Creating a new social life while sober is not a task for the faint of heart. It is a task of recovery and as such, inseparable from that process, one that is non-negotiable. It is not that you can do all the other things and somehow manage not to do this, but rather that without people around you who are seeking the same, you’ll quickly find yourself unable to follow the road not travelled for very long
We’ve been trained that we must “make sober friends,” but rarely are we educated on how to do this when the last thing we want to do is ask anyone for help
Loneliness is a relapse trigger
due in part to its physicality, not to mention the psychological state it primes you for when disconnected from other people. It’s when intrusive thoughts concerning self-worth peak, when memories serve up particularly handy anecdotes of a time when you knew a surefire way to make all of that go away.
Auditing your friendships before writing them off doesn’t mean cutting all your ties at once, or else you might find yourself with almost no social life and no other plan but to return to your old habits because of that isolation.
Go through your contacts list with a fine-toothed comb, weighing each person on three criteria:
- do they respect your decision to stop?
- do they bring out the worst in you?
- do you feel steadier or more unmoored after seeing them?
A friend who gets a little rattled because they see your continuing sobriety as a statement about their own self-worth but who manages to keep coming through for you isn’t necessarily a bad friend. nor is a drinking companion automatically a bad prospect. what defines toxic or codependent relationships (aside from their one-sided nature in many cases–not that one party muttered ‘good for you’ about ‘getting sober’ and ‘making healthy lifestyle choices’) is the lack of boundaries, not just space (though you may want to give them that too). you don’t have to have a formal exit strategy. you can start simply by saying no more often, attending less, and watching who tests the boundaries.
Shame is the primary reason your social life is currently lacking
Most guidance fails to address that it’s the reason you’re struggling to do this in the first place, not because you lack the knowledge, but rather that explaining yourself can feel exposing, and you may miss the friend who is right there listening. it wants you to believe that a substance use disorder is a reflection of your character, not your health, but that same stigma is also what keeps you from those same supports once you find yourself in recovery, and looking to rebuild that social life. places like Legacy Healing NJ operate under the premise that stigma is the greatest barrier to both treatment and to connection, and so it’s worth noting what they do to combat it, including introducing people-first language as a helpful first step. that phrase reframes the way you hear it, not because it makes it sound good, but rather because it doesn’t sound so bad, and it’s not an easy task to put into other words without sliding right back into ‘addict.’ you can make the argument that it’s not the label as much as the judgment behind it, but either way, it’s a start. it helps you move through the rest of that explanation, the one that is so necessary, without putting any undue emphasis on that word.
Meetings work because they provide the social infrastructure required
While 12-step fellowships like aa and na, which are primarily treatment resources, also serve as excellent social outlets due to the nature of their meetings: regular, reliable, and low-pressure, requiring little from you beyond showing up. that sort of interaction is what a rehabilitating social life needs, because the easy kind rarely comes about through a single conversation. rather, it’s found in the ebb and flow of multiple, as you trade stories about your friend of a friend or that guy everyone knows from the church basement group that meets there.
But if the spiritual aspect of 12-step recovery isn’t your thing, there’s always smart recovery, which offers similar options in a self-help setting that incorporate rational-emotive and cognitive behavioral therapy tenets. smart also serves up that crucial low-investment, week-to-week continuity that’s so necessary, with the additional benefit of being decidedly secular, and having meetings that focus specifically on discussion-based interaction. neither option is objectively better, but if you want to get out there and meet some people, what you have to realize is that you need to invest somewhat regularly and consistently in order to get anywhere near that sense of having found a peer group.
Scripts for social occasions
The vulnerability of the newly recovering is a genuine thing, and if we don’t address it, people won’t really engage in those social circumstances again and that’s not conducive to building that new life. it helps, then, to have a script already prepared.
