Overcoming Stigma and Seeking Help for Mental Health Concerns
The term stigma is used to refer to unfairly negative attitudes or beliefs that result in prejudice and discrimination. With regard to mental health disorders, stigma involves the idea that such illnesses are shameful, embarrassing, and weak. This can cause [...]
Why Successful Recovery is A Group Effort
If we zoom as far out as possible from our loved one’s substance use disorder (SUD), we see that its effects ripple into larger social systems. We see that the person struggling with addiction is taking the brunt of the [...]
The Myth of The Addictive Personality
When people throw around the term addictive personality, they’re often referring to what they see as a tendency to abuse substances or fixate on certain risky activities or adrenaline-seeking behaviors. The phase can be used jokingly, as an insult, or [...]
Why Successful Recovery is A Group Effort
If we zoom as far out as possible from our loved one’s substance use disorder (SUD), we see that its effects ripple into larger social systems. We see that the person struggling with addiction is taking the brunt of the [...]
Let It Go: 6 Important Benefits of Forgiveness
At St. Joseph Institute for Addiction, we've found that a lasting recovery is about more than simply abstaining from the use of drugs and alcohol. Clients at our Pennsylvania residential addiction treatment center make peace with their past and learn [...]
Shower Affirmations: An Awesome Mindfulness Technique
What are Affirmations, and How Do They Work? Affirmations are concise, positive phrases about your life that you repeat regularly. The idea is that with repetition, your brain starts to believe and accept the affirmations as true--causing you to feel [...]
Why Smoking Weed and Driving is Dangerous
While fatal car accidents involving marijuana consumption in the United States have nearly doubled in the past 20 years, smoking weed and driving is still less likely to result in fatal collisions than drunk driving. However, the danger that weed [...]
Finding Meaning and Purpose in Recovery
A lasting recovery is about more than just abstaining from the use of addictive substances. Once you're no longer under the influence of drugs and alcohol, it becomes about finding new sources of meaning and purpose. There's no one-size-fits-all answer, [...]
Fighting Addiction Stigma to Promote a Lasting Recovery
Addiction stigma is an often overlooked yet pervasive barrier to healing. For people in recovery, fighting this stigma is not only a matter of breaking free from the burden of drug and alcohol abuse but also from the suffocating grip [...]
The Importance of Optimism in Recovery
"The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today." ~ Franklin D. Roosevelt. Franklin D. Roosevelt became president in 1933 during the height of the Great Depression. He led the United States through the early [...]
