December 30, 2020

The Role of Physical Health in Recovery

Posted by Pat S in Insights
health

Alcoholism and addiction, as well as mental and emotional health issues, can wreak havoc on our physical health. From health problems like ulcers, elevated blood pressure, and brain damage, to other issues like chemical imbalances, there is a whole host of physical conditions that can be brought about or exacerbated by these issues. Aside from the conditions themselves, the lifestyles that commonly accompany them can be highly destructive as well. It isn’t just the big trouble like cirrhosis of the liver or potentially fatal overdose. There are often issues caused by frequent accompaniments like cigarette smoking that are disastrous to overall physical health.  What muddies the waters here is the crossover between destructive actions and their results. Not only can alcoholism and addiction result from self-medicating mental and emotional health issues like anxiety, depression, or trauma, but excessive problematic drinking and substance abuse can also cause anxiety, depression, or trauma….

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December 29, 2020

Staying in Gratitude

Posted by Pat S in Alumni
gratitude

Just the fact that we’re here and reading this right now is reason enough to be grateful. Maybe you’re here because you’re new to recovery, or contemplating sobriety, or you’ve been in recovery awhile and you’re just struggling. Whatever brought you here doesn’t matter as much as acknowledging your gratitude for getting to be here. Every day that we wake up and are still breathing is a day full of beautiful opportunities, whether it’s easy to see things that way or not. In general, whatever your spiritual beliefs may be, the astronomical odds of even being alive are pretty miraculous. We are made up of millions and millions of microscopic events that had to go just right for us to be here. Yet, here we are. Maybe we are looking for help or just an emotional boost, and we found this article. What are the odds? Hopefully we can do…

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December 27, 2020

How Can I Practice Self-Love?

Posted by Pat S in Lifestyle
selflove

Self-love is not a dismissable term, though at first glance it may seem like a vague, overused catchphrase. Self-love is akin to self-care, which essentially means taking care of ourselves and being as loving to ourselves as we are to the people around us. For alcoholics and addicts, we often have to begin journeying the 12-Steps to start understanding and practicing love of any kind. The 12-Steps help us overcome our destructive selfishness. They teach us how to think of others and be of service to them.  Ultimately, the program of recovery aims to teach us how to be loving, healthy people in all our relationships — and that includes our relationship with ourselves. A glass can only spill what it contains. If we are unkind to ourselves or treat ourselves like garbage, it will be nearly impossible to be as kind, loving, and helpful towards others as our recovery…

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December 25, 2020

Learning How to Accept Help

Posted by Pat S in Recovery
help

People need people — there’s no getting around it. We’d all like to fancy ourselves as independent and self-sufficient, and we all are to varying degrees. But nobody can do it all by themselves. At some point in our lives, we will all need a little help. Sometimes we will need a lot of help, like when we first enter recovery. For those of us who are alcoholics or addicts, we can begin to see pretty clearly here how much help can, well, help.  Life is pretty empty without other people, and it often becomes impossible to live without the occasional bit of help from these people. We need each other, whether we like it or not. Sometimes we allow our history in alcoholism or addiction to make us feel unworthy of help. We may not like asking for help, we may wish we didn’t ever need a helping hand,…

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December 23, 2020

Hope as a Foundation

Posted by Pat S in Insights
hope

Alcoholism and addiction are often accompanied by a multitude of mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual issues. Where does hope come in? Hope is a concept, an idea, and a motivating feeling. But it is also a somewhat ambiguous principle, because what gives hope to one may not spark it in another.  Like alcoholism and addiction — which have a solution in the 12-Steps — mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual health issues each have treatments and practices that can go far in addressing and solving them. We have seen great success with the idea of hope as a foundation for all the necessary treatment methods that someone who is experiencing these issues will need to engage with. We Must Hope for Success It goes back to a very old philosophy quote, “You cannot achieve that which is not hoped for.” Simply put, if you do not believe that treatment will be…

