Teen Drinking: What we have Seen Since School Has Been Out for summer & The 4th of July – Mainting Sobriety.

We have seen a number of our clients who had sobriety during the last part of the school year relapse already this summer. There are a number of clients who have arrived to recovery group meetings or individual sessions late. We also have had many miss appointments without any notice at all. We have also had clients pull away from their 12-step groups in the community too.

We understand the reasons why this is occurring. We know that the structure of the day has changed for your child. Many had a very structured day or routine that has been disrupted as a result of the end of the school year.

We notice that the adolescents we are seeing may become complacent in their recovery as if they are on vacation from recovery as well as school. We know that substance abuse and addiction never go on vacation.

The other factor is that many parents also become complacent during the summer time. Please make your son or daughter accountable for attending all sessions on time and please continue to drug test. You may need to reiterate the Setting Limits Contract to yourself and your child if either of you are not fully aware of the healthy expectations and consequences that were listed when you developed the contract.

Finally, to intervene on ways in which you might be complacent, we recommend you contact your counselor to check-in with them and ask them in what ways you might be complacent in your own or your child’s recovery at this time.

The 4th of July has proven to be a time of relapse over the years. We certainly have seen many of our clients relapse on this day. So if you are the parent of a child in a program, we encourage you to remind your child through healthy role modeling and clear expectations that it is not okay to use chemicals on this day. Along that note of healthy intervention, it would be a good idea to drug test after the 4th. If you are an adult in our program who is in recovery for addiction, then this also a time for you to hold yourself accountable for your recovery. Make sure you go into this day with a very specific plan to stay sober.