Desensitizing Triggers in Recovery

Many individuals began their journey of substance use disorder (SUD) in response to a traumatic experience. The hardships of addiction can cause many trigger points that influence relapse to occur. It is important to address these triggers to avoid falling into a state of relapse or halting your recovery progress.

What Are Triggers?

Triggers are specific stimuli that are associated with the use of a substance or the effects of SUD. These are essentially warning signs for substance abuse. Being aware of what your triggers are can help you to avoid relapse and further understand your recovery needs. To address your triggers, think about potential stimuli that may influence your potential to engage in substance use.

Triggers can be associated with emotions, social situations, withdrawal symptoms, or common patterns you engage in. If you find that a certain action, situation, or activity tends to enhance your cravings or desire to use a substance, you are likely encountering a trigger response.

Desensitizing Trigger Effects

As each common trigger with SUD is addressed, you can learn different techniques to help desensitize yourself to these triggers to overcome their effects. You may find that some of your potential triggers are not on this list. However, some of these techniques can be altered and used to suit your specific needs to overcome your triggers and desensitize yourself to their negative effects. The following triggers are commonly experienced in recovery and may play a role in the occurrence of relapse if not properly addressed.

Social Media

Many individuals find that social media is a trigger point for them. It may be due to seeing posts about substance use, inducing cravings, or it may be from seeing the success of others. Seeing others’ success and feeling that you are lacking is a common feeling when viewing social media posts. As everyone is in a different state of life, most people tend to show their best side on social media. If you see posts of others’ picture-perfect lifestyle, it likely has their faults below the surface of the public eye.

Stepping away from social media or limiting your amount of social media use can help you to avoid these triggers. Social media use can become a form of addiction within itself. Ensuring you are not spending your free time scrolling through posts for hours on end can provide you with benefits in all areas of your life, including avoiding potential trigger responses.

To desensitize from the negative effects of social media posts, you can alter what content you choose to look at or change your mindset when scrolling through posts. If you find that you are feeling negative self-thoughts when viewing others’ posts, take a moment to pause and reflect on your thoughts. Think about the positive aspects of your current situation. It may be hard to think about them, but they are always there. Expressing self-gratitude rather than self-shame can help desensitize you to these posts.

If you find high amounts of substance use posted on your feed, consider removing the individuals posting this form of content. Rather than thinking about your desire to use these substances, think of something to distract you or focus on the negative effects of the use to desensitize the desire from the image.

Social Isolation

Through the hardships of addiction, it can be easy to engage in acts of self-isolation. When your recovery journey does not go as planned, you may feel feelings of shame and embarrassment. To avoid addressing these feelings around others, self-isolation is often used as a coping mechanism.

While this may appear to be a good idea on the surface, being alone for extended periods can be a trigger point for many individuals. If you tended to use substances to help ease feelings of loneliness, you might feel the desire to begin using again during periods of self-isolation.

When you are isolated, there is nobody to help hold you accountable but yourself. While accountability is ultimately up to you, having a positive influence from others can often help to keep you on track. There is no backlash from others dealing with the shame of using if you are the only one aware of your relapse. This can be extremely problematic as you move forward through your journey at sober living, as you may not choose to seek the help you need and are going against the requirements of our facility.

Self-isolation can also cause you to avoid engaging in activities or group meetings that are required to attend within sober living. A lack of engagement in the activities within your sober living home can be detrimental to your long-term recovery. It is important to stay engaged with your responsibilities in recovery, even through hardships. Working to overcome the obstacles that present themselves and learning to take advantage of the resources available to you can help set you up for success as you move on from sober living.

A great way to desensitize yourself from self-isolation is to do enjoyable things and distract from the idea of substance use during your alone time. If you tend to sit in silence and burrow within your thoughts when alone, the desire to use substances will often present itself. Keeping your mind engaged with other activities when you need alone time can help you make the best of your moments of isolation and create a healthy state of mind to prepare to engage with others. Ask for help from others in your community to help build your confidence in going out to assist in avoiding self-isolation.

