Other Behavioral Issues in Sober Living

Hey, guys, Chris Edrington here from Cadre. And I think we're gonna talk a little bit about. Got a little technical issue here for 2 seconds. Talk a little bit about other behavioral issues in sober living, because I think it's a relevant point. It's kind of current for us at my program. And I'll preface this by saying we're not mental health experts. Right. We're not experts in everything. In early recovery, lots of things come up. Lots of other stuff, behavioral stuff, like eating disorders and depression and cutting or self harm or gambling or whatever, and they tend to flush out when you're in sober living because it's a supportive environment, and people literally start to feel comfortable while in that structure being who they are and, like, sort of flushing stuff out and talking about stuff.

And, you know, you get some relationships built in this supportive environment, and you start talking real about what's really going on with you, and stuff comes up and comes out. And so what I'm getting at here is that environment should be cherished, supported, and taken full advantage of whatever it is you can do during that time. So you might be in a sober living and also be in an outpatient program, and you've got some clinical work going on at the same time. Hopefully you got therapy going on at the same time.

So there's this comprehensive sort of coverage. But specifically, while you're in the house, if other stuff comes up that hasn't necessarily to do with chemical dependency or just not drinking, which really is too much of a simplification anyway for what sober living is, I think it's important to recognize and talk about how can we be supportive, and to what extent can we be supportive of people in sober living with different issues? And here is an example. So maybe, and we've had this happen many times where an eating disorder flares up and other girls in the house may be triggered by that.

Or maybe they're supportive of the person who's having their eating disorder come back to the surface because they've done it and they know how to talk about it and be supportive of their housemate, who is also being supported in their chemical dependency and their sobriety. And why would I leave the sober house just because this other issue comes up? And that's. I think what I'd really like to point out is soberhouse operators should be open to supporting people in all areas there if you have the right staff and you have the right structure.

So we've had a few of these instances, and I've gone so far as to say, okay, if the chemical dependency or the sobriety component here is being addressed and you're getting better and you feel supported and you like living here, this other thing is rearing its head, can we support you while here in that? Can you go to an eating disorder outpatient, which was really hard to find years ago, there's a few more of them now. Can we get you a different kind of therapist? Can we get a mental health outpatient program going on?

There's a whole bunch of stuff in the telehealth world that's now available that wasn't before. And I want to make it an open discussion about we're not trying to be all things to all people. We're not trying to say your sober house manager is also your therapist and making decisions about your mental health or the meds you're on. It's not what we're talking about here. What I'm talking about is during the process of changing your lifestyle in early recovery or all of your recovery, other stuff surfaces.

It's an opportunity. In other words, it's not really something that should segregate you. Right? Like you go to an AA meeting and you're talking about some other stuff you're, you know, you're struggling with. They don't throw you out of the meeting. Okay? So in the sober living atmosphere, it's a positive, it's a win that these things are surfacing. It's, it means you feel supported, right? You haven't talked about it with your friends, probably because they're your using friends and they could give a s*** about what's going on with you.

You get into treatment, you have a month, maybe three. You have a counselor and a therapist, and maybe you're talking to some of that stuff there. You meet some people in the treatment center, they're gone in a month. You go to a sober living and you meet some girls or some guys in your house and you become close friends. And three months in, you're super tight and you're feeling supported and you feel safe and you're like, you know what? I'm going to talk about what's really going on with me because I feel safe here, or I feel good here.

I feel supported. I got resources. I could go to my sober house operator and say, you know, I'm struggling with this, that and the other thing. And I might say, well, here's a whole bunch of opportunities for you, and I'm not going to interrupt the supportive environment that you're in just because that comes up granted, there are, you know, it's about severity and acuity. And, you know, if you're, if you're trying to harm yourself every day or, you know, purging and doing all kinds of stuff that's triggering other people, there's some limits there.

But I really like to support this idea of let us keep you in this environment and do everything we can. Supporting the clinical work as well, the outside professional work, because you can go to some of the best therapists and doctors, but you still got to live somewhere, right? So why wouldn't you live where your group of girls or your group of guys has your back and you feel comfortable? It makes sober living complicated sometimes. I've been doing this for 20 plus years, and we've had all kinds of different cases of people.

And my attitude is, if you have to leave my sober living, I tell my staff, you better have a d*** good reason to deny them this opportunity where they have support, where they probably haven't had anywhere else, where they have acceptance, where they have understanding. I mean, you can be as crazy as you want to be. We've seen it all, and we're going to support you as long as you don't hurt others. Right. Once you sort of cross that line where you're causing problems for others, it becomes a different conversation.

I think there's one thing that really bothers me about sober living. Complaints from outsiders and neighbors. I've been to a, can't tell you how many town councils talking to city councils. And the neighbors are mad that the sober house is in the neighborhood, and they think, well, why don't they have counselors? There's a bunch of addicts in there, and there's no counselors. Well, that's because the clinical counseling work is already done. It's. It was at primary acute level care. So this is social model care and sober living.

