Common Relapse Triggers and Prevention in Addiction Recovery
One of the biggest challenges of addiction recovery is managing the powerful physical and emotional cues of cravings. These cues, called “triggers,” can affect people in many ways.
Emotions about old friends can make you drink. Stress from work or school may lead some to use stimulants.
Anticipating triggers and preparing for them is the best way to stay on track during recovery.
What’s an Addiction Trigger?
A trigger is an emotional, environmental, or social situation that brings back drug or alcohol memories. Strong emotions from these memories can lead to substance use again. Triggers don’t always cause relapse, but they make intense cravings harder to resist.
Addiction is a chronic brain disease with a relapse rate like diabetes. Substance abuse links daily routines to cravings, so small cues can switch the switch. Triggers may fade, but recovering people must be ready to respond.
Common Relapse Causes
Several categories of addiction relapse triggers exist. Emotional, environmental, and mental triggers often overlap. Ten of the most common addiction recovery triggers and quick ways to avoid them are listed here.
- HALT: hungry, mad, lonely, and tired
If unmet, basic human needs can trigger events, so the HALT acronym helps recovery patients track them. Any HALT state impairs stress management and increases impulsivity.
Meal planning, mindfulness, social support, and sleep consistency are essential. This will reduce trigger reactivity.
- Challenging Emotions
Drug abuse often begins with negative emotions like sadness, guilt, or anger. The brain remembers using drugs or alcohol to deal with these emotions during recovery, triggering cravings.
No one can avoid negative emotions. Persons in recovery must learn coping skills to prevent therapy-identified triggers to avoid relapse.
- Stress
Both chronic and acute stress increase drug addiction risk and may be the primary relapse triggers. Most people experience stress daily, from being late for work to having tense relationships with loved ones. Stress from health issues, increased responsibility, and other factors can cause drug cravings.
The only way to manage stress is through preventive self-care and coping skills when overwhelmed. If stress lasts more than a week, seek the support of a therapist.
- Overconfidence in Recovery
Although recovery is ongoing, some believe they are cured and no longer need support. Self-confidence and humility are essential. If a person forgets that addiction is a chronic condition, they may be tempted to have “just one” drink, injection, hit, or bump. This causes riskier situations and a complete relapse.
- Mental or Physical Illness
Depression and anxiety are linked to addiction and can increase or decrease triggers. Physical illness and chronic pain stress the body and increase the risk of relapse.
Inform your doctor or mental health professional of your recovery. Requiring non-addictive and alternative medications can eliminate triggers.
- Social Isolation
Many recovering people find socialising and building a support system exhausting. Some avoid it altogether, which can lead to loneliness and isolation. Isolation makes it easier to rationalise drug or alcohol use. An addict alone is in bad company.
Social anxiety is common in recovering people, so having a sponsor or trusted friend can help avoid isolation and triggers.
- Romantic Relationships
Breakup survivors know how much emotional strength it takes to move on. Along with addiction recovery’s upheaval, romantic relationships can cause devastating emotional waves that leave a person feeling lost and out of control, which can lead to relapses. There’s no reason to stay single forever, but avoiding romantic relationships for the first year after recovery is wise.
- New Job and Promotions
Not only do adverse events trigger addiction relapses. Changing jobs or getting promoted can lead to relapses in various ways. You may be tempted to celebrate “just this once”. Sober celebrations can help you stay on track.
New or increased responsibilities add stress and pressure. Stress and anxiety can result from pressure to learn new skills and succeed in a new role.
- Substance Abuse Nostalgia
When people use drugs or alcohol to feel better, addiction develops. Although a recovering addict knows their addiction hurt them and others, they often see past substance abuse through rose-colored glasses.
Reminiscing about past substance abuse is a clear sign of triggers and relapse. Contact your support system or therapistif you keep thinking about drugs or alcohol. Talking to a counsellor, supportive friend, or sponsor can remind you why you chose recovery.
- Places to get Drugs
Substance abuse is difficult to avoid. Alcohol is problematic because many people consider it normal and can appear unexpectedly at office parties or friends’ gatherings. To prevent relapse, list your triggers—people, places, and things.
How to Identify Relapse Triggers
You should be aware of internal and external triggers. External triggers—people, places, things, and activities that make someone want to use drugs or alcohol again—are easier to spot. Complex emotions make internal triggers harder to identify.
A significant study examined how visual triggers affected ex-cocaine users. Researchers found that cocaine and related photos evoked a subconscious emotional response in participants. The researchers found that drug craving pathways activated quickly.