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December 21, 2020

Staying Current With 12-Step Work

Posted by Pat S in Alumni
sobriety

Those of us who have experienced living with the disease of alcoholism and addiction remember how desperately we sought escape and freedom. We also remember the hope and relief that we felt we finally found the program of recovery. Maybe it didn’t look exactly how we imagined it, but we sure were happy to find a solution to our deadly disease, finally. The sheer joy of seeing people who had alcoholism and addiction just like we did, but were now living happy and free lives in recovery, was incredible. Our time spent losing our lives trapped inside our disease could finally be over. We heard these recovering alcoholics and addicts talk about participating in the program of recovery. They spoke about attending meetings, being of service, and getting familiar with the concept of fellowship. They also spoke often about taking the 12-Steps. They called all of this “working a program”…

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December 19, 2020

Aren’t Healthy Coping Mechanisms Enough?

Posted by Pat S in Recovery
meditation

“Healthy coping mechanisms” has become a common catchphrase in popular psychology today. It’s a catch-all term for self-care, emotional balance, rational reaction, and general mental and emotional well-being. Any number of healthy, clear-headed, and constructive tools and practices that allow us to process, deal with, and navigate life events are considered healthy coping mechanisms. They are essentially great things to have close at hand in our daily bag of life skills.  Things like breathing exercises, therapy, and meditation can all be healthy coping mechanisms. Make no mistake — these things are absolutely wonderful. Participation and practice with healthy coping mechanisms are highly encouraged. Just because it is an often-used psychology term does not make it something to be dismissed. Any segment of society that wants people to be healthy and live well will encourage some fashion of coping with the turmoil and chaos that inevitably occur in life. Say Goodbye…

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December 17, 2020

Coping With Chaos

Posted by Pat S in Recovery
mental health

Whether you are an alcoholic, addict, or neither, turbulent times are inevitable in our lives. This is not something we should live in fear of. Still, it is an eventuality that we can prepare for — particularly those of us who are in recovery and may also have mental and emotional health issues to consider. It would serve us all well to take the necessary precautions to limit the damage done by chaotic times. By just a few small actions and a couple of simple reminders, we can help safeguard our recovery and emotional and mental health through life’s storms. Don’t Give in To Fear Life has a natural rhythm, just like the ocean’s tides. Often the waves are calm and the sea is low, but eventually, the waves will rock and the tide will rise. But it will also lower and calm again soon enough. Don’t take chaotic times…

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December 15, 2020

Establishing Treatment Methods as Habit

Posted by Pat S in Insights
mental health

Jaywalker Lodge is proud to utilize many treatment methods for the men who stay with us. The particular methodologies we employ are chosen for good reason. It’s no mistake that we do things this way. We believe it is in everyone’s best interest for the most helpful, healing, educational, and effective treatments to be used to their highest efficacy. We believe in combining treatments that improve the benefits of one another. The men who come to Jaywalker Lodge suffer from alcoholism and addiction, potentially in conjunction with mental and emotional health issues. Most of our men have struggled to achieve or maintain recovery in the past as well. This needs to be addressed head-on and that’s exactly what we do here. We utilize our particular mixture of treatments because we aim to implement a program designed to heal these issues holistically. Working the 12-Steps Alcoholism and addiction are best dealt…

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December 13, 2020

Applying the Principles in All Our Affairs

Posted by Pat S in Alumni
spiritual

For those of us who are alcoholics or addicts and new to recovery, we may not be aware of the spiritual principles behind the 12-Steps. Hopefully, we have seen how effective the 12-Steps are for people just like us, and we know the life-saving value that they offer. For those of us who are familiar with recovery, we likely know how much the 12-Steps can do for us. But even then, we may not have familiarized ourselves with the underlying principles of spirituality that are embodied in each of the 12-Steps and the program of recovery as a whole.  As we practice and work each of the 12-Steps with our sponsor, we are learning a new perspective, a new life skill, and adding a new tool to our spiritual toolbox — all of which better equips us to handle life with lovingness, serenity, and effectiveness. There are spiritual principles that…

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