We're basically just supporting each other, which, you know, if you talk to some of the neighbors, they're probably doing it on Sundays at church or with their friends at Starbucks. They're supporting each other, and there's stuff that goes on in their life, and that's the same thing we're doing in the sober house. So for some of you out there who are thinking, you know, my child or my wife or my cousin or my brother or me, I need a lot of other kind of help. You can't go and find a home you can live in where you can address all of the issues in your life at one time.

They just really don't exist. So we have this infrastructure built around recovery, which is brilliant. It's done well. I've trained sober house operators around the country. I've been speaking about it for years. I've met sober house operators who do a phenomenal job. I've met sober house operators who don't do a phenomenal job. And the thread of this thought here is that we have this incredible thing that is this therapeutic, supportive momentum you give your clients in those houses. Take advantage of it, and use that supportive environment to support all kinds of stuff.

And when you get. I talked to my residents, you know, years after they've been in this overhaus, and they will often bring up, you know, I was never going to talk about that thing that was up with me or my wife or my kids or my history with whatever. I was never going to bring that up. And who knew that it would come out in this overhaul? So there's this really incredible dynamic that you can build inside of the house with that camaraderie. And, you know, we call it community. And we, you know, it's not necessarily a Kumbaya moment.

It's not like group therapy every night at dinner, at the table. It's not really like that. It's a understood baseline sort of thread that goes through the house where these people have my back. I show up, I do my part. I don't break the rules. Living with ten other people is not easy. Sometimes everybody gets to be an a****** once in a while. Everybody gets, you know, you can't call the FBI if someone ate your peanut butter. And you got to learn that there's structure to this and that there's supportiveness, but there's also proactive support, contribution.

You have to contribute to that hole. Everybody in the house is holding up their end of the boat. You see those people carrying those heavy boats over their heads. Everyone's carrying their part to create this dynamic in the house. And then you get supported for all kinds of stuff. Right? Yeah. It may not feel like it has to do with your recovery, that, you know, that you come home and your parents are crawling all over you about not having a job or your wife wants to divorce you or your. The kids are mad at you and people are like, well, this isn't, you know, this isn't recovery.

Sure it is. The whole thing is. The whole thing is a lifestyle change. So I'm a big fan of let's open the tent, so to speak, in sober living, support people, whatever they're struggling with. Because we can, right? Because we can. And how else are you going to get it? You can't go and stay at an inpatient program forever. You can't have six therapists every week. You got to rely on others. And then here's the best part, that experience in the house, you build on that when you leave the sober house into the community.

And now you've created this group of friends you have in your life, and you're supported outside of that structure, which is phenomenal. And a lot of really healthy people you see on Instagram and you see talking about how they fix their lives or life purposes changes. You see I'm surrounded by people who support me, right? I'm surrounded by people who are cheerleaders. For me, one of the hardest things in the world to learn is that other people might actually care about me if I stick my hand out, right?

As opposed to going through this world thinking nobody cares about me. You can find that dynamic in this over living home, and it will serve you in all areas of your life. We try to teach our clients, our residents. Take this experience. What you learned, you dropped the fear about being a transparent person. You've become an open person who cares about others, tells the truth. Take that out into your life when you leave. Go be a better person in recovery. And using and drinking will look ridiculous compared to that life.

And that's the power, right? You build this more meaningful purpose in yourself, the way you see yourself in this world. You've really changed the way that you see that. And you can do it in the house, in that group setting, and take that out into the world and become a stronger, better, thoughtful person. And if you do, you're probably going to like yourself a lot more. And then there's nothing more powerful than that. That's where it all comes from. You stay sober, you get better relationships, everything improves.

So I was thinking about this because of a current situation at one of our houses, and I wanted to put it out there. And I think it's really, really great conversation. We can talk to professionals about how to do that better. I'm constantly talking to therapists and other professionals about how can we support some of these issues within the house without trying to, you know, overstep our bounds, trying to pretend like we're therapists of every kind of thing in the world. It's. It's a great opportunity, and I, and I'm glad we get this opportunity to do this.

And I tell my clients and my, and my parents of clients all the time, we're going to try to help on all kinds of levels everywhere we can. So I think it's an important thought. Why don't you share that with you guys again? This is real lived, actual experience. This is stuff I do. I don't just talk about it. It happens in front of me, largely because I designed the program to treat people that way, too. This is the way I want to approach our clients, and I've train my staff that way. I've got a couple of new staff persons, staff members in Colorado that I've got to train at their houses, and I'm looking forward to teaching them some of this stuff.

But that kind of experience that I'm talking about is what you'll find on Cadre from other creators here. And there's some incredibly intuitive, smart, capable, very attractive people on Cadre. So sign up. Sign in. Take care. See you next time.