It means that you’re not just using your words to show a change, your actions are proving this change as well. When someone is struggling with substance abuse, their disease affects not only themselves but also everyone around them. The person may withdraw from those closest to them, be quick to lash out, or even steal from family and friends. When a person gets sober, it can be difficult to process the pain they have caused their loved ones. Making amends, however, can help repair strained relationships while also reinforcing recovery.
Navigating Step Nine: Living Amends
- Instead, you can volunteer your time to educate teens on the dangers of driving under the influence of drugs or alcohol.
- We can’t know for certain how another person will respond—or even how the interaction might affect us emotionally.
- They may find resolution and understanding about the past.
- We will honor the emotional consequences that stem from our behaviors, and seek to become healthier so as not to repeat them.
- The guilt may have been real, but the apology didn’t come with lasting change.
If you’re writing a letter, whether sending or sharing it in person, spend some time reflecting on and sharing the actions you’re taking to redress the wrong(s) done. Taking these actions helps us to separate ourselves from living amends the disease of addiction. We come to understand that we are good people with a bad disease. Steps 8 and 9 help us to move out of the shame we have lived in, shame that feeds the cycle of substance use and addiction.
Work on your relationships
- Perhaps it is something you said or did while they were ill.
- Being helpful toward others can mean lending a hand to friends and family who need help moving, checking in on elderly parents, or offering to babysit their nieces and nephews for a parent’s night out.
- These promises focus on rebuilding your relationship with a loved one and moving forward from the pain of the past.
In a serene and picturesque ranch setting, merging evidence-based treatment with holistic approaches to treat substance use disorders and dual diagnoses. Ninety percent of the time, I keep my mouth shut, but I am my son’s mother. I have a responsibility to parent him and speak out for his best interests. Early in my recovery, I learned neither https://ecosoberhouse.com/article/celebrating-the-first-year-sober/ my son nor my husband was listening to anything I said. Older children will more clearly understand our explanations of addiction and how that affected us, but that doesn’t mean we should spend much time on the subject. Apologizing in this way may open the door to continued healing, growth, and restored relationships in recovery.
Patient Care Network
If they take my words for granted, sometimes, I take a break from talking. I don’t punish them with silence (although I did do that in the past). It’s much easier to just apologize and move on, but committing to living your life differently looks different. Making these types of life improvements typically requires that you work with a counselor or therapist who can provide an outsider’s perspective and objective view of your life. Making these types of life changes is difficult and requires lots of hard, emotionally-complex work, but it’s worth all the effort in the end. For example, someone living with an addiction may make amends by apologizing for stealing property and then make it right by returning what they’d taken.
Instead of yin and yang, they are dependent and codependent. When my husband misses a turn because he’s in the wrong lane, I say nothing. When he runs out of medicine because he didn’t call the doctor for a refill, I trust he has the intelligence to solve his own problem. When he handles a situation at work “the wrong way” I keep my opinion to myself. If there are any concerns about content we have published, please reach out to us at
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But several high-profile killings have prompted calls for the law to change. Representative Jamaal Bowman of New York, a member of the House’s left-wing “squad,” was defeated by George Latimer in a race that exposed Democratic fissures. To act beyond our old patterns of behavior, many of us require guidance.