Stress

You will almost certainly experience high feelings of stress at some point through recovery. Stress is a natural response that we all encounter at one point or another. When individuals in recovery experience high levels of stress, it can be a trigger to engage in substance use to calm the effects of stress. Before starting your recovery journey, you may have used substances to alleviate the effects of stress. You now have to rely upon alternative coping mechanisms to manage these feelings.

Desensitizing yourself to the stress responses your body encounters can help alleviate the desire to use substances when you encounter high levels of stress. Utilizing breathwork is a great way to alleviate feelings of stress. This method can be used within any given situation, making it extremely versatile. As you begin to use your breathwork to alleviate stress responses, your body slowly becomes able to adjust when moments of stress arise naturally.

When you notice your stress responses beginning to activate, try to lower your heart rate and focus on taking deep breaths. With each breath, picture your heart rate slowing down. Try to put all your focus on your breathing, taking away your thoughts from the activated stress response. The more you continue to practice this, the easier it will be to implement during moments of high stress.

Nostalgia

You may feel feelings of nostalgia when reminiscing on your time before recovery. While substance abuse can lead to many long-term negative effects, there is a short-term reward. Many individuals experience an association with positive memories from social events, parties, and other events where they used substances. Thinking back to these times can bring upon feelings of nostalgia, potentially promoting the desire for you to lose sight of recovery and go back to substance use again.

To desensitize from these feelings, try to think about the negative effects that these times brought upon you. It can be easy to look back and remember the moments of joy, but try to look at the full picture. Think about why you started your recovery journey. There were likely negative aspects of substance abuse that brought you into recovery. Remember what those effects were, and focus on how you can build your life in a way that doesn’t incorporate the negative aspects of substance abuse.

If you find that you are commonly experiencing feelings of nostalgia, reach out to your support system. Discuss the positive aspects of where you are now compared to your past with them. Having someone to discuss these points with can help you to feel validated in your recovery journey and understand why reliving those past experiences is not the best path for your future. It is okay to reminisce on the past and feel a sense of pleasure from the positive moments.

However, you should stay focused on the future ahead of you rather than the past you have left behind. Think about the positive aspects of your life now. You have gained many skills to help set yourself up for success in your recovery journey and overcome the problems within your past. There is still a great deal of success to accomplish in your future.

Going back to your state of addiction will only set you back in your future abilities. Focus on new forms of enjoyment and pleasure that do not come with negative side effects. Utilize the resources available to you in our sober living home to overcome these feelings of nostalgia and recognize everything you have to be grateful for in your present. Rebuild your self-esteem on your abilities to continue and overcome these nostalgic feelings.

Addressing Other Trigger Points

As we have reviewed some of the most common trigger points, you may find that there is another factor that you consider to be a trigger in your recovery. Many of the desensitization techniques listed can be applied to various forms of triggers. Try experimenting with some of them and making them applicable to your situation to see if you can overcome the effects. You may need to make adjustments to these practices to make them applicable to your needs and situation.

If you are struggling to pinpoint a specific practice to overcome one of your triggers, seek assistance from your team within your sober living home or ask for advice from a trusted individual within your support system. Each person will react differently to triggers. Therefore, the same techniques to overcome them will not work for everyone. You may need to try multiple methods and find a practice that works best for you to desensitize your trigger responses.

Through your recovery journey, many triggering points may present themselves, encouraging you to engage in substance use again and regress in your recovery progress. Being aware of your common trigger points and learning how to desensitize yourself to them can help you stay on track in recovery. The use of social media, self-isolating, high-stress responses, and feelings of nostalgia can all be common trigger points for individuals in recovery. Learn about these common triggers and practices to desensitize them. These techniques can be applied to other trigger points as well to help keep you on track to success. To learn more, reach out to Real Recovery Sober Living at (727) 290-9156.