Relapse warning signs
Understand the warning signs of a relapse and learn ways to manage your cravings.
Relapse is often a challenging and deeply misunderstood part of the journey towards recovery from addiction. It can bring about feelings of guilt, shame or frustration, but it’s crucial to understand that relapse doesn’t make you weak or a failure. It can be a valuable learning experience that can allow you to better understand your triggers and cravings, and find new ways of dealing with them.
Relapse warning signs
There are some common signs an alcoholic is drinking again, or that someone is going through a chronic relapse. Whilst everyone can experience relapse differently, the following alcohol relapse symptoms could suggest that a person is at risk of an alcohol relapse, or may have already relapsed:
Emotional and psychological warning signs
- Feeling like you don’t care about recovery anymore
- More frequent and intense cravings for the substance or behaviour (source)
- Finding it more difficult to manage cravings
- Fantasising about and romanticising past addictive behaviours
- Feeling emotionally unstable, stressed or overwhelmed
- Experiencing anger, irritability, anxiety or depression
- Heightened sensitivity to stressors (source)
- Dismissing the need for support systems and coping strategies
- Experiencing shame due to cravings or lapses, and not reaching out for support
Behavioural warning signs
- Experiencing a lapse (a one-time or temporary return to the addictive behaviour)
- Isolating yourself from people and the world
- Avoiding your support network and support groups (source)
- Changes in sleep or appetite
- Neglecting self-care, like eating unhealthily or not exercising
- Appearing more stressed
- Changing their routine
- Returning to social events that could be harmful
What is chronic relapse?
Chronic relapse, also known as constant relapse, is when a person has tried to put a stop to their active addiction numerous times but has continued to return to their addictive substance or behaviour. If someone you care about is a 'chronic relapser', we understand that this can be incredibly painful to live with.
Chronic relapse is not a sign of failure
It is important to note that chronic relapse is not a sign that recovery isn’t possible. This is never the case. With the right support and treatment, recovery is achievable for everyone.
Chronic relapse can happen for many reasons, such as:
- Being in an environment where the object of their addiction is present
- Experiencing and succumbing to a trigger such as a place, a person or an emotion
- Being ill equipped to deal with triggers, urges and cravings
- Having underlying mental health conditions that haven’t been effectively treated
- Having underlying thoughts and emotions that haven’t been properly addressed
- Not accessing or not having access to an adequate level of support
When a person relapses, they will often feel guilty and ashamed about what they have done. These emotions can then cause them to sink even further into their addiction, and also result in them denying or trying to hide their relapse from the people that they are close to.
Relapse prevention strategies
Everyone can expect to face cravings from time-to-time. It is not uncommon for people in recovery to experience a form of relapse at some point – in fact the majority of people will, especially in the first few months after recovery. What matters is how you recover from your relapse and get back to sobriety.
Reducing the risk of relapse involves planning ahead and building a personalised prevention strategy.
Identify personal triggers
It’s normal to experience cravings from time-to-time, and everyone’s triggers are different. Treat relapse as an opportunity for self-reflection to identify triggers and patterns that led to the lapse or relapse.
You could ask yourself some of the following questions:
- What events or situations did you experience before relapsing?
- What environments were you spending time in that may have triggered cravings?
- Who were you spending time with? Did they influence or tempt you?
- How were you feeling leading up to the relapse? Were you feeling stressed, lonely or overwhelmed?
- Were you having particular thoughts leading up to the relapse? Did you have any justifications for using again?
- How was your self-care before the relapse?
- What could you do differently next time you’re faced with a similar situation?
Avoid high-risk environments and people
Identify environments that are high risk for you and people who might tempt you into using again.
Avoid places you associate with the addictive behaviour as much as possible, especially at first. Be mindful of people who don’t support your healthy choices, and consider distancing yourself from them.
Build a strong support network
You don’t have to go through your recovery journey alone. Ensure that you lean on your support network, such as reliable friends and family, support groups and professionals.
Develop a healthy routine
A healthy routine can provide a sense of control, purpose and direction. Build or re-build a routine that works for you and helps you to stay healthy.
Learn relaxation techniques and practice self-care
Learning techniques that allow you to deal with stress, cravings and high-risk situations can be important. Looking after your physical, mental and emotional health will also help you to stay on track.
Everyone has different ideas around what makes them feel good, but it could include:
- Sleeping and resting enough
- Eating a healthy diet
- Spending time in nature
- Exercising
- Engaging in creative expression like drawing, dancing or writing
- Learning something new like a skill or language
- Practising self-care techniques such as grounding and relaxation techniques such as breathing exercises and mindfulness
- Volunteering in the community for a cause you care about
Be kind to yourself
It’s common to experience shame and guilt if you’ve relapsed. But being kind and compassionate to yourself is much more helpful.
Imagine your best friend going through what you’re experiencing and give yourself the care and support you’d give them. Relapse isn’t the end of the journey; it’s only a setback and gives you the opportunity to learn.
Renew commitment to goals
What were your reasons for controlling or quitting the addictive behaviour? Reaffirm your long-term goals, values and the benefits of stopping to reignite your motivation to continue your recovery journey.
Seek professional support
Re-engage or engage with professional support to help you identify triggers and areas of improvement. For example, to develop better coping skills and ways to manage cravings, learn stress-reduction and grounding techniques and provide general guidance and support.
Create a personalised relapse prevention plan
Having a plan in place that you can turn to and put into action is a core element of recovery and relapse prevention. It should give you a clear idea of what to do and how to stay on track.
The plan can include the points mentioned above as well as elements that work for you personally. For example:
- Your personal triggers and how to manage those
- How to avoid high-risk environments and people
- A list of people who can support you
- What a healthy routine looks like for you
- Self-care and relaxation techniques that you find helpful
- Placing a list of your goals and reasons for quitting somewhere you can see or access it easily
- Create affirmations that help you to be kind to yourself, such as ‘Setbacks are part growth, and this is an opportunity to for me to learn and strengthen my commitment’
- Contact information for your professional support network and crisis support