drug Rehab
  • Inpatient Rehab
  • Complete Residential Care
  • Partial Hospitalization
  • Intensive Outpatient
  • Intervention
  • Family Support
  • Verify Insurance
  • Financing Options
  • Coronavirus Safety Procedures
  • Alcoholism
  • Health and Wellness
  • Life in Recovery
  • Love and Relationships
  • Opioid Addiction
  • Parent Resources
  • Relapse and Recovery
  • Substance Abuse
  • Opioids
  • Sleeping Pills
  • Stimulants

5 Ways to Handle Stress in Recovery

Feb 14 2017
Categories:Articles

Recovering from a drug or alcohol addiction means getting your life back, rebuilding your relationships, and most likely dealing with a great deal of stress and anxiety. Unfortunately, stress is an unavoidable side-effect of not only withdrawing from a substance, but also going back into the regular events of life without having a substance to fall back onto. Because many of us use substances to escape from stress in the first place, handling stress in recovery can be doubly difficult.

However, because stress is one of the primary triggers of relapse, it is crucial that you learn to manage your stress, so that you can stay clean, and stay happy. You can use these five ways to handle stress in recovery to reduce stress, and to handle it without resorting to substance use.

Ways to Handle Stress

1. Be More Mindful – Mindfulness is increasingly popular, for addiction recovery and for stress management. Mindfulness based stress reduction or MBSR has been studied since 1979, and is proven to be effective, providing you continue to practice. Mindfulness focuses on teaching you to be aware of the present moment, rather than thinking or worrying about the past or the future. This can in turn help to reduce cravings, will reduce stress, and will help you to deal with stressful environments more easily, because you can shift your attention to the present as soon as you leave that stressful environment behind. For the best results, you should talk to your doctor or look for an MBSR facility near you. In some cases, you may also be able to find a treatment facility for your addiction that offers MBSR as part of your treatment.

2. Find an Outlet – An outlet is something that you do to deliberately work off stress. Because stress varies from person to person, your outlets may vary a great deal. For example, many people find that aerobic or cardiovascular exercise will greatly reduce stress by stimulating blood flow in the brain and creating a reward sensation through dopamine and serotonin production. However, any moderate exercise will stimulate dopamine and serotonin production in the brain, which naturally works to relax the body and reduce stress. You may also find that taking walks, having positive social interactions, building something, or even taking a hot bath works just as well. Other ideas could include playing a musical instrument, taking time to read every day, meditation, yoga, taking time to cook and eat a nice meal, or dozens of other activities. If you can find something to do that requires you to focus your attention on that thing, and you enjoy it, it's probably a good stress outlet.

3. Take Care of Your Health – Health and stress are very much interconnected. If you don't exercise and eat poorly, you will be much more stressed than if you eat well and exercise. Most studies show that if you exercise at least 30 minutes per day, you can boost your self-esteem, reduce stress, and improve your sense of self. At the same time, quality nutrition can help you to reduce stress, while reducing your stress response system. This is crucial in recovering addicts, because many addicts suffer from cooccurring nutrient disorders and gastrointestinal damage due to substance abuse and a poor diet during substance abuse. Neurotransmitters like vitamins B6, B12, and folate, as well as Omega fatty acids can cause anxiety and mimic depression symptoms if you are deficient. Eating well will help you to stress less, while boosting the natural levels of serotonin and dopamine in the brain, so that you will be happier.

anaheimlighthouse-5-ways-to-handle-stress-in-recovery-article-photo-time-to-relax-handsome-young-man-holding-hands-behind-head-while-sleeping-on-the-couch-400222432

4. Take Time to Relax – Recovering from an addiction is difficult, you may spend a great deal of time pushing yourself to do better, and you will probably get tired. It's important to take time to relax, do something fun, and spend time with friends or family. Relaxing is still one of the most important ways to reduce stress, because you need to stop and calm down for at least part of every day. However, you should be careful to ensure that you don't get bored or lonely, as these can be triggers for a relapse. Keep yourself occupied, but make sure you take time out when you need it.

5. Actively Work to Reduce Stress – Stress is everywhere, but if you are in a situation that causes consistent stress, you should work to get out of it. Many of us have stress from our jobs, family, debt, neighbors, or our car. You can try sitting down to identify what is causing you to stress, and then working to get away from it. For example, if you write down events that cause you to stress as they happen, and continue every day, you will very quickly have a good picture of what is making you stress. For example, your boss may be too demanding, you might have debt, you might be under too much pressure from family, etc. Once you identify what is causing you to stress, you can work to get rid of it. However, not all sources of stress will be easy to get away from, so it's important to learn to manage stress and how you react to it as well.

Learning how to handle stress can be immensely helpful to your recovery. While everyone stresses about different things, and in different ways, you can work to handle your stress using the methods listed above. By taking care of yourself, exercising, eating right, finding outlets, and acively working to reduce the causes of stress in your life, you can manage more easily. Recovering from an addiction will cause stress on its own, so make sure you take time to relax and find a healthy outlet, so that you stay happy and stay clean and sober.

