5 Benefits of Choosing a Local Addiction Recovery Center

Author: Autumn Jerumbo

There are numerous benefits to choosing a local addiction recovery center.

If you are dealing with addiction, you know firsthand how frightening, isolating, and painful that experience can be. Lives and livelihood may be at stake, and the many treatment options to choose from can be daunting. However, when you are ready to enter treatment, there is help available from specialists who can learn about your unique situation and provide you with information to make the right treatment decision.

What Kinds of Centers Are There?

There are a variety of recovery centers to choose from, such as:

• Centers that have particular treatment approaches and specialties
• Centers that specialize in substance-specific treatment
• Inpatient medical centers that support detoxification and addiction recovery
• Rehabilitation through Veterans Affairs
• Local recovery centers

Each type of recovery center has pros and cons associated with it. The benefits of local addiction recovery include in-person exploration, ease, access, affordability, and connection to aftercare. In local recovery, you have the following benefits:

1. Touring the Location Before Committing to Treatment.

Because you do not have to travel to attend local addiction recovery, you can tour a local center to ensure it has a good feel for you. During the tour, you’ll want to:

• Check in with your intuition. Explore if the recovery center has a healing and supportive feel. Can you see yourself feeling tranquil in this environment?
• Identify if the premises and rooms are clean and well-maintained.
• Learn about what dietary options are available in the cafeteria and explore the quality of meals prepared.
• Meet the clinicians and staff you will be working with. The ability to interview your care team is a crucial benefit of choosing a local recovery center. A trusting relationship with counselors and staff is a core factor in the deep therapeutic work associated with addiction recovery.

2. Reducing Travel-Related Stress.

Travel can be stressful. You navigate everything from traffic to coordinating transport to and from an airport, selecting the right flights at the proper budget for you and your family, potential delays, and layovers. You’re in tight quarters with not so fun conditions that you cannot control.

These kinds of situations are stressful under any circumstance, much less when you are about to embark on a significant life change. Additionally, research has indicated that the closer you live to your treatment support, the longer you are likely to engage in treatment. Having accessible, local access to the care you need makes you more likely to turn to this support if you feel at risk for relapse. Additionally, many treatment plans include family therapy. When your family does not have to travel to attend this part of your treatment, they are more likely to participate in your recovery process. By staying local, your family won’t experience the financial or job-related stress associated with travel.

3. Connecting with Local Addiction Recovery Resources.

By attending local treatment, you have first-hand local recommendations for aftercare provided by clinicians, staff, and fellow patients. Your aftercare planning will consist of the following: Intensive outpatient treatment, individual counseling, local 12-step meetings such as Alcoholics Anonymous, Narcotics Anonymous, or Al-Anon, and other local community meetings such as SMART-recovery or Refuge Recovery.

By connecting with others in your local community, you will learn of spiritual groups that align with your beliefs. These may include local churches, synagogues, meditation centers, yoga centers, or secular humanist groups. By staying local, you learn more about your community, which gives you an opportunity to meaningfully connect with others and integrate community into your daily life.

4. Lower Costs for Local Addiction Recovery Treatment.

Local treatment centers are almost always more affordable than centers at a distance. The right financial fit can be a significant factor in supporting your long-term recovery. Many who have struggled with addiction have experienced a significant economic impact that has threatened their careers, rent, mortgage, and ability to support their loved ones. When you can find high-quality care for an affordable price, you set yourself up to rebuild your financial future.

5. Creating a Support System of Other Local People in Recovery.

Your long-term support system is paramount in recovery. Research indicates that engagement in community support groups is a powerful factor in long-term sobriety. You will more quickly connect with local friends and a local addiction recovery community by staying local in recovery.

The benefit of having a local addiction recovery community include:

• The ability to call others when you have a trigger or craving
• Regular support nearby to help hold you accountable
• Friends to share their experience, strength, and hope
• Friends who desire to engage in sober-activities
• Friends to check in on your if they notice our absence from activities or groups

Hope on the Horizon

Poet Kahlil Gibran writes, “The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.” The perils of addiction can feel overwhelming and life-consuming. However, in recovery, suffering can turn into service, and hopelessness can turn into healing. Many people in recovery have shared, “I would never have chosen my addiction. However, without my addiction, I would not have found the gift of recovery. I am so grateful that I am where I am today.” There is hope, and this hope can begin right down the road from where you currently live.

To speak with a specialist to learn about local addiction recovery in your area, call 800-908-4823 (Who Answers?) today.

Photos courtesy of Canva.