Often referred to as a family disease, addiction affects every part of an individual’s life and relationships negatively. It’s not just the person struggling with a substance abuse problem that needs treatment, close loved ones and families also need interventions from the impact abuse puts on everyone.
Addicts don’t think or act clearly when they are in the throes of their disease, and as a result, they hurt loved ones and break valuable trust bonds. After mistrust and anger are ingrained into relationships, it is extremely difficult to fully mend relationships, but it’s not impossible. Trust is complex when dealing with addicts, it’s easy to lose and difficult to regain. While a recovering addict may feel that their time in treatment is enough to have their loved ones trust them again, it isn’t that simple. The reality is that it will be a time-intensive effort on the part of the recovering addict to build up those broken bonds.
How Can You Rebuild Trust After Addiction?
If you are having a difficult time re-establishing healthy relationships here are some strategies may help move the ball forward.
- Defining boundaries and expectations set the ground rules for what is acceptable and what is not. Explaining how trust can be regained and an outlook on what that process looks like will better illustrate how your loved one can earn your trust. It will also minimize communication misunderstandings and the potential for your loved one to become disheartened.
- Be direct with your loved one if they do something unacceptable. Honest feedback that is delivered promptly addresses issues when they arise and works to better resolve them. Not addressing issues causes them to fester and hinders the trust process.
- Family therapy provides a buffer during highly emotional and contentious interactions that only breed negativity and an inability towards progress. An outside, a trained professional is a neutral party that each perspective can work through. The result is feedback and input which is fair for each side.
After the trauma on all sides that addiction causes, everyone must heal. It is possible to rebuild and move forward with strong relationships that were once dismantled and which you believed were beyond repair. Understand that it will take time but if everyone is willing and has the love for each other to put the necessary time forth, repairing valuable relationships can be done.
Family Treatment
After completing substance treatment at a medical detox and addiction alternative treatment center like Discovery Place in Tennessee, it’s time to work on bringing life back to damaged relationships. Not only can our facility and care team help you safely detox and provide you the long term support after treatment that you need to stay sober, but we also have a family program too. Discovery Place is Tennessee’s alternative treatment center and offers nourishing and healthy support at no additional cost to our residents because we know how important strong family bonds are to the recovery process and to staying sober after treatment.
Call our Tennessee detox alternative treatment center anytime day or night at 1-800-725-0922 to discuss your situation.
