Feeling Good is an Inside Job

So, you’re clean and sober and your body begins the process by detoxing. Our bodies are ultra-efficient machines when they are working at their optimum potential. However, when we’re getting high and drinking, our bodies have been working overtime to filter out all the chemicals we’ve been abusing. Our liver is tired! Our lungs, exhausted! And our brains… worn out. Our bodies have been overworked and it, too, needs to recover.

Emotional and Physical Disease

Addiction is both an emotional and physical disease. Many are surprised to learn that drugs not only damage the mind, but also the body, and physical activity is as important as counseling in helping an addict recover.

12 Palms recovery Center offers a large air-conditioned private gym, where clients have access to a personal trainer to help heal the body while counseling sessions work on the soul. In addition, daily activities that prepare the patients for life after treatment are also slowly incorporated. These activities include everything from basic everyday tasks to life skills one can use to strengthen sobriety.

How to have fun and stay clean and sober

By the time most of us finally make it to the rooms of recovery, our idea of being social was keeping our seat warm at the bar. Perhaps standing in line at the coffee pot at our first meeting, we were greeted with a handshake or a hug, our first physical contact with another human that wasn’t violent or sexual. It’s difficult for addicts and alcoholics to get chummy, especially now without the “liquid courage” to hide our awkwardness. So, we clutch our styro cup of coffee tightly and venture to a seat in the back of the room.

After coming to the same meeting for a few weeks, the same person says, “Hi” to us again, and this time asks, “How are you? Do you have plans after the meeting?” After mumbling an incoherent response, we discover we’ve been invited to coffee after the meeting. While at coffee, we’re introduced to a few other members of the fellowship. Wait a minute, they’re telling jokes and laughing! They’re having fun! In fact, no one’s even drinking alcohol. They’re all stone-cold sober! How can this be? How can they be carrying on and having a good time without a drink or drug? Baffled, yet feeling exhilarated by the laughter, we smile.