How To Support Someone Trying To Get Sober

You know, we're constantly saying to people who are trying to overcome an addiction, we're constantly saying to them, you can't do it by yourself. You need help. You need support. But what kind of help do you really need? What is helpful, what is not? And how can other people support you? I mean, isn't this something that you just kind of have to pull yourself up by your bootstraps and get done? What is it that other people can do? This video is going to answer all those questions for you. We're going to take a look at what kind of recovery supports are available and what you need be looking for and identifying who's going to be part of your recovery support network. Now, if you're watching this because you're trying to support someone else, even better, because we're going to be talking about what you can do that is actually helpful. For those of you who are new here, welcome to Put the Shovel Down. I'm Amber Hollingsworth, and this YouTube channel is all about helping you understand the science and psychology of addiction so you can get your life and your family back on track. Get out there and live the life that you want to live. Now, in this video, we're going to talk about how individual people can support your recovery in an actually helpful sort of way. Now, naturally, there are other recovery supports out there, like treatment programs and treatment centers and detox centers, but we're talking about on an individual basis, what do you need from the people around you? I think there are actually five sort of categories of things that you need in a support network. Now, you're probably not going to find any one person that can do all of these, which is why you're going to need a few different people in your life that serve a few different functions. Now, one of the things that you need is you need a really good sounding board. You need somebody you can bounce your thoughts off of, right? Somebody can help you sort through stressors and think through problems and that you can talk to freely without feeling judged. Now, the person who does this for you is going to have to have a couple of unique characteristics. First and foremost, you're going to have to see this person as wise. Like, you need to be able to trust this person's judgment. You need to sort of respect their thoughts and ideas on things so that when they give you feedback or advice or they're helping you solve problems, you actually trust their opinion. But you also need to feel safe with this person, which means you need to feel like this person understands you and isn't judging you, because if you don't feel safe and you're worried about being judged, then you're probably not going to share everything with them. So not going to be a very good sounding board if you're not giving them all the information. Now, another thing that you need in your recovery support system is you need a system of accountability. This is a really, really, really big, important factor in early recovery. Who is it that's gonna hold you accountable? Who is it that's gonna check in with you? Who is it that's gonna call you out if you're not doing the things that you said you were gonna do in your recovery program or your relapse prevention plan or whatever it is? Now, this person has to have a unique balance of toughness and softness, right? They have to be brave enough to call you out. They have to be brave enough to push you just a little bit, but they also have to have a way of pushing you that's not going to make you crazy, defensive or send you over the edge. And you may even need to train your accountability person how to most effectively hold you accountable, like what's going to work with you and what's not. You're going to have to be able to tell this person what you should and shouldn't be doing and how to call you out if they see you veering off track. Another thing you're going to need in your support system is you're going to need somebody or somebodies to be cheerleaders for you. You need someone that can effectively cheer you on and make you feel good about the choices that you're making. Now, what makes an effective cheerleader? Anybody can be like, oh, good job. So proud of you. Right? Those are nice things to say. But the most effective cheerleaders are actually able to really see clearly what you're doing, right? Like, specifically, they're able to point out like, that was a really wise choice that you made the other or I can't believe you successfully navigated that really difficult situation. The reason why that makes someone a more effective cheerleader is because it's more objective and it's more believable and it's more specific. So who do you have in your support structure that's generally a positive person and they can see the good parts of people and the good things that you're doing. This is really helpful to have that person that can point out the good choices that you're making and the progress that they're seeing. Another role to think about as far as Having in your recovery support system is you need like a person that can run interference for you. Like if you have to go to a social event that's going to be particularly high risk. You need someone that you can kind of give the secret look to or the secret code to, and they know how to get you out of a situation, or they know how to certain person away from you that you don't want to have to deal with. This is like your recovery wingman. Now the recovery wingman, they have to know enough about what's going on. And it's usually kind of helpful in a recovery wingman that they sort of are in your social circle. So they're a person that could show up with you at the family function or the work function or the other kind of thing that you need to go to. And then you have pretty good social skills, right? So you need to be able to bring this person places and for them to be able to sort of successfully navigate that for you. Especially because early on these kind of social functions may make you feel anxious. So this person is there to help kind of keep you at ease, get you out of a situation you don't need to get out of. Keep people away from you that you don't want around you. This is your wingman. So pick them carefully. Even better, have a few of them. Now there's another role that you need which is very important. And this role I'm going to call the truth teller. This is the call you