I tailor each session to your specific goals, challenges, and pace so that your growth feels empowering, not overwhelming.
Get proven tools and actionable guidance that you can apply daily, helping you build resilience and regain control of your life.
I walk beside you with compassion, commitment, and confidentiality every step of the way on your path to recovery.
Recovery Coaching is a great way to practice maintenance in one’s recovery or establish a foundation of recovery.
Provide you with information, tools, and networks that help to achieve and maintain your recovery.
Give direction and help you set realistic goals for your recovery journey.
Offer nonjudgemental emotional support, celebrate your successes, and provide encouragement during setbacks.
Share my own personal experiences and wisdom, serving as a role model for long-term recovery success.
Benefit from a new sense of routine, accountability, and education in the ways of recovery.
A Recovery Coach is someone who guides and supports people in their recovery from addiction by helping remove obstacles to one’s recovery. This can include introducing one to the recovery community through recovery support programs (12 STEP AND NON-12 STEP programs) and social activities with people who do not use substances. What especially is unique about this is that the CLIENT DETERMINES his or her OWN PATH OF RECOVERY that he or she is most comfortable with. Recovery occurs in many different ways. There are programs that are dedicated to recovery that can be very helpful but aren’t necessarily for everyone. A Recovery Coach uses personal experience of recovery and expertise of the subject to guide the recovering person through the complex path.
I spent 12 years spiraling downward in a vacuum of substance abuse, depression, and anxiety. Since 1/13/09 I have (with lots of help) built a fulfilling, balanced lifestyle in recovery. My life is by no means perfect but I am consistently amazed and grateful for the quality of life I am living now in recovery and with well managed mental health. I have spent over a decade working in the field of addiction treatment throughout many levels of care learning the intricacies of what creates solid recovery from addiction as well as what hinders a person from recovery. I also have a B.A. in Behavioral Sciences from the University of Texas at Dallas, and am a level 2 Certified Addiction Peer Recovery Coach as well as am a Certified Life Coach. This combination of education, training, work and personal experience makes me uniquely qualified to help create successful paths to recovery.
A Recovery Coach can be useful at any stage of the recovery process. Its efficacy is not contingent on the quantity or frequency of use, or how much time a person has free from substances. While medical detox is essential in many cases of active substance abuse, recovery coaching can take place along side the detoxification process. Recovery is extremely fragile in the early months and having expert support can be a vital tool.
Addiction Treatment Centers can do an assessment to see what level of care would be most appropriate (i.e. inpatient care, such as detoxification or residential treatment, or outpatient care such as Intensive outpatient counseling or drug education classes.) Recovery Coaching can take place alongside any of these levels of treatment but it is important to note that recovery coaching cannot take the place of this type of treatment, especially the detoxification process.
Not necessarily. Recovery from addiction can be an extremely daunting task. The rate of relapse is significant and even those who enter treatment often do not stay clean and sober on the first try. I believe if at all possible in utilizing every resource available to treat substance use disorder including but not limited to Recovery Coaching, Treatment Centers, individual counseling, medically assisted treatment, etc. However, many people do not have the resources, time, willingness, or a combination thereof, to utilize all these measures. What stands out about Recovery Coaching is that it is tailor made to the individual and directed by the client themselves.
Recovery can take on three forms: spiritual, secular, or religious. Recovery Coaching is meant to be directed by the client. Whatever beliefs the client has or doesn’t have will not be challenged or threatened in anyway.
Maintaining recovery from substance use is very difficult and most can not quit or control it on their own. A Recovery Coach can walk alongside the path to recovery helping to avoid pitfalls, link the recovering person to the recovering community, and be a source of imperative support and encouragement.
Recovery Coaching is client directed. This means that the recovering person will dictate what means they wish to employ in their recovery. The Coach is there to work within the confines of how the recovering person wishes to work their own program of recovery and to offer guidance, suggestions, encouragement and resource connections along the way.
While a recovery coach can certainly work along side a counselor and/or a sponsor, and there is potential for some overlap among the relationships to the client, the roles are quite different.
A sponsor is a voluntary representative who works within the confines of a 12 step program and essentially is there to take a person through the twelve steps. A recovery coach goes through a certification process which includes training and testing to better help the client on an individualized basis catering to specific needs of the client.
In order to heal from the damage of substance abuse, one first must be able to control or abstain from the substances themselves. This is why counseling alone can be ineffective. Many people suffering from addiction can not stay clean and sober long enough to reap the benefits of counseling.
A counselor is often involved in the emotional make up of the individual being counseled and helping the client initiate a readiness for change, whereas a recovery coach will help cultivate the environment and thought process that is necessary for the change to occur and last.
Each role has the potential to be effective in its own right but only recovery coaching combines training, certification as well as personal experience of addiction and recovery.
Unfortunately substance use disorder can occur at a young age and often starts in adolescence. I have years of experience working with individuals all the way from age 13 to in their 80’s. Even if an adolescent has not progressed that far in their use, recovery coaching can help the individual prevent the use from spiraling into addiction. For those with loved ones with substance use issues, recovery coaching can be helpful even if the individual doesn’t feel ready to quit (as is often the case with adolescents). I have worked with many individuals who did not want to quit drinking or using drugs. Typically even if a person doesn’t feel ready to quit, working on coping skills, providing education about substance use disorder, and working on emotional regulation provides the foundation for the individual to make healthier choices and many times arrive at the conclusion that substance use is causing issues for themselves and those around them.
Life Long Recovery stands to change lives of those affected by addiction. These testimonials come from individuals and families who’ve experienced the support, guidance, and hope that recovery coaching can offer.
Have questions or need support? Reach out to us—we’re here to help! Fill out the form or use the details below to get in touch with our team.
Lifelongrc@gmail.com
The initial stages of recovery are particularly vulnerable. Professional support during this period can be an essential resource for sustained progress.
Life Long Recovery guides individuals and families through addiction and healing. Coach Matt supports recovery from substances, food, sex, gambling, and more. You’re never alone on this journey.
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