The Anaheim Lighthouse is a modern and effective addiction treatment center in Southern California. To talk to us about financing options at our affordable drug and alcohol rehab that fit your needs, call (844) 494-4939.

Confidential Contact Form

  • This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

Privacy Policy

Learn About Lighthouse

  • Affordable Drug Rehab and Detox Center
  • CARF Certified
  • Homelike setting and world-class facilities
  • State licensed and certified
  • Most PPO insurance accepted
  • Specialized Alcohol and Drug Treatment Programs
  • Licensed and well-qualified professional staff
KNOW MORE

BLOG CATEGORIES

All Categories Alcoholism Drug Facts Health and Wellness Love and Relationships Opioid Addiction

Recent Posts

Snort Xanax

Can You Snort Xanax? Dangers You Should Know

March 20 2023
Alcoholism

5 Ways To Spot A Closet Drinker

March 13 2023
St. Patrick's Day In Addiction Recovery

Surviving St. Patrick's Day In Recovery

March 3 2023
Snort Hydrocodone

Can You Snort Hydrocodone? Here's Why You Shouldn't?

February 17 2023
Valentine's Day When You're Single And Sober

How To Spend Valentine's Day When You're Single And Sober

February 6 2023

WHY CHOOSE LIGHTHOUSE

  • Affordable Drug Rehab and Detox Center
  • CARF Certified
  • Homelike setting and world-class facilities
  • State licensed and certified
  • Most PPO insurance accepted
  • Specialized Alcohol and Drug Treatment Programs
  • Licensed and well-qualified professional staff

Google Reviews

Christopher Tamburello

Absolutely loved this place. Great counselors- my counselor was Johnny. Great Alumni aftercare program that helps keep you connected. I highly recommend Lighthouse for anyone struggling with alcohol or drug addiction.

Josh Mugol

When I first stepped in to fill out the paper work to get admitted to housing, I immediately felt welcomed. If you treat the staff, therapists, and doctors with respect and use common courtesy, you will get more in return. The staff is run by former addicts/alcoholics so they...

Teresa Egan

The Lighthouse saved my life. I was willing to do whatever it takes to learn how to live a new way of life. Before I came into the program I was a hollow shell just wanting to die.. The staff loved me until I could love myself, and taught me how to deal with myself. I have a...

Related Posts

Sep 12 2018

Does Hypnosis Work for Drug Addiction?

Hypnosis or hypnotherapy is the process of using relaxation techniques to induce suggestions on the mind, which then affect the conscious mind, which is thought to be effective in treating substance use disorders related to behavioral problems. While often a subject of contention in medical circl...
Aug 29 2018

7 Bad Habits That Will Affect Your Recovery

Whether you’ve recently left rehab or have been in recovery for some time, relapse is always a risk. Taking the time and care to build good habits revolving around keeping your mental and physical health in a good place, helping you to cope with cravings, and building a support network so that wh...
Aug 22 2018

Drug Use at Raves and Club

Clubs and raves are almost as well-known for their drugs as for music and dancing, with millions of people around the world participating in a culture of use and abuse while out. These drugs range from the well-known MDMA (methylenedioxymethamphetamine) to a range of less-identifiable drugs known...
Aug 15 2018

How I Forgave Myself for My Drug Addiction

When the time came in my recovery to apologize to and make amends with all of the people I hurt during my using, I expected I would finally be free of all of the guilt I carried. It didn't quite work out that way. The Value of an Apology First of all, not everyone accepted my apology or wanted t...
Aug 09 2018

Setting Healthy Boundaries with an Addict

Boundaries are an incredibly healthy part of any relationship, but when your loved one is addicted to a substance, good boundaries can mean the difference between a toxic relationship that harms you and them and one in which both of you can benefit. Addiction changes people, damaging the ego and ...
Aug 01 2018

8 Ways to Teach Yourself You Deserve Love in Recovery

After I hit my bottom and came into recovery I realized that I had super low self-esteem, and that those feelings would need to change somehow. I thought once I got sober that it would be a piece of cake. After all, my drinking was what caused all of my problems. I was clueless. GETTING TO KNOW ...

We Accept Insurance

Don’t see your provider? Contact us to confirm coverage.

3 Easy Options to Get Started or Learn More

You Call Us

We are here to answer your questions. Learn about detox, treatment, costs, or anything else. Give us a call now.
(877) 959-5909

We Call You

Complete this secure form to receive a fast response from our support team
  • This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

Verify Your Insurance

Quickly confirm your coverage using our fast & easy verification system. We accept most insurances (and financing).
Verify My Insurance
  • About Us
  • What We Treat
  • Treatment Options
  • Our Facility
  • Admissions
  • Learn About
  • Contact Us

Connect With Us

(877) 959-5909

1320 West Pearl Street, Anaheim, CA 92801

Licensed and Certified by the State Department of Health Care Services 300188AP Exp. 5/31/2024
Licensed by the State Department of Health Care Services 300188CP Exp. 5/31/2024
Certified by the State Department of Health Care Services 300188FP Exp 5/31/2023

Copyright © 2022 Anaheim Lighthouse. All Rights Reserved. | Privacy Policy | Web Accessibility