Whether you’re facing financial struggles right now or an exhausting workload or relationship conflicts with your significant other, stress causes all sorts of unhealthy physical and emotional responses. Even worse, many of these stress responses trigger the urge to drink or lose ourselves in addiction.
The good news is: you don’t have to act out on those impulses.
The bad news is: stress - of some sort or another - is part of existence.
Because humans can think and feel deeply, can remember the past and plan for the future, our brains can turn thoughts into worries, anxieties and fears faster than the blink of an eye. This is true for all people, but those with Substance Use Disorder are apt to reach for a substance for relief and thus make their difficult situations even worse.
Some people attempt to manage life circumstances to relieve stress, and it’s often helpful. Maybe a job with less responsibility will bring your stress down to a level that’s bearable. Or, maybe you’re having relationship conflict because it’s truly in everyone’s best interest to end the relationship.
But, sometimes leaving or changing a stressful situation is not an option. And, sometimes we’ll find more relief by changing how we respond to stress than by trying to escape the stressor.
Increase Distress Tolerance (Instead of Just Decreasing Stressors)
Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) offers many helpful tools for responding to stress in positive or healthy (or at the very least, not harmful) ways. You may remember some of these from your time at Asana Recovery. Additionally, you may find that the lessons have more real-world application and relevance now that you’re living a sober life on your own. Life never shortchanges us on opportunities to grow, right?
Here’s a short review and explanation of some helpful crisis response skills that help you build your distress tolerance:
STOP skill (a crisis response skill)
This acronym (S.T.O.P.) stands for:
Stop. Literally, freeze. Stay in control.
Take a step back. Physically step away, take a breath or emotionally distance yourself from the situation.
Observe. Notice physical sensations, thoughts, urges. Observe them without judgement or intention to act on them.
Proceed mindfully. Try to access your Wise Mind and determine which responses will make the situation better or worse.
After all this, you may be ready to take action.
Pros and Cons
Making a list and/or discussing with someone you trust the pros and cons of a specific course of action is helpful. And, it’s not only helpful for big decisions but also for small things like changing the habitual responses that get us into trouble (Alcoholics Anonymous calls these “character defects”). For example: “I feel like staying home, isolating and feeling sorry for myself right now. What are the pros of doing this? What are the cons?”
TIPP Skill (a crisis response skill)
This is a way to harness your physiological responses to quickly change your emotional state. Remember those old movies where someone would throw cold water on a hysterical person to calm them down? Turns out, that’s not a bad idea! The acronym T.I.P.P. stands for:
Tip the temperature of your face with cold water.
Intense exercise.
Paced breathing to slow down your breath and heart rate.
Paired muscle relaxation. Calm down by pairing muscle relaxation with your exhale.
The skills listed above are primarily “quick fixes,” not long-term solutions. In AA, they could be described as learning to “pause when agitated.” They give us the gift of time and space to respond to stress in the best way possible - as opposed to the types of knee-jerk reactions that got us into so much trouble in the past.
After the Crisis: Problem-Solving
Once we’ve brought our physical and emotional responses out of crisis mode, we can use rational thinking and other DBT skills like Wise Mind to address the stressful situation. Or, we can use AA tools like a moral inventory or calling our sponsor to resolve the problem or relieve feelings of stress. Sometimes a simple prayer - like “Please relieve me of my fear and show me how I can be useful.” - can carry us through a stressful situation without trying to run away.
Over time and with repeated practice, it’s possible to change the way we respond to stressful triggers. Miraculously, you may find that you can “handle situations that used to baffle you.” And, even more miraculously, you’ll realize you did it without even thinking about alcohol or drugs!
How have you used DBT (or CBT) to handle stress in your recovery? Share in the comments!