Sober Living What is it like living in a Sober House?
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For individuals struggling with addiction to alcohol and drugs, Harris House helps people achieve sobriety and become healthy and productive individuals. Since our founding in 1961, Harris House has grown to become a top-rated non-profit treatment center. While there isn’t an exact length of time that everyone should stay in one of these programs, you definitely shouldn’t leave before you’re ready. According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, 90 days of treatment is a fair general starting point for people beginning a recovery journey, regardless of treatment type.
Set up to mimic a home-like setting, a sober living program provides patients with the opportunity to live in a safe, stable, and substance-free environment as they continue their recovery. In response to this, some programs created halfway houses where clients could live after they completed residential treatment or while they attended outpatient treatment. Many studies showed that halfway houses improved the outcomes of treatment.
When Should a Sober Living Home be Considered?
You live in a substance-free environment while navigating the responsibilities of life in the real world. Sober living is just like it sounds, a place to stay where you’ll have a supportive community and can start your new life free from alcohol or other drugs. Residents in sober-living homes commit to abstaining from substance use while participating in outpatient programming or after completing inpatient drug rehab. Residents may remain in a sober living home for as long as they want – if they continue following the house rules. The length of time depends on an individual’s unique journey and how long their treatment and recovery take.
Sober living homes’ features, such as private rooms or additional services like employment counseling or therapy, will also affect the price. Most sober living facilities are not insured, and the resident is responsible for any fees involved with their stay. It is often important for recovering individuals to remove themselves from their accustomed social milieus, especially in the early recovery period.
Common Elements of a Structured Sober Living Program
Moreover, they can offer the structure and accountability, learning opportunities, resume building, and job training important to sustaining recovery. Gaining long-term stability and well-being may depend heavily on access to these resources. While it can’t be denied that sober living homes provide several benefits to residents, they are often no more than places to spend the night. While they provide a sober environment, most do not provide the resources people need to tackle their substance use disorder. These resources must be sought out elsewhere, either through an outpatient program or through regular attendance of 12-step meetings. Research shows that individuals who continue to work on their recovery after leaving formal treatment programs have lower rates of relapse down the road.
- If they think you might be a good fit, they’ll likely ask you some of their own.
- Residents must continue to follow the rules through their entire stay.
However, they may want to avoid the level of commitment involved in reentering a formal treatment program. Sober living houses (SLHs) are alcohol and drug free living environments that offer peer support for recovery outside the context of treatment. ORS is an outpatient substance abuse treatment program located in Berkeley, California that treats approximately 800 clients per year. Most of the clients are low income and many have history of being homeless at some point in their lives. Because a large number do not have a stable living environment that supports abstinence from alcohol and drugs, ORS developed SLHs where clients can live while they attend the outpatient program. The houses are different from freestanding SLHs, such as those at CSTL, because all residents must be involved in the outpatient program.
What Is the Sober Living Program, and Who Would Benefit Most from It?
As such, sober living associations now make finding a residence easier. There are also plenty of independent sober living houses that have not changed their protocols much since the late 1940s when these residences came to be. They first came into existence when a group of active participants in the Alcoholics Anonymous group created a “12-step” residence. This was a home, typically placed in low-income housing, that enforced policies around sobriety and required attendance to AA meetings.
We used the Global Severity Index (GSI) as an overall measure of psychiatric severity. As such, you will need to identify aspects of a great recovery home for the best chance at sobriety. Inpatient treatment may be required for detox or 24-hr medical/psychological monitoring. Additionally, they receive a designated sober house support contact called a “sponsor.” Their sponsor helps to keep them accountable and be an advisor in times of difficulty. Reintroduction phases gradually add personal responsibilities in the resident’s life. Once basic responsibilities are handled, related privileges will be restored as well.
At sober living, you’ll gain a supportive community to help you move forward in your life free of drugs and alcohol. Sober living residents commit to abstaining from substance use while in outpatient programming and often stay in touch after leaving. In the ’40s and ’50s, California began to dismantle its custodial care systems (e.g., local jails and state psychiatric hospitals), creating an even greater need for sober living houses. However, the existing 12-step recovery houses usually refused to accept inebriates. Instead, they required applicants to begin their sobriety before approaching the sober house.
Sober-living homes provide a strong support network and community to help you safely navigate the tough spots and triggers you may encounter. Living in a sober environment helps you develop new habits and routines, taking what you learned during drug or alcohol rehab and applying it in your daily life. This is where the rubber starts to meet the road in addiction recovery. To join a sober living house, residents must pay their own rent, which could range anywhere from $500 to $5,000 per month, depending on the location and whether certain houses include meals and other services. Residents may not have to pay for utilities at all, making housing very affordable. While this type of residency can help anyone bridge the gap between rehab and returning home, it’s especially relevant if you’ve been in treatment multiple times and need an alternative aftercare program.
We’ll go over the different types of people who typically benefit from a sober living situation or substance abuse halfway house in a later section. For right now, just know that if any of this sounds appealing, look into it. If you’re interested in a substance abuse halfway house, you should ask the professionals working with you about them. They’ll be able to give you the best recommendations because of their familiarity with your specific circumstances. Learning everything you can about different parts of the process can help you feel more prepared to prioritize your wellbeing and seek treatment.
- One of the greatest benefits of sober living is the newfound (or re-found) independence that it brings.
- It’s totally fair to wonder how sober living homes work at first — after all, most of us don’t encounter them in our day-to-day lives.
- You will be given a place to live and to focus on yourself, without temptation from old drug-using friends, old hang-out spots, and other environmental relapse triggers.
- A substance abuse halfway house, transitional housing, recovery housing, and many more near synonyms come to mind.
- Living in a sober house or residential treatment can also help reduce loneliness, which is an inherent part of the addiction cycle.
