Grief And Addiction

Grief and Addiction illuminates the role of grief work in addiction counseling, encouraging counselors to be more comprehensive in their treatment and to increase empathy for what the treatment process is asking of clients. Acknowledging that entering recovery includes a loss of coping skills, and that it requires building a new identity, this book focuses on addiction-specific grief work. Grief and Addiction integrates concepts like complicated grief, nonfinite loss, trauma, family grief responses, and treatment suggestions in one place—all with a focus on the application to addiction work. Featuring appendices with information and examples for clinicians, Grief and Addiction provides treatment strategies drawn from both the addiction and grief world for professionals and counselor educators.

How learning to deal with unresolved emotions leads to true healing—and authentic emotional recovery from addiction. Just as one needs to hit bottom with drinking or using in order to begin recovery, eventually one will also hit an emotional “bottom” of fear, anger, and grief. And recovery can only start by first understanding how, when, and where those emotions took control. Barb Rogers challenges readers in recovery to investigate the unresolved grief and loss in their lives and navigate the impacts of those emotions—emotions that can lead back to using if not resolved. Recovery from addictions involves more than getting sober. It involves finding happiness, which can only happen if the emotional work is done as well. Negative emotions have the ability to weigh on us and influence both our decisions and the way we handle life’s challenges. If we continue to live with fear, anger, and grief, we aren’t really free from our addictions. The steps to recovery—authentic and complete recovery—involve healing from the deeper issues in our life. Learn more about:The emotional healing that goes hand-in-hand with addiction recoveryDealing with grief and resolving underlying issuesHow to find happiness after getting sober

Grief Work in Addictions Counseling is a book for practitioners and students in the field of substance abuse counseling who encounter grief and loss issues with clients recovering from addiction. Enlightening the reader about loss, its relation to addiction, and the need to grieve these losses, this book provides specific strategies and techniques that readers can apply to both individual clients and counseling groups. Chapters address multicultural themes to help clinicians design treatments that will meet the needs of diverse genders, sexual orientations, cultures, ages, and spiritual orientations. This book is useful both for professionals and as a supplemental textbook for students preparing to become addictions counselors.

When her brother dies of AIDS and her husband dies of cancer in the same year, Rosemary is left on her own with two young daughters and antsy addiction demons dancing in her head. This is the nucleus of The Art of Losing It a young mother jerking from emergency to emergency as the men in her life drop dead around her; a high-functioning radio show host waging war with her addictions while trying to raise her two little girls who just lost their daddy; and finally, a stint in rehab and sobriety that ushers in a fresh brand of chaos instead of the tranquility her family so desperately needs. Heartrending but ultimately hopeful, The Art of Losing It is the story of a struggling mother who finds her way—slowly, painfully—from one side of grief and addiction to the other.

Most addictive behavior is rooted in some type of loss, be it the death of a loved one, coming to terms with limitations set by chronic health problems, or the end of a relationship. By turning to drugs and alcohol, people who have suffered a loss can numb their grief. In the process, they postpone their healing and can drive themselves further into addiction. The Mindfulness Workbook for Addiction offers readers an effective program for working through their addiction and grief with cognitive behavior therapy (CBT), dialectical behavior therapy (DBT), and acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT). Created by a psychologist who works for the Department of Veterans Affairs and a marriage and family therapist who works for Sharp Mesa Vista Hospital, this mindfulness training workbook is effective for treating the emotion dysregulation, stress, depression, and grief that lie at the heart of addiction. No matter the loss, the mindfulness skills in this workbook help readers process their grief, determine the function their addiction is serving, and replace the addiction with healthy coping behaviors.

How learning to deal with unresolved emotions leads to true healing—and authentic emotional recovery from addiction. Just as one needs to hit bottom with drinking or using in order to begin recovery, eventually one will also hit an emotional “bottom” of fear, anger, and grief. And recovery can only start by first understanding how, when, and where those emotions took control. Barb Rogers challenges readers in recovery to investigate the unresolved grief and loss in their lives and navigate the impacts of those emotions—emotions that can lead back to using if not resolved. Recovery from addictions involves more than getting sober. It involves finding happiness, which can only happen if the emotional work is done as well. Negative emotions have the ability to weigh on us and influence both our decisions and the way we handle life’s challenges. If we continue to live with fear, anger, and grief, we aren’t really free from our addictions. The steps to recovery—authentic and complete recovery—involve healing from the deeper issues in our life. Learn more about:The emotional healing that goes hand-in-hand with addiction recoveryDealing with grief and resolving underlying issuesHow to find happiness after getting sober

Grief Work in Addictions Counseling is a book for practitioners and students in the field of substance abuse counseling who encounter grief and loss issues with clients recovering from addiction. Enlightening the reader about loss, its relation to addiction, and the need to grieve these losses, this book provides specific strategies and techniques that readers can apply to both individual clients and counseling groups. Chapters address multicultural themes to help clinicians design treatments that will meet the needs of diverse genders, sexual orientations, cultures, ages, and spiritual orientations. This book is useful both for professionals and as a supplemental textbook for students preparing to become addictions counselors.

Heegaard, a registered art therapist and certified grief counselor created the Children Can Cope series of workbooks to help children work through feelings about traumatic events and changes using art.