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Early recovery is a tough time. You’re unsteady and on unfamiliar ground. Your life is filled with changes and nothing feels normal. More than anything, you’re vulnerable to falling back into hold habits and start picking up again.
Which means if you’re going through a breakup, it can be harder to deal with, and you may feel like you don’t have a chance at success.
But it doesn’t have to be that way. Here’s what you need to know to get through a breakup in early recovery to ensure you don’t fall back into negative behaviors that could lead you down the road to relapse.
Be the Best You
Early recovery should be focused on you. How you can get better. How you can learn to live a life without drugs and alcohol. How you can learn to be the best you that you can be. And if you experience a breakup in early recovery, there’s no better time to take a break from the dating scene and focus on you and your recovery. That way you’ll have less distractions and more time to focus on getting better.
Find Support
Seeking support from loved ones can help you get through a breakup.
You’re not the first person to go through a breakup in early recovery and you won’t be the last. Go to a meeting and reach out for support. Explain what’s going on and ask for some extra help.
Maybe a ride to tomorrow’s meeting or a cup of coffee later in the day. While friends and family may never have gone through a breakup in recovery, they too know what it’s like to have a broken heart and can offer a hand when needed.
Give Back
While volunteering won’t spoon with you at night, it will take your mind off your sorrows at least for a little while. And spend four hours at a soup kitchen, and you’ll fall asleep better regardless of the shape of your heart. Giving back helps you focus on the positive, realize what you have to be grateful for, and know that you’ve helped another out.
Give It a Year
Even if you were in a relationship when you first started your journey into recovery, after a breakup, give it at least a year before you start looking for love again. That gives you time to become steady in your sobriety, know who you are and what you want, and deal with the aftermath that addiction left in your life. It also ensures you won’t make any rash decisions when it comes to dating someone new and putting your recovery at risk.
When you’re new to sobriety and experiencing a breakup, it can be devastating. But don’t let it bring you down and don’t use it as an excuse to use. Regardless of who you’re with, your recovery still comes first.