out person. This is the person that's going to be able to help you see maybe where your blind spots are, right. It can be slightly different than the accountability person. This is the person that's going to help you see if your thinking is wrong, right? If maybe you're making a bad decision. This is a really important role because when it comes to addiction, you can't always trust your own thought processes. And the addiction will lie to you and it will for sure lead you astray. You need this truth telling person to kind of be your eyes and ears and look out for you, right? But this is a really hard role to be in because it's kind of like the bad cop role, right? And so you got to have the right person to do this. The important factor here is this has to be a person that you have a solid enough relationship with and that you trust enough to be able hear difficult feedback from, right? And to be able to sort of like listen to them and trust them even when it doesn't sound right to you or even when they're asking you to do something that goes against your instincts. Who is it you have in your life that you trust on that level, that you would trust their judgment more than your own judgment? And who has an ability to say these things to you, like, directly, but with kindness? And you know that they're like really looking out for your best interest. And you know that they know what they're talking about, basically. Now, those are the five big sort of functions that you need from other people. Now, who can be those other people? Anybody can be those other people. It can be counselors can serve those functions, sponsors, coaches, mentors, religious gurus, friends, family members. Not every person can serve every role or function. But think through who you have in your life and who can do what thing for you, and then literally ask that person to serve that role for you. They'll love it. They'll feel honored that you ask them to be that role for you. And it's just so much better for that person that gets asked because they want to support you and they want to help you, but they probably feel a little awkward about it and they don't want to do the wrong thing and they don't want you to feel like they're being intrusive and they don't know what to do that's helpful. So if you can go up to someone and say, hey, can you be my sounding board? Hey, can you be my recovery wingman? I'm telling you, they will feel great about it, but you may need to give them a little training on what all is involved in that particular function, or how to say things to you in the right way, or what to watch out for you, because you know where you can be sneaky. So you got to give them a little training. I'm not talking about some kind of six weeks orientation. You just got to talk to them a little bit. Even if you have a counselor, this person is trained on how to help you. You still have to guide that counselor on what specific things are helpful for you and what's not. One of the questions I ask new clients within the first 10 minutes usually is, like, what they've done in the past, what's been helpful and what's not helpful. Because I'll say, go ahead and tell me right now what's not helpful and we'll skip it, right? Because even as a counselor, yes, I'm trained on how to help people. But you know, you the best. You know how you're gonna interact with things. You know where you might get sneaky or where you might be vulnerable spots are. You gotta help these people to help you. I promise you they will appreciate it. You see, those are the big five roles that everybody in recovery needs. Don't care what kind of recovery program you're working. These are flexible roles. You can get them met by different people in your life. Everybody needs that. Now. You may also need a more specialized type of help. Now, when I say specialized type of, what I'm generally referring to is if you know that part of your recovery needs to involve digging through past childhood trauma or dealing with ongoing difficult mental health issues. This is where you may need like a specially trained person that's going to be able to sort of get into those deeper, more difficult areas that maybe your friend can't, or maybe even your sponsor can't. If you've got some of that kind of stuff that needs to be dealt with, then you're probably going to need a professionally trained person, like psychologist or a counselor, like a therapist. Now, if you know that you need this kind of support and you don't already have a counselor, then I want to suggest looking into BetterHelp. BetterHelp is an online counseling program. Yes, these are real counselors. Real licensed, real licensed clinical professionals. And BetterHelp has licensed clinicians all over the world. One of the best things about them is they're so easily accessible because they do it through an online platform, which means it's a lot easier to get connected to the help that you need quickly. Because as you may have ran into in the past, if you're trying to find a new mental health provider, the whole process can be daunting. Right? Like you got to make all these phone calls and then they tell you they're not accepting patients, or they don't call you back, or they get you an appointment. But it's gonna be, you know, like seven weeks out from now. Right. There's a lot of difficulty that you can run into trying to find a qualified mental health professional. This is you, and you need somebody to help you. I'm tell you, look into BetterHelp. They're going to match you up quickly. You can go onto their website anytime, day or night and begin the process. They can match you up with a counselor. Not only is that going to happen quickly for you, but once you get assigned a person, which is pretty quick process, you can actually start to message, even back and forth with your counselor. You're going to have access to virtual sessions, chat messaging, email messaging. BetterHelp does a great job of removing all the obstacles and gives you quick access to the help that you need. Not only that, but it's also pretty affordable. I'm gonna put a link in the description for you to check out BetterHelp. And by using this link, you'll actually get a little bonus discount. Now, up next, I want you to watch this video about what makes a good counselor versus a not so good counselor. Like, what do you need to be looking for when you're trying to find the right counselor for you?