At a dinner party where there’s a number of people and the waiter asks you what you’re drinking make sure you say aloud “just water for me, thanks”
You avoid having to explain yourself more than necessary. if anyone asks why you say you’re taking a break or that it doesn’t agree with you; it’s unlikely they’ll press further, but if they do, a suitable response is “I’m good, but thanks for asking.” and when it comes to introducing someone new into your life, don’t feel like you need some grand gesture. “I’m going to the movies this thursday if you’re interested” or “I’m playing basketball this weekend, you should come” sounds reasonable and not like you’re laying out your entire existence for them to either accept or reject. the idea is to keep things as light as possible without appearing too eager or despondent, just making a general opportunity for one.
Building communities around activities
The ‘sober curious’ movement has made this easier than it might have been ten years ago. dry events have become more normalized, as have mindful drinking experiences and dry bars, and this sort of cultural shift has meant you can make a suggestion of an activity without having to make a statement of your intentions.
Fitness classes, hiking clubs, book clubs, and volunteering all work in a similar way to meetings, but serve as an alternative if you want to focus elsewhere besides your recovery. they’re good options for building a social life because while you may find a friend in the group, it’s an added bonus rather than the point. it’s easy to feel like those friendships are tenuous insofar as there isn’t anything else really tying you together, but if you focus on what you enjoy about it, that can become a shared thing you both engage in and help you build a wider social circle.
Here it’s also worth noting sober living arrangements for people early in their recovery. living with others who are also building their lives back up is an essential step for many, both to avoid the crushing loneliness that comes with early transition, as well as provide people with someone to hold them accountable while having a sober presence in their day-to-day.
Quality over quantity
You don’t need a huge amount of people. all you need is just one or two who can hold up their end of the bargain, who can send you a message asking how you’re doing and actually care about the answer, and who would help you when the time comes rather than just judge you for where you were. in that vein, you might want to limit the amount of acquaintances you have that only know the surface-level version of you, because it’s not those people who will stick around when it really matters.
And let’s be honest, quantity will always fail you when it comes to a functioning social life. seeking to improve on that front is a fool’s errand, and one that leaves you perpetually disillusioned when your expectations aren’t met. quantity is meaningless without quality.
Online communities are a good place to start if that’s not an option for you
If you find that the prospect of engaging in these social situations is too much for you to handle at this stage, online communities are a valid option. they do not have to be a last resort; they can be a first step, and you can work your way up to in-person interactions once you’re used to the idea of talking about your recovery in places where it’s not immediately taboo.
This is incredibly important for people who suffer from social anxiety due to their prolonged isolation, as reaching out to people can be an incredibly intimidating prospect, and even finding a way to get to that meeting can feel insurmountable. but typing it out to someone who can relate and understand it better is the way to ease back into confidence, and is frequently the bridge people need in order to return to in-person social life.
When you can’t do this alone, it’s not a failure, it’s a sign that you need more structure than most
You might already be doing everything on this list and nothing is clicking for you. but if you’re trying all the time and your efforts keep falling apart, that doesn’t mean you somehow aren’t capable of doing this in general or that you’ll never get this social life you want some day. it means that maybe there are particular circumstances in which these goals are easier for you to achieve, and you need to recognize the steps you can take to make that happen because achieving them requires structure and community.
Treatment facilities that have established alumni networks and encourage you to lean on existing ones are an excellent resource in this regard. so long as they’re making sure you’re getting the support you need to develop your own network, or that you’re using theirs in conjunction with others and taking active steps to utilize them to the fullest, they’re serving you.
Facilities that foster alumni connections, host sober events, or have a more integrated check-in process as part of their treatment are taking those social models and making sure you’re implementing them in your own life as part of your recovery, which is an indication that they understand the value in that kind of social infrastructure to the point that they’re embedding it in your treatment.
Asking for those things doesn’t mean you’ve failed, rather, it means you’ve appropriately identified the signs of isolation as a risk for relapse and are doing everything you can to avoid both.
The friendships will come, but not by accident
Once you’ve become sober you can’t sit back and wait for this new social life to find you. you have to engage in the sort of behaviors that, in time, will yield those connections and those opportunities. it’s not about waiting but making small efforts at these meetings, these invitations, these answers to awkward questions. these are all actions that might seem insignificant in their impact at first, but when you repeat them constantly that can become the catalyst needed to build a strong support network in your sobriety.
