When in recovery, there are physical, emotional, and mental hardships that arise. Setbacks and struggles are common during recovery, including while in residential treatment. Because of this, it is normal for clients to experience negative thoughts. However, changing negative thoughts is necessary to ensure the best results from residential treatment.
During residential treatment at First Steps Recovery, the staff works with clients to foster positive personal growth. This includes working to help clients develop a positive mindset through habits that sustain optimal physical, mental, and emotional health. Having these skills is important for clients in recovery, especially when one’s time at the treatment center ends.
The Importance of a Positive Mindset in Residential Treatment
A positive mindset and hope are extremely important throughout recovery. This can especially be an asset during residential treatment. Likewise, it is important for facilities to include positive thinking skills and personal growth techniques in treatment plans in order to promote this mindset.
There are many factors that contribute to substance use disorders (SUDs). Many of these are mental and emotional in nature. Finding ways to improve one’s mental and emotional aspects can help bolster both effectiveness and engagement during the recovery process. Having a positive mindset also encourages clients to work through the root cause of their SUD without guilt, shame, or blame.
Addressing Post-Treatment Transition Barriers
Working through negative thoughts during residential treatment is especially crucial for post-treatment. There are often limited aftercare resources for clients once discharged. Clients will also often return to their environments where the SUD began. These are known as “transition barriers.”
Developing healthy coping mechanisms and improving one’s mindset or thoughts can help clients during this transition period after treatment. A positive, open mindset during residential treatment allows clients to actively partake in the programs they are in and reap the benefits of their care. This helps down the line when clients leave the facility.
Having an open-minded and positive mindset also helps clients learn about themselves on a deeper level. By committing to work through negative thoughts, clients can not only understand the root cause of their SUD but also figure out ways to change negative thinking in general. These strategies can be used after treatment to ease the transition back into clients’ normal routines.
Working Through Negative Thoughts During Residential Treatment
At First Steps Recovery, clients are provided with individualized treatment plans that work to heal their whole person. This residential treatment program lasts 30 days. During these 30 days, one’s physical, mental, and emotional health and healing are prioritized by the team. To help surpass negative thoughts, the staff works with clients to develop healthy thinking patterns and healthy coping mechanisms. This is done through both holistic approaches to care as well as clinical approaches most common in residential treatment.
Holistic Care and Healthy Habits
There are a number of holistic care options at First Steps Recovery. These include recreation, art, yoga, horseback riding, music, and wilderness therapies. Holistic care offers more hands-on experiences that heal the mental and emotional components of addiction. Often clients do not feel comfortable expressing themselves or their thoughts when they enter treatment. Holistic approaches are implemented to help clients through difficult thoughts or feelings in an alternative way.
Yoga Therapy
For instance, yoga therapy helps improve clients’ mental and emotional states through physical activity. Yoga focuses mostly on controlled breathing, spinal work, flexibility, and calming the mind. As their energy circulates throughout the body in a new way, old ways of being are released.
Also, for those struggling with substance abuse, yoga is a good tool for strengthening concentration and developing patience. When negative thoughts come into play, yoga is important in evening out emotions and restoring balance. Rather than letting these negative thoughts overwhelm them, a person can use yoga as a healthy coping mechanism for calming the mind and body.
Creative Therapies
In more creative and expressive therapies, such as music therapy, clients work with various types of music to self-reflect. Rather than simply listening to music, clients bring more interpretation into this therapy. Through a series of songwriting, drumming, composition, and playing exercises, clients learn to express themselves in a nonverbal and healing way. For those with negative thoughts, music therapy helps reduce stress and promote relaxation. These difficult feelings are addressed without feeding into negative self-talk.
Clinical Approaches to Therapy and Treatment
First Steps Recovery offers a broad range of clinical approaches including individual psychotherapy, individual drug and alcohol counseling, group therapy and counseling, individual case management, and psychological assessments.
During group and individual therapy sessions, clients are encouraged to be open and honest with those around them. Honesty is important in getting to the underlying causes of the client’s substance use disorder. Therapists, specifically those in talk therapy, also work with clients to develop healthier thinking patterns. Clients are invited to verbally express their negative feelings, thoughts, and behaviors in order to reconstruct them and produce healthier habits. In turn, these healthier patterns help clients accelerate their personal and mental growth during residential treatment and after.
Here at First Steps Recovery, we encourage clients to work toward a positive mindset in order to reconstruct and diminish negative thinking. Due to setbacks and overwhelming feelings, negative thinking is natural and normal during recovery. In residential treatment following detox, though, it is important to work toward healthier thinking habits in order to prevent relapse. This also helps make the most of the recovery treatment process. First Steps Recovery offers clinical and holistic services to help clients understand and express themselves more positively and productively. Using clinical approaches such as psychotherapy, licensed clinicians work with clients to reconstruct their negative thinking. To learn more about negative thinking in recovery, please call us at (844) 489-0836.
