This might include hosting a sober holiday gathering, volunteering at a local charity, or organizing reframing holidays in early recovery a fun, substance-free activity with loved ones. These new traditions can reinforce your commitment to recovery while helping you enjoy the season in a healthier way. Not every family is brimming with joy during the holidays. Disconnections within the family setting are commonplace, but that doesn’t mean you, at this vulnerable time in your life, need to step into the fray. When conflicts arise, you may choose to dismiss yourself from the group until the trouble passes.

Helpful Tips for Celebrating the Holidays in Early Recovery

Let Little Creek Recovery Center guide you down the right path to recovery, personal growth, and long-term sobriety. Sarah Allen Benton, M.S., LMHC., LPC, is a licensed mental health counselor and author of Understanding the High-Functioning Alcoholic. When a parent struggles with porn addiction or sex addiction, this can have a negative impact on children and the family as a whole. Remember, even if your loved one is upset, they will benefit much more from your recovery than you relapsing because you wanted to please them in the moment. Find ways to simplify or eliminate travel plans and keep visits relatively short (or not at all).

Finding My True Self: Travis’s Journey from Addiction to Authenticity

Positive thoughts and positive self-esteem can help you get through the difficult moments during your recovery. It is most important to find the right balance for your individual needs during the holiday season. The biggest gift that you can give to yourself and your loved ones is that of sobriety. The simple idea of going holiday shopping can be stressful on its own.

Check-In with Loved Ones

In a series of 8 videos, you’ll learn the BASIC principles of health boundaries and the 5 steps to discovering and communicating your own boundaries. Partners of sex or porn addicts often report struggles with establishing boundaries. If you are new in recovery, you are likely creating new routines and daily habits for yourself. During this time, try to stick to as many of these new behaviors as you can. For example, we easily throw good sleep habits out the window when we are vacationing.

The ghosts of Christmas and holidays past may also haunt those in early sobriety and bring their substance use and “good ol’ days” to the forefront of their minds. Those with SUDs also have a far greater chance, statistically, of having first-degree relatives with addiction issues. So although this time of year can bring families together, substance use may also be part of the fabric of a family culture during celebratory events. Those showing up to social events sober can unintentionally hold a mirror up to those around them and lead to resistance and judgment.

Recovery Support During the Holidays

• And if you are not in recovery, but you are at an office party and someone declines an offer of an alcoholic beverage, please accept that as the most reasonable choice in the world and move on.
• Those showing up to social events sober can unintentionally hold a mirror up to those around them and lead to resistance and judgment.
• For others, the season can highlight loneliness, especially for those separated from loved ones or rebuilding connections post-recovery.

Everyone deals with holiday stress, but for people in recovery trying to stay sober, the holiday season places Drug rehabilitation unprecedented challenges. At family gatherings and social events, tote around your favorite non-alcoholic drink. People won’t feel so inclined to offer you a drink, and they won’t get the chance to pester you about your sobriety. Remember, sobriety allows you to experience the holidays in a new, meaningful way—free from the haze of addiction and full of potential for joy, connection, and self-discovery.

• For many addicts, getting through a stressful situation is not that difficult.
• Our programs focus on building life skills, emotional resilience, and a strong support network to help you thrive during this time.
• Recovery is a process that takes time, effort and commitment, and everyone’s experience will be different depending on their individual needs and circumstances.
• Celebrate the holiday season and the fullness of your sober life by taking time for yourself.

By preparing for emotions, planning for social situations, and leaning on your support network, you can navigate this season with confidence and grace. If you’re facing challenges with your mental health or are new to recovery, focus on spending time with people who make you feel safe and supported. You don’t need the added stress of putting on a brave face for people who don’t honor where you’re at. Research has shown that negative social support can hinder sustained recovery (Kitzinger et al., 2023).

At Little Creek Lodge, we understand the unique challenges of navigating the holiday season in early recovery. Our programs focus on building life skills, emotional resilience, and a strong support network to help you thrive during this time. The holidays are a cheerful and lovely time of the year to spend time with friends and family.

Explore null Treatment Centers

Many worry about family dinners, and purchasing presents as the holidays quickly approach. For people in early recovery, these stressors can be more severe. If you know Cousin Sadie is going to grill you about rehab, avoid her. If Uncle Brian is going to mix you a stiff drink, stay away from him. If the office New Year’s party is really all about drinking or other drug use, make a brief appearance or don’t attend. It’s unrealistic in all of these scenarios to say, «I can soldier through it.» That’s what Step One of the Twelve Steps teaches us, right?

