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Don’t Go It Alone: Keeping Loneliness at Bay in Recovery
It is probably the case that most everyone feels lonely from time to time. Maybe you are the only person in the office on a Saturday while you try to catch up on work. Maybe you are home alone because everyone else in the family has one activity or another. Maybe a good friend is out of town for a while—or has moved away permanently. These moments of loneliness are, in general, no big deal and are short-lived. But ongoing loneliness can be problematic. This is especially true for a person who is in recovery from a substance use disorder.
Do Not Take Club Drugs Just to Be Sociable—Or For Any Other Reason
Have you ever heard someone say that they are just a “social smoker” or a “social drinker”? Maybe you have said something like this yourself. The idea of the social smoker or drinker is that the person in question does not smoke or drink all of the time. Instead, they just light up or drink up when they are in the company of friends. We must admit that we are, in general, a little skeptical of the notion of social smokers or drinkers. But the concept does point to an important fact: Many people develop a substance use disorder as
Make Up Your Mind to Give Mindfulness a Try
Here is an experience you are likely familiar with. You are engaged in a task you have done a million times before—taking a shower, washing the dishes, mowing the lawn—and your thoughts start to drift. Maybe you find yourself replaying something that happened to you recently. Maybe you start to think about something that is coming up that you are feeling a little nervous about. Or maybe you would be hard-pressed to recount your series of thoughts to someone else because you have fallen down a rabbit hole of tenuously connected ideas or memories (mindless social media scrolling is one
No Hard Definition of ‘Rock Bottom’
Are you hip to Elmo’s feud with a pet rock named Rocco? Elmo, the red furry monster of Sesame Street fame, finds himself frequently losing his temper when faced with the demands of Rocco as presented by Elmo’s friend Zoe. As Elmo likes to remind anyone who will listen, Rocco is a rock! Rocks are, in general, pretty easy to understand. While the idea that a rock is a solid mass of geological materials might not roll right off your tongue, as a rule, we know a rock when we see one. And we know its likely characteristics—especially the fact
Employee Spotlight: Sheila Graves
Sheila Graves, LMSW, LCSW(s) Williamsburg Intensive Outpatient Therapist at The Farley Center Sheila comes with an array of life & career experience that’s led her to make the decision to go back to college at 38 y/o to become a LCSW Therapist. She chose the University of Denver’s clinical adult mental health & addiction track to earn a MSW in 2010. Sheila is a native of central CA, is the youngest of 3 children w/a 28 y/o daughter, Erika, who lives in Portland, OR. She’s over the moon proud of her daughter & in awe in her grace/courage in living
What is the Pink Cloud Syndrome?
Imagine you have just accomplished a significant goal—something you have been working toward for a long time. Maybe you got promoted. Maybe your significant other accepted your marriage proposal. Maybe you published a novel or took a dream vacation or shared the joy of one of your children being accepted by their first-choice college. Take a moment and think about how you would (or did!) feel in that moment. It seems safe to say that you felt happy, right? But “happy” might not be a strong enough word here. After all, we are talking about a milestone moment. You wouldn’t