These subconscious brain responses and cues reinforce drug and alcohol use without the person realising it, making them dangerous for people in recovery. Long-term recovery requires avoiding people, places, and objects associated with substance abuse.
- Other Folks
People are a hard trigger to avoid. Family and friends who use drugs put recovering people with an addiction at risk of relapse. Even non-drug users can trigger a recovering person. They may offer a drink to a person with a heroin use disorder in recovery without realising that alcohol may cause a desire for another intoxication.
Many friends, family, and acquaintances don’t understand recovery and may make negative comments.
- Physical Places
A “high-risk” location conjures drug use. Driving past a bar or neighbourhood where you used to hang out with a friend will bring back memories. Finding alternative routes to your destinations and avoiding these locations is best. Being aware of your location triggers can help you avoid certain places.
- Specific Items
Many objects in our lives can trigger cravings in recovering people. Heroin users may be triggered by spoons. These factors may cause drug or alcohol cravings:
- Liquor bottles displayed in your or your friends’ home
- Credit cards and cash are accepted
- Empty pill bottles
- Movie or TV ads
- High-risk Situations
Stress from a high-risk situation may lead to drug or alcohol use again. Many people in recovery are triggered by extended holidays. They are meant to be a time to celebrate, but those in recovery must work harder to handle social drinking events. Some friends and family don’t understand that saying “just one” or “just for tonight” can enable relapse.
Persons in treatment or aftercare may skip therapy or support group meetings to attend mandatory family events, which can be stressful. Holidays can also change routines, which may lead to substance use.
Many situations can be dangerous for one person but safe for another. Understanding stressors and finding ways to manage them is crucial.
How to Prevent Triggers?
Preventing relapse requires avoiding triggers. These three steps can help people in recovery reframe their mindset, making triggers tolerable.
- Redefine “fun”
Many people started using drugs and alcohol to relieve boredom or enjoy certain activities. People in recovery often struggle to find new ways to have fun, which can lead them to glorify or dwell on their substance abuse. Recovery is hard, and drug use seems easy, so people may feel like their efforts were wasted. Therapy can help people understand that recovery is hard and maintaining an addiction is harder.
- Learn from Failures
Everyone has recovery setbacks. These aren’t failures and shouldn’t be called that. Lack of coping skills or planning often causes recovery issues. People can solve these problems by questioning their assumptions and focusing on past successes.
Global statements like “This action proves I am a failure” can cause negative emotions and relapses.
- Accept Discomfort
Addiction often results from using drugs or alcohol to cope. Substance abuse usually masks discomfort from new or stressful events or emotions. Without that option, recovering people may struggle to accept and process negative emotions.
Recovery patients must learn that discomfort is not a disease. Everyone has problems. Therapy coping strategies help people stay grounded and reduce substance abuse escapism.
Recognising the Stages of Relapse
Many people think relapse is a sudden impulse, but there are many warning signs that someone is at risk of using drugs or alcohol again. Relapse has three stages:
- Emotional Relapse
People initially don’t consider drug or alcohol use. The person wants to avoid drinking or using again because the consequences are still fresh in their mind. Their emotional state may be compromised, causing behavioural warning signs like:
- Suppressing feelings
- Isolating
- Missing therapy or meetings
- Poor diet and sleep
- Mental Relapse
Poor self-care will likely cause mental relapse in recovery. Recovering persons may become dissatisfied with their progress and restless in their disintegrating routine. Without structure and routine, people may use again.
An individual may start a pros and cons list to justify using it again, but they are unsure if they will. Only the recovering person can recognise mental relapse symptoms, such as:
- Drug or alcohol cravings
- Overthinking past uses, people, or places
- Minimising or glorifying past use
- Deception and bargaining
- Developing future use control strategies
- Seeking old buddies
- Planning or fantasising about relapse
- Physical Relapse
And finally, picking up the drink or drug. Impulsive behaviour is more likely in people who lack practical coping skills or don’t use them fully.
How to Handle a Relapse
Failure and relapse are two different things. Comparing addiction relapse to other chronic conditions is helpful. Diabetes relapses often result from poor diets. Diabetes relapses do not indicate failure. They must reset their diet, eat well, and work with their doctor to manage their blood sugar.
Relapse is usually accompanied by shame and guilt. Build the courage to admit you need help and reach out to a therapist.
Addiction recovery is hard. But the fruits of recovery are more than worth it!
Hope Trust™ has been providing addiction treatment for over 20 years. Our experience and expertise haveproven to be effective for clients from all over the world.
Click www.hopetrustindia.com for an online appointment with an addiction therapist.