Group Therapy Games for Substance Abuse

Substance abuse counseling requires a counselor who can break an addict's resistance because most addicts who enter treatment deny that they are addicted to drugs. Recovery from substance abuse also requires new habits, some of which are competing with lifestyle experiences that have been present in the addicted person's life for years. It is not enough to simply teach addicts about addiction, brain chemistry, denial and the consequences of drug abuse. For recovery to actually stick, it must provide the individual with the skills and the motivation to begin a new approach to life.

Denial

• Denial is the minimization of the destruction that substance abuse, or addiction, is causing in one's life. Before an individual can begin to recover from substance abuse, he must first accept that a problem exists. One benefit of group therapy is that each participant becomes a source of confrontation to the individual who attempts to deny his addiction against obvious evidence to the contrary. One therapy technique is to have an individual write his addiction story, and then have someone else read it aloud in the presence of all group participants, preferably allowing only those who have internalized the recovery process to comment. Participants are then asked to respectfully question any incidence of suspected denial, also sharing similar details of their own lives that led to and included addiction.

Relapse prevention Skills

• Relapse prevention is about teaching the recovering person about associations he might have to drug use. Because the individual is usually not aware of all of those associations, his story must be told before the group, which helps to point out ways that the addict continued to make it easy to use the substance. One game for teaching relapse prevention is to have a person share his plans for staying drug-free after discharge from treatment, and then have group members signal by raising their hands whenever the person reports a plan that appears to put him or her at risk of relapse. The person is taught by the silent hands which people, places and situations are likely to cause him to desire to use drugs. Suggestions for alternative behaviors are then shared. Suggestions sometimes include advice to drive home using a different route than the one one used before, if the former route involved driving past a favorite bar, crack house or other scene of prior drug abuse.

Maintenance

• In order to remain drug-free, the former drug user must see something positive in it. Enjoying a drug-free life requires interests that cause the individual to desire them over drug use. Developing new career goals, hobbies and interests should be paramount in any substance-abuse recovery program. Also, the recovering person must learn how to deal with his or her anger, sadness, grief and disappointment in constructive ways. Writing in a journal, exercise and support group relationships are methods that work for many recovering individuals. A healthier diet also assists in avoiding emotional ups and downs that can lead to drug-using thoughts and relapse.