Several things might make you feel lonely when you quit drinking. For some people, the loneliness might be because they no longer have the alcohol to push down their feelings or to act as a distraction. This can mean dealing with tough emotions, including loneliness.
Mental Health and Substance Abuse
Along with these data, a new systematic review strengthens the evidence on the links between social isolation, loneliness, and heart disease. There are three main reasons why reorienting around social health will ignite more impact. Of course, you can be lonely even when you’re surrounded by a lot of people, and that makes meaningful relationships all the more important.
Could Clinical Trial Reporting Spur Illicit Substance Use?
These conditions include anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, binge eating disorder and avoidant restrictive food intake disorder. It’s important to maintain good sleep hygiene by attempting to go to bed on time and wake up around the same time every day. But if you’re struggling with nighttime anxiety or a sleep disorder, it’s important to seek medical attention. Doctors can prescribe treatments and nonaddictive medication to help. HALT is an acronym that stands for “hunger, anger, lonely, tired.” To use the HALT method, you check in with yourself periodically and ask yourself how you’re feeling in these four categories.
- Approximately 46.4% of people will face a mental health condition in their lives.
- This includes attending support group meetings, avoiding triggers, and following your aftercare plan.
- Battling loneliness, especially during recovery while fighting cravings and rebuilding relationships, can feel overwhelming.
- That’s why our addiction therapy programs span a wide range of methods and approaches.
So, What Is the Best Way To Overcome Loneliness?
You may have already done this to some extent while working the 12 steps. Relationships are typically built through frequent, low-intensity contact. If you still haven’t apologized and made amends to some people, now might be a good time to do that.
The Male Friendship Crisis
The best way to beat loneliness is obviously to have regular social connections. For people in recovery, that often means attending regular 1Step or other mutual-aid meetings. This is a time to connect to other sober people and it may also be a good time to discuss your feelings of loneliness. Those moving through the recovery process often experience feelings of loneliness. These feelings may eventually manifest into increased occurrences of isolation or even present as physical ailments such as depression and anxiety. Experts suggest that ongoing loneliness may even lead to health problems, such as an increased chance for heart attacks and a weakened immune system.
Is Loneliness In Addiction Recovery a Normal Feeling?
- Physical hunger can lead to irritability, anger or feelings of nausea.
- Another reason you may be feeling lonely is that you may have alienated some of your friends and family when you were actively addicted.
- An apology and making amends won’t fix your relationship right away but it’s a good place to start.
- That’s why it’s incredibly important to find people to connect with in recovery in order to build a healthier social network.
Some may withdraw from even the most supportive people in their lives, including family members, counselors, and health professionals. If you find yourself in this catch-22 of loneliness combined with a fear or reluctance to be around people, know that loneliness in recovery you are setting yourself up for relapse. Talk to someone you trust; tell them what’s going on and ask them to help you find the support you need. Bridges of Hope is a Joint Commission-accredited dual-diagnosis substance abuse treatment program.
Loneliness and Other Health Problems
- You may have learned a new hobby or interest during your rehab period.
- Joining a 12-step community or another rehab program can also be beneficial, not just for accountability, but to establish meaningful relationships.
- While creating a new social support circle may be challenging, doing so is critical to maintaining sobriety.
- While you were using drugs or alcohol, your friend group was most likely made up of people who did the same.
- However, people don’t always talk about feelings of loneliness and don’t always know what to do with these feelings.