Living in a halfway house is a vital and sometimes underestimated step in the recovery process.  When you are thinking about finding a maintaining recovery, living in a halfway house NJ may make or break whether your success.  Finding a great halfway house that has a positive community of recovering addicts living there is often the step that is suggested to you after you leave treatment.  

What may a halfway house do for YOUR recovery?

What is a halfway house?

Understanding what a halfway house is is the first step for you to make your decision about the next portion of your recovery journey.  A halfway house is usually government sanctioned and is meant to provide housing for people who have recently left incarceration, or who have been mandated there due to being found guilty of drugs offenses it court.  It provides a group home setting that tenants can live in together and assimilate into society.

Today, halfway houses are a little different than how they were.  Now, clients move into the home with other recovering addicts.  There are rules which are established to maintain safety and order in the house. The first of these is that there must be absolutely no substance use or drinking.  Clients are habitually drug tested and breathalyzed to make sure that they adhere to this rule.  If the rule is broken then clients are discharged and evicted.

Other rules involve following a curfew, performing chores and keeping an atmosphere of recovery while in the house.

Benefits of being in a halfway house

Living in a halfway house can feel stressful and difficult for newly recovered addicts.  Newcomers are often so accustomed to a lifestyle of addiction that following rules can prove a challenge.  But it is often in their stay at a halfway house that addicts and alcoholics can find the most growth.

Gaining accountability

The first benefit that you will receive when living in a halfway house is gaining accountability.  As mentioned above, halfway house NJ will have a variety of rules which are intended to provide a guideline for living responsibility.  Addicts will often revolt, and claim that an authority figure is out to get them, but it is in adherence to the rules that you are learning adaptability.  Part of being successful in recovery is figuring out how to be teachable and listen to direction.

Living around recovery

Another positive aspect of a living in a halfway house is that you can focus on recovery.  Most halfway houses require twelve step recovery meeting attendance as one of the conditions of living in the house.  By having a strict regime of recovery from the start, it is much easier to maintain long-lasting recovery.  Even if meeting attendance is not your thing initially, often people who attend meetings get into a routine and begin to look forward to this aspect of recovery.  Halfway houses can mandate working the steps as part of the rules of the house, which ensures that no one is slacking off in the vital beginning stages of their recovery.

Making great recovery friendship

One of the benefits of communal living is meeting people with shared experience.  Having a network of support among your housemates is a crucial part of recovery.  Some of the best memories of a person’s life may be made while they are living in a halfway house.  Finding people to grow together in recovery and celebrating victories in sobriety is one of the best ways of getting planted within a recovery community.

Learning how you can live with others

While many look at living with a bunch of other people as somewhat of a drawback, it can actually be considered a benefit.  In halfway houses, you are surrounded by housemates, some of which you will like, some you will not.  It is learning to live with many other personality traits that is another important life lesson.

How to be a solid employee

Another benefit to be gained from living in a halfway house is the requirement of seeking gainful employment.  Living at a house is often contingent on having a job.  Even if this is a simple job such as flipping burgers, it is still a job.  Most addicts have not had a job in a long time, as using and drinking often gets in the way of being a good employee.  Learning to to suit up and be a productive member of society is part of what recovery is about.