Welcome to our series 3 Ingredients Every Recovery Friendship Needs. Ingredient #1: Equal Need and Equal Availability
Sometimes people in recovery ask me if they can rely solely on their sponsor, therapist or spiritual leader as an accountability partner (AP).
I do think that having guides can really make a difference. However, most guides can’t commit to the day in, day out support you might need. Or, they may be able to provide that for short periods but often the level of support can’t be sustained for the long haul.
You have to find someone who wants recovery just as bad as you.
So, we recommend that you have at least one other person who has an equal need for accountability.
Since your friend is experiencing similar issues, it can help you both practice rigorous honesty. Rigorous honesty is key to growth in recovery. This may be difficult to do with an authority figure or guide. But, a good recovery friend can encourage you to share your secrets with a guide and help you work through that process.
You may have found an AP with equal need but do they have equal availability?
Uneven availability between AP’s can sabotage effective accountability.
It can already be difficult to reach out to someone. And, if you are constantly missing one another that can lead to frustration and eventually disconnection.
To keep this from happening, it’s important for AP’s to talk about their expectations of communication modes (texts, email, calls, etc) and frequency.
It’s also important to decide how available you want to be for recovery communication. And, find someone whose availability matches. For example, if you want to message someone 3x/day then you will want to find someone who will have that same availability.
At some point your preference or needs may change and it’s important to update your AP on those changes, this way you’re always getting the amount and type of help you need.
If you need help finding an AP here are some places to start:
1) Try an online or in person 12 step meeting and ask if someone is looking for an accountability partner
2) If you use the NoFAP forum on Reddit or any other online forum, you might already have someone you trust that you could ask to be in your group.
3) Consider going to your spiritual leader and ask them if they know other people who share your struggle and might want an accountability partner.
4) Ask your therapist if someone else they are helping is looking for a recovery partner
Next week we will discuss “carefrontations” as a way of keeping your accountability relationship healthy.
Until next time…Tribe on
Free Porn Addiction Recovery App: www.rtribe.org
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