How to Stay Sober: 13 Tips for Long-Term Sobriety

When you have achieved recovery, the next step is to maintain your newly established sobriety. Lasting sobriety requires lasting changes in your life, where you make your sobriety a priority every single day of your life. The reason being, relapse is a huge risk even during or after your recovery. So, in this blog, we shall explore how to stay sober long-term and focus on 13 tips that can enable you to stay sober.

1. Take One Day at a Time

When you have achieved sobriety, it is common to focus on the future and how life is going to go from here. But the first tip is to stay grounded. Take one day at a time. Sobriety is a journey, and every day is new; take each day as it comes. Begin the new day with a positive mindset and be grateful for your achievements in the evening.

2. Identify and Avoid Your Triggers

Triggers refer to persons, environments, circumstances, and events that can induce strong urges or cravings to reach out for a substance. For instance, it can be your previous hangout where you have pleasant memories associated with substance use or something as stressful as interpersonal conflicts. Identifying and avoiding these triggers play a major role in preventing relapse. While triggers may vary from person to person, here are some commonly recognizable ones:

• Stressful events
• Emotional distress
• Interpersonal relationship conflicts
• Social network of people who engage in substance use
• Spaces associated with substance use.

When you identify your triggers, you can avoid them or use the healthy coping skills you learned during your rehab.

3. Establish Personal Boundaries

One of the things you learn in therapy is just how important personal boundaries are in your life. So, when you learn to establish personal boundaries regarding what you will or will not tolerate when it comes to your recovery, you can firmly stand up to anything that goes against your recovery. Personal boundaries involve saying no, open communication, and taking yourself away from those situations that are risky, among others.

4. Create a Structured Daily Routine

Sobriety is the priority of your life going forward. So, what you can do is incorporate it into your routine to the point that it just becomes like a second skin. Therefore, you need to develop a structured schedule where you set both short-term and long-term goals related to sobriety. All these goals must be specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound (S.M.A.R.T.) goals.

5. Practice Self-Care

During substance use, the biggest thing you neglect is yourself. In sobriety, you need to start prioritizing yourself. Take care of yourself every single day by eating nutritious meals, engaging in physical exercise, sleeping for 8-10 hours daily, practicing relaxation techniques like meditation, mindfulness, and so on, and partaking in your interests and other recreational activities. Even pamper yourself with the odd spa day whenever you feel like it, so that you can just unwind and relax.

6. Build New, Sober Relationships

Building new and sober relationships can become difficult during recovery, however, they are crucial to your lasting sobriety. They motivate and engage with you, and even provide you with a distraction when you need it. Still, you need to put in the effort to foster these relationships. To begin with, you can enroll in 12-step recovery programs like Alcoholics Anonymous or Narcotics Anonymous, which are not only good for your ongoing care but also provide a medium through which you can build new, sober connections.

7. Engage in Therapy and Counseling

Recovery and staying sober require ongoing therapy and counseling. Therefore, your aftercare will be planned accordingly depending on your needs and goals. You can attend therapy and counseling in outpatient settings or even through telehealth services. This provides you with the support you need while also playing a crucial role in preventing relapse.

8. Practice Healthy Living Practices

Rehab involves incorporating healthy living practices into your life, into your routine. These can range from physical exercise, meditation, mindfulness, yoga, and more. Whatever you are comfortable with, devote some time in your day to this and plan your routine accordingly.

9. Avoid Old Routines

Quitting substance use means not continuing with your same old routine. When you follow the same routine as you used to during your substance use episodes, where recovery was not your priority, you will be doing the same things that led to substance use in the first place. So, build a new, structured routine that prioritizes your recovery, such as a consistent sleep-wake pattern, nutritious diet, physical exercise, mental exercise, therapy, counseling, 12-step recovery meetings, and so on.

10. Stay Mindful of Relapse Warning Signs

Where sobriety is the goal, relapse is an unfortunate possibility. In fact, relapse rates can run as high as 60% during one’s lifetime. Therefore, you need to be aware of the relapse warning signs, such as:

• Persistent urges and cravings to use substances.
• Withdrawal symptoms.
• Change in your mindset, where you begin to think that your recovery is not really as important as it is.
• Behavioral changes, like moving away from the structured routine you have built for yourself, and engaging in self-defeating behaviors.
• Losing control over your triggers and making irrational decisions.
• You withdraw socially, where you begin to lose your social connections.

11. Deal With Mistakes

Mistakes are a part of life. In your recovery, you will make mistakes, as it is something new and different. However, do not treat these mistakes as failures, but rather as challenges that you will overcome. For instance, do not feel guilty or ashamed of your past behavior or assign too many emotions to it.

12. Strike the Balance

When you are new to recovery, it may be that you can find new behaviors that replace your old ones, which are not always healthy. Therefore, when you approach recovery, you need to find new activities that are productive instead of trying to fill the gap in your life, which you may experience when you quit using substances. The key is to achieve harmony, and this will take time and effort, but believe that you will get there.

13. Celebrate Your Achievements

Remember, when you are in recovery, you have come far. Celebrate your milestone - every day of your sobriety is a milestone, and never lose sight of this. So, acknowledge your achievements, and if you make a mistake, practice forgiveness and rise above it.

If you or a loved one is struggling with substance use, help is just a step away. At the NuView Treatment Center, we offer premier outpatient treatment programs that are personalized and tailored to your needs and goals, as we believe in making behavioral healthcare relevant to you to be effective.

If you are wondering how to get sober and stay sober, contact us at (323) 307-7997 or email us at info@nuviewtreatment.com today!