«But most people have a sunscreen bottle that lasts the whole summer.» Plus, if you’re going to splurge on an LED mask, you may as well start with the best possible skin. Read on to discover how quitting alcohol will help you feel — and look — your best.

Final Thoughts About Alcohol and Aging Effects

When most people hear «wellness habits,» they think of things you can do to make you feel better, be healthier, or live longer, like meditation apps, yoga classes, or eating quinoa. What they don’t often consider is how wellness habits can improve how you look. As you get older, the effects of alcohol can become dangerous. People over 65 need to be careful when they drink alcohol. Alcohol abuse in older adults is a quiet but serious problem.

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Psoriasis not only affects the skin’s appearance but can also lead to discomfort and a significant impact on quality of life. Consuming too many alcoholic beverages can reduce your levels of vitamin A (retinol) and vitamin C. Vitamins produce collagen, an essential component of skin, bones, and muscles. Research examining the impact of alcohol consumption over a long period of time, as well as binge drinking, on biological aging has been limited. Drinking heavily and often can have a significant impact on your overall health. It can also age you prematurely, making you look, feel, and act older than you actually are.

Alcohol and Aging Effects: Does Alcohol Make You Look Older and Cause Wrinkles?

That’s why we make it our goal to successfully treat every person that walks in our doors with a variety of traditional and alternative treatment methods. After detox has been completed, the next step is to learn how to go about life without needing alcohol anymore. Individuals completing alcohol detox should also learn ways to better take care of their bodies.

• Receive free access to exclusive content, a personalized homepage based on your interests, and a weekly newsletter with the topics of your choice.
• Drinking dehydrates your body, and that includes your skin.
• If you find hangovers becoming increasingly rough, it might be a sign to reevaluate your drinking habits.
• Even if you fall asleep quickly after drinking, the quality of that sleep isn’t great.

There is a point though at which a person’s alcohol tolerance will actually begin to go down. This can be the direct result of changes to the composition of the body and hormonal changes. This is why you may notice that the older you get, the more prone what is alcoholism you may become to hangovers the next day.

• Plus, if you’re going to splurge on an LED mask, you may as well start with the best possible skin.
• Our programs are flexible and customized to target your specific needs.
• Alcohol acts as a diuretic, which means it increases urine production and leads to the loss of fluids and essential electrolytes.
• If you do decide to drink, professionals recommend that people over 65 shouldn’t take more than one standard drink each day and no more than 7 each week.
• Attempting to self-detox can end up causing even more harm and can even be life-threatening.
• Aging effects on the skin vary depending on the type of drug.

• Consider keeping the bottle closed as often as possible and prioritize your health & wellness.
• In simpler terms, dehydration is like not watering a plant.
• Substance use can cause other skin conditions like rosacea, eczema, and delayed wound healing.

Consider your current health conditions and medications before you drink. Heavy alcohol use can lead to more noticeable facial lines, make the eyes puffy and swollen, and make the blood vessels on the face more visible, causing skin redness. You can count on Ardu’s alcohol rehab center to provide everything you need to kick your drinking habit and start fresh. Ever noticed how some people’s faces get really red when they drink? Alcohol inflames your body and skin, which can lead to a puffy appearance. Over time, does alcohol make you look older this inflammation can cause your skin to lose its natural plumpness and elasticity.

At North Jersey Recovery Center in Fair Lawn, New Jersey, we offer various therapies so that a patient can enjoy a successful recovery from alcohol misuse. After a person becomes sober and learns ways to live healthier, he or she will notice an improved appearance. To take the first step in the right direction, contact us today. Alcohol can cause a lack of rest from a depleted sleep cycle.

Say Goodbye to Acne and Other Skin Conditions

The alcohol-induced impairment of intestinal barrier integrity and increased systemic inflammation mirrors inflammatory aging in older adults. You might not think knocking back drinks can weaken your bones over time, but alcohol may damage your skeletal health and accelerate bone aging. Alcohol prevents your body from properly absorbing bone-strengthening nutrients such as calcium and vitamin D. Less nutrient absorption coupled with more calcium being flushed out through frequent urination deprives the bones of what they need to stay healthy. Again, alcohol affects the skin and can cause negative deterioration of various internal systems.

The Australian guidelines to reduce health risks from drinking alcohol provide recommendations to keep the risk of harm from alcohol low, but don’t remove all risk. Older people report drinking alcohol more regularly than people in younger age groups. Those aged 70 years and over are the age group most likely to drink daily (both males and females) 1. When you drink alcohol, it’s absorbed through the small intestine, processed by the liver, and circulated through your major organs.