Aristotle said, ‘Give me a child until he is 7 and I will show you the man’, which suggests that between ages 0 to 7 we are programmed by our primary care givers. This school of thought is supported in modern times and as with our computer we may need our program updated and at installing completely new programs because ‘if nothing changes – nothing changes’.
If we want to develop mature age programs that help us to both grow and recover from old programs, we need to be creative with our programs that could incorporate a number of combined standalone programs. For example, a letter from a family member was sent to me after her husband had left an inpatient Drug and Alcohol program which at that time was six weeks in duration.
It went as follows:
My husband recently went through rehab for alcohol, he has just been sober 6 months. Prior to rehab he had times of being “dry” but would gamble out of control spending several thousands of dollars monthly. He was honest about this in his rehab program, very little was done to address the gambling, one worksheet. He just admitted that he has been gambling several times per week for the last 2 months. He feels that he has not relapsed as he did not drink. He has been very involved with AA since he was released from rehab.
He lied, to me and the people in his oxford house (half way transitional house) to cover up the gambling. He has not paid the rent at the oxford house and used money he needed to pay his DUI court fees to gamble with. He says he has not relapsed but he needs to get in the program with GA. I feel this is not correct and that he is not fully facing that his actions of gambling are no different than a drinking relapse.
I would suggest that it wasn’t the person but the program that failed to adequately address the issues.
Having a program that incorporates a joined up thinking approach with other programs such as addiction issues (including cross addiction), men’s behavioural change programs (Family violence), mental health programs that incorporate emotional intelligence growth as well as connected to other services such as financial counselling that support the client in their endeavours to change is what Frontier Counselling specialises in.
We can assist programs in the Behavioural Change space further develop on a consultative and contractual basis.
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