20 Keys to Successful Treatment Outcome By Christie Bates-MacKaskle Whether you have three days to detox or six months to transition from treatment to halfway-housing and back into the world, there are some basic principles that can help you get the very most out of your treatment experience.  - Recognize that the word "treatment" means just that. You are being treated for a medical condition called addiction. You're not a derelict; you're a patient.
- Assume that you cannot trust your own mind. Active addiction muddies your ability to see reality. If you were thinking clearly, you wouldn't need treatment.
- Respect your feelings. If you don't respect your feelings enough to face them and feel them, your sobriety won't be stable. It's that simple.
- Focus on recovery. For now, you're not at work and you have no responsibilities at home. Your job is to get as well as you can in the time you have. You'll do everyone else in your life a favor if you take care of your recovery first.
- Stay in the present moment. Don't look for guarantees about your marriage, your job or anything else. Do what's in front of you. You're always okay in the present.
- Seek out similarities. Sick people like to find even sicker people to compare themselves to, but you'll get more out of treatment if you look fro what you have in common with other clients, instead of trying to prove to yourself you're not "as bad" as others are.
- Be honest where you can. Don't be ashamed to let family and friends know that you're getting help. Chances are they are aware of your drug problem and will be glad to know you're doing something about it.
- Be discreet where you must. If there are some people you absolutely cannot tell about your addiction, you still have choices. You can say you're going inpatient for a medical problem, which is true. Or you can say you're taking a spiritual retreat, which is also true.
- Come clean. You might as well get it all out on the table right now while you're with people who understand. As soon as you can, let your counselor know what bothers you most. If you don't, it's like having surgery for a gunshot wound and leaving the bullet in your flesh. You have to come clean to stay clean.
- H.A.L.T. Pay attention to what's going on inside your body. This is a perfect time to learn how you feel and act when you're too Hungry, Angry, Lonely, or Tired. It's also the time to learn to deal with these feelings without using drugs.
- Ask questions. In most cases, being in treatment give you access to people just like you, except they've somehow learned to live happily without drugs and alcohol. Fin out how they do it.
- Keep commitments. The first relationship you must repair is your relationship to yourself. If you sign up for 14 days of treatment, use all 14 days. Your self-esteem is your reputation with yourself and addiction has trashed it. The process of rebuilding beings now.
- Accept that you're sick. In recovery, there's a saying that, "I'm not a bad person trying to become good. I'm a sick person trying to get well."
- Learn about your disease. Most treatment centers offer great information on the workings of your disease. This can help you understand why you've done some of the things you've done, so that you can set things right without hating yourself.
- Most of all, practice your recovery. It won't help you to be an expert about your disease unless you are willing to do what works in recovery.
- Read. Especially literature from recovery programs. It helps to know that there are so many people outside of treatment who know just what you're going through.
- Get phone numbers and use them. Whether your program takes you to meetings off-campus, or 12-steppers bring a meeting to you, get phone numbers from people who have experienced long-term recovery. These are the folks who can help you live clean and sober when treatment is over.
- Suspend all of your old ideas. Everything you think you know has landed you here. Be willing to let go of all of it. If any of your thinking is any good, someone sane will let you know.
- Believe you can recover. If you have trouble believing you can live clean and sober, you can't help that. But you can choose to be willing to believe it, and to take the actions that someone takes when they're willing to recover.
- Fire your Higher Power. Sounds blasphemous? Maybe, until you face the truth that drugs are/or alcohol have been your Higher Power up to this point. Listen in meetings to learn qualities of a Higher Power that keep people clean and sober, and then write a job description for your new Higher Power.
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