What Can You Do When You and Your Spouse Struggle With Addiction?

If you and your spouse struggle with addiction, have you ever wondered if you can get sober together? Relationships are tough. Couples often struggle with constant fighting, a lack of communication, or an overall loss of connection. However, when substance use is a significant factor, the relationship can become even more strenuous. Spouses can seek treatment together, but both individuals must want to improve. 

Whether or not you and your spouse can recover together is a question that you'll have to ask yourself within the confines of your relationship. Attending counseling together may even help you answer this question. Along with figuring out that question, counseling will help you improve communication, restore trust, and help each other foster a sense of support in your recovery journeys. To begin that journey, consider working with West Coast Recovery Centers today! 

What to Do When You and Your Spouse Struggle With Addiction

When a person struggles with addiction, there are several reasons why that might be. That may include biological factors and societal influences. However, when someone is in active addiction, they tend to surround themselves with individuals also struggling with addiction. Building friendships and starting relationships with individuals when the only thing you have in common is substance use can make the road to recovery even more challenging. 

Romantic relationships born out of substance use can become dangerously toxic. Substance use within a relationship can lead to mistrust, manipulation, physical violence, and emotional abuse. If you recognize the signs of addiction within you or your spouse, seeking treatment immediately is critical. Unfortunately, for some, this means the end of a relationship if one person wants help and the other doesn't. That can be extremely difficult to accept, but what if both you and your spouse want treatment? What if you could seek treatment together? 

Can You and Your Spouse Seek Treatment Together?

Whether or not you and your spouse can seek addiction treatment together will depend on your specific situation. If your spouse is in denial or is unwilling to seek treatment, some tough decisions may have to be made regarding the relationship. 

Remaining in a toxic, substance-field relationship can be extremely harmful. For starters, it prevents you from seeking treatment for yourself, causing long-term and sometimes irreversible damage to your overall well-being. That includes organ damage, the development of other mental health conditions, and being at an increased risk for death by overdose. 

While you and your spouse can embark on recovery together, individual treatment is still necessary. Along with individual therapy and regular couples counseling – which we'll discuss further in a bit – behavioral couples therapy (BCT) may also produce benefits. BCT is a therapeutic practice “designed for married or cohabiting individuals seeking help for alcohol or drug abuse.” This tool may aid in your individual sobriety journeys while restoring trust within your relationship. 

Of course, many individuals opt to seek individual addiction treatment while attending couples counseling. So, let's learn a little bit more about what couples counseling is and what it entails.  

The Benefits of Couples Counseling When You and Your Spouse Struggle With Addiction

Some individuals are skeptical about the effectiveness of couples therapy – also referred to as family or marriage counseling. Like anything, you can't gauge the effectiveness of something until you try it, and many recommend couples counseling to help even with small issues occurring within a marriage. 

Couples counseling is when a therapist works with individuals in a romantic relationship. Within this journey, the therapist may use a number of therapeutic tools. However, regardless of the tools used, the goal is generally to improve the relationship and resolve interpersonal conflicts. It's also a goal for spouses to learn more about each other and develop a more profound understanding of one's needs and the needs of their spouse. 

Some of the benefits of couples counseling include: 

• Better understanding of each other 
• Identify problems within a relationship 
• Learn tools to resolve interpersonal conflicts 
• Improve communication skills 
• Change dysfunctional behaviors within the relationship 

Some of the benefits of couples counseling as they pertain to addiction and substance use disorder (SUD) may include: 

• Improving problem-solving skills 
• Learning to express emotions healthily 
• Identifying triggers within the relationship  
• Recognizing enabling behaviors 
• Finding solutions to enabling behaviors 

The Importance of Individual Treatment When You and Your Spouse Struggle With Addiction

As mentioned, individual therapy is just as necessary if you and your spouse struggle with addiction. Couples counseling can be extremely effective, but individual therapy can help you get to the root cause of your addiction. Having a spouse working toward sobriety and supporting your journey is beautiful, but there's a lot of individual work to be done along the way. 

Know that help is available if you and your spouse are struggling with addiction. You can embark on the journey together, but be sure you prioritize individual wellness, too. Call West Coast Recovery Centers to begin your recovery journeys today! 

Active substance use can lead to many harmful behaviors. When the addiction influences your relationships, seeking treatment can become more difficult. For example, many people begin romantic relationships where the only thing they have in common is substance use. However, it is possible for partners experiencing addiction to seek treatment together. Unfortunately, the journey will become more challenging if your spouse doesn't want to seek treatment or is in denial about their addiction. Nevertheless, treatment is available if you and your spouse struggle with addiction. To learn more about these resources or to begin your individual addiction recovery journey, contact West Coast Recovery Centers at (760) 492-6509. We can guide you as you start your healing today.