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No matter what you have heard, no matter what people may have said to you, and no matter what you might believe - here is the truth:
RECOVERY IS REAL
(Restoring Every Aspect of Life)
FACT: Recovery is a transformative, evidence-based reality.
Backed by research from several government sectors and studies, individuals (pay attention: they are talking about us), effectively heal neurological function, re-establish personal stability, and overcome the barriers of mental health and substance use disorders through personalized pathways.
FACT: Recovery is the rule; not the exception.
What this means for anyone standing at the start: the odds are not stacked against you. Recovery isn’t a rare exception handed to a fortunate few, it’s a path that a vast number of people have already walked, which is part of why believing it’s possible is itself linked to reaching it.
"Getting connected to the right support system
is the most powerful step you can take."
Source: Spectrum Health Systems
Whether you are just starting or are looking for
support to maintain your recovery
HELP IS AVAILABLE.
REAL
Support Groups
PEER acknowledges the concept of "Multiple Pathways to Recovery"-which means there is "no wrong door" to how a person finds and supports their recovery. There are a wide variety of peer-led support groups for you to choose from - both locally and virtually - and we encourage you to check out a few until you find your "tribe" and plug-in to the support that fits you.
Supported Access to Treatment
Navigating "the system" and accessing the right treatment and recovery supports can be challenging. We can help simplify the process by helping you discover available options, provide connection to resources and services and support you as you develop and execute your personal Recovery Management Plan.
Recovery Check-ups
We know that you can do this - we're just here to help. Our team of trained staff and volunteers would love the opportunity to just check-in with you and see how you are doing! We can call, text or email you (typically once a week - but as often you choose) at a time that is convenient for you. You can sign-up by clicking the button below and, as always, you are free to cancel the service at any time.
Peer Support/ Recovery Coach
Peer Recovery Support Specialist (PRSS)/Peer Recovery Coach (PRC) is a non-clinical professional that has “lived experience with mental health and/or substance use disorder” (read: We are in recovery, too!) that utilize our experience, strength and hope to engage, educate and support others in their own recovery.
Volunteer @ PEER
Recovering and recovered people are part of the solution: recovery gives back what mental health and substance use has taken from individuals, families, and communities. There are many ways to pay the "gift of recovery forward". If you are looking for opporunitties to utilize your skills and strengths to help others at the recovery center please let us know!
Join a PEER Committee
The Recovery Movement has helped coin the phrase, "Nothing about us without us!" Peer Committees are an essential component to ensuring that Recovery Community Centers are peer-led and peer-driven. Your voice matters and your input is valuable. We hope you will consider joining one of the amazing committees that makes PEER Wellness Center possible.
There are about as many different definitions of what "recovery" is as there are people who are in recovery. Some believe that recovery only relates to no longer using drugs or alcohol; or no longer using illegal drug(s). One popular belief is that if you have ever developed a substance use disorder to one substance, you must abstain from all substances; complete abstinence or "being sober" is the only recovery that there is. Others include living with a mental health disorder in the definition of recovery while someone else trys to assert that only certain diagnoses "qualify", or that one must have a co-occurring substance use disorder to truly claim that they are "in recovery". Then someone else trys to tell us that if you are taking "any mind altering" medications that one "is not really in recovery". Many of these "philosophies" or "opinions" of what recovery actually is and is not have stood the test of time and have saved millions of lives around the globe. However, some of these beliefs and opinions have cost people their lives. How, you ask? By telling a person who was struggling that there was only one way that their lives would get better, and that if they could not (or assumed that they would not) strictly follow this one way, (whatever "way" that was), that there was no hope for them.
What does "recovery" mean to you?
"Hope, the belief that these challenges and conditions can be overcome, is the foundation of recovery."
Source: SAMHSA - Guiding Principles of Recovery
We are not here to define your Recovery. We never will. To do so would go against the evidence-based and nationally recognized Core Principles and Values of a Recovery Community Organization (RCO). But having the designation of "RCO" seems to imply that we must know what "recovery" is, doesn't it? How can we legitimately call ourselves a "recovery community organization" if we can't even tell you what "recovery" is?
Trying to explain to someone that "my recovery is whatever I say it is" or "their recovery is whatever they says it is" has not always gone over very well. (OK. I 'm pretty sure it has never gone over well, nor has it ever been well received - or understood.) Thanks to SAMHSA (the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration) this particular dilemma has been resolved and can be avoided by all of us going forward.
SAMHSA created a "think tank" of industry leaders and subject-matter experts and tasked them with "defining recovery". And that is how the "Working Definition of Recovery" came to be. You might notice that nowhere in their definition of "recovery" are drugs or alcohol mentioned. Likewise, this definition of recovery doesn't include one single "label", negative stero-type or even a diagnosis from the DSM-V.
At the end of the day, this definition of recovery is less about "where we have been" or what situation, substance or event became a negative issue in our lives, and more about "where am I trying to go?"
As people in recovery ourselves, this definition of "recovery" is what a Recovery Community is all about and why PEER Wellness Center has adopted this definition, as well. "Where we have been" is as varied as the number of people that are in recovery. And, irrelevant. Because what we have in common is "where we are going". And that common ground is at the root of "community".
Most importantly, how YOU define your recovery is, and should be, completely up to you. How you approach that "process of change" and what "health and wellness" means to you is what matters.
Your life. Your recovery. Your way.
Evidence shows that the process of recovery is highly personal and occurs via many pathways. Your recovery should reflect and build on your strengths, talents, coping abilities, resources, and inherent values. It should be holistic, address you as a whole person, include your community, and is much easier to navigate if you are supported by your peers, friends, and family members.
Whether you choose:
-
clinical treatment (in-patient or out-patient),
-
no treatment,
-
just detox/withdrawal management
-
a new hobby,
-
medications,
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individual therapy or group counseling,
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trauma therapy,
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explore Faith-Based/Agnostic/Aethiest/Secular/Buddist/Spiritual /Anonymous/Physically Acitve/SMART/Abstenent/California-Sober/Moderation/Sober-Curious/Natural Focused Programs,
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include peer-support, family support, self-care, or
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None Of The Above
- the long-term success that you achieve in your recovery will greatly depend on your "ownership" and a recovery support system that empowers you, honors your autonomy and respects your right to make informed choices.
Just in case you are wondering, the answer is, "No. The staff at PEER didn't just make all this up on our own." The idea of enpowered recovery was borne from what has come to be known as "The Recovery Movement".
Faces and Voices of Recovery (a national advcocacy group for us: the recovery community) utilized our (people in recovery) collective voices to develop and publish what is now referred to as "The Recovery Bill of Rights".
At PEER Wellness Center, it is our expressed goal to actively cultivate a supportive environment
that is condusive to both our individual and collective recovery: a culture where we empower
each other, respect each other and ourselves, honor each other's autonomy and heal.
We hope you will be a part of our recovery at PEER.