Let’s be honest, while enrolling in a treatment plan and plugging into a treatment center are such huge victories on the path of healing, they can often seem like giant failures, too. It’s ironic for both feelings of victory and defeat to live in the same space, trying to take control over the same situation.
Unfortunately, more often than not, we tend to let defeat take over our headspace, allowing it to steer conversations in whichever way defeat pleases. Defeat is sneaky, though. It doesn’t want you to know it’s there; it operates its own creative version of smoke and mirrors. Instead of shouting, “Hey, I’m here to trip you up!” defeat wants you to believe that its lies are your truth — that you’re the one who genuinely believes:
- There’s no going back, no returning to the way things were, no more good days ahead. So why am I even here?
- What if ________ finds out that I’m at this place? How will that make me look?
- I’ve tried this recovery thing before, and it didn’t work. What good is another go at failing?
- I’ve gone too far. I’m irredeemable. Once I tell these people what I’ve done, I’ll lose the last bit of dignity I have. Then what?
- Even if I get out of here in one piece, who’s to say relapse won’t be the end of my story?
Defeat ensures that these lies that hold so much doubt, fear, and shame will parallel not only your past but your future, too. Tricky enough, most of these lies make sense; they fit the narrative; they might as well be true. What if they’re wrong, though? What if defeat doesn’t deserve your headspace? Your thought patterns? Your self-worth? Your life? What if there’s a different take on treatment and your treatment center that puts defeat on the curve?
The cool thing is, there is a different take. There’s a better narrative, a brighter future for you at your treatment center, so let’s look at a few healthy perspectives, a few overlooked truths to remind yourself of when a cloud of doubt and defeat wants you to forget just why you are here.
Life Isn’t Linear
You’ve probably heard this saying before that life has its ups and downs. Often, we tend to ignore cliches like these out of pure disdain for their overused, misused, sometimes misconstrued repetition. We don’t want the motivational sayings on the posters because deep down, we know that reality carves no room for a steady, constant, upward sloping pattern. Instead, we want more than the words; we want proof-positive that those words come from the core, true origins that can back such a claim.
Life isn’t linear. If you can ignore the cheesy, overrated Pinterest feel this phrase holds, then you can step back long enough to process what your heartbeat looks like on a scanner. Lots of ups and downs. Lots of highs and lows. Lots of spikes and plummets. All bunched up together to create a beautiful display that reminds you that you are still alive. You are still breathing. You still hold space on this earth. You still matter.
At your treatment facility, this truth is both recognized and understood. Victory isn’t meant to be smooth. A lack of perfection doesn’t equate to defeat. The A+ and F- all serve a common purpose while you’re in treatment — to teach you how to grow through life: hard and easy, good and bad.
You Can’t Succeed Without Community
Feel free to try healing from addiction solo, but it’ll go about as well as trying to play on a see-saw by yourself. If you aren’t a fan of one-man bands, one-man shows, or one-man rounds on the see-saw, then it’s time to think that maybe being surrounded by a community of people with like-minded goals and a desire to encourage you along the way isn’t such a bad road to success.
Many people struggling with addiction avoid treatment facilities because they’re an ultimate blow to the ego; they are a mandatory confession that you couldn’t make it on your own. Yet, we think we’ve made it everywhere else in life without someone, and at the same time, we think we’re the only ones who’ve ever needed someone else.
Everyone has been taught by someone, start to finish. Everyone has been taught how to walk and how to talk, just like everyone has been taught how to ace math or English test. Further along the road, everyone has been taught how to create a healthy marriage, raise a wonderful child, find the right job, and more.
Everyone has needed someone at some point. The reason these “everyone’s” are everywhere is that they were willing to receive help. They swallowed their pride and said, “My marriage is failing, and I don’t have a clue what to do,” or, “This baby is running a fever and won’t stop screaming. What am I supposed to do?”
They’ve asked the sort of harder questions that essentially mean, “I can’t do it without you.” As soon as they make such a confession, they receive life-changing answers to some of the most difficult seasons of their lives.
Treatment is no different. Confessing your need for community is vital to navigating the murky, scary, yet rewarding waters of addiction recovery.
Joining a treatment facility for your addiction recovery can almost feel like a gut punch, like a failure, but at Renaissance Ranch, we celebrate your humility and your desire to take care of yourself in the present to create a better future for you and your loved ones. It’s not always easy to admit that you need help through a difficult life season, especially when you were hoping all along that you could just do this on your own. We believe that’s the pinnacle of recovery, accepting humility, valuing community, and restoring your soul with God. We know this is often easier said than done, and if you’re having trouble or you need someone to hold you accountable, our staff at Renaissance Ranch is available to talk. Healing is hard, but you don’t have to walk through it alone. If you’re struggling with any aspect of addiction, addiction recovery, or reintegration, we can help. To learn more about our assistance, please contact us today at (801) 308-8898.