Family Healing

Our clients often have large spheres of influence. These larger family systems encompass all who influence or are impacted by our clients’ addictions. This group may include spouses, children, friends, relatives, business colleagues, attorneys, and financial advisors. We are mindful first and always of the need to preserve the privacy and dignity of our clients. Along with this, we understand how critical it is that family members — and referents — are kept informed throughout treatment.

From assessment to continuing care planning, their active participation on “the team” is essential to long-term recovery. At Headwaters, all family clinical work is tailored to the needs of the client and to his or her family’s schedule; these therapeutic offerings will be available to family members who need extra support. Our goal is to clinically assist in repairing and healing the family devastation so often inflicted by addictive behaviors. We work to nourish healthy, new, and necessary change as we recapture and build upon positive family dynamics that may have been forgotten or abandoned due to the ravages of addiction.

Focusing on the client alone creates an artificial boundary drawn between the individual and their social context. When treatment for the fast-paced adult who is recovering from addiction is focused exclusively on the individual, a clear pathway to relapse is created. We bridge the gap between the individual and their loved ones through proven interventions that help the family develop healthy communication patterns and coping skills.

Our definition of holistic treatment includes an examination of the entire system in which addiction and other disorders have evolved and festered. Often, family members learn that their own behaviors, even if well-intentioned, have contributed to another’s addiction or dysfunction. We work to train family members to recognize and change unhealthy patterns, to set and keep boundaries, and to resolve conflicts and adopt other behaviors that contribute to recovery and the overall health of the family and its complex relationships. Additionally, we help family members prepare for the changes in family dynamics when a loved one completes treatment at Headwaters and returns home.
Successful recovery is a lifestyle. Our experience has shown that the 12-Step process plays a critical role in fulfilling client needs for a continuing community of support and spiritual renewal. How one defines spirituality is unique to each individual, and our staff is dedicated to helping Headwaters clients explore recovery from their personal spiritual perspective. We know that by connecting with a deeper sense of meaning and purpose, people in recovery are able to positively engage with and impact the lives of those around them. We have found that in combination with clinical treatment, the 12-Step philosophy can prove to be a vital part of permanent recovery.

The family is a natural context for healing and finding recovery, and family therapy is a significant part of the treatment process at Headwaters. Family therapy can be described as the art of a therapist joining with a family to become an agent of change while working within the constraints of the family system to produce a more productive way of living. By broadening the focus with therapies designed for the whole family, the therapist raises the hope that a different way of looking at the problem will bring new solutions. In our program, family and therapist form a partnership to reduce conflict and stress for the entire family, learn new ways of coping, and escape the stronghold of substance use. Family therapists help each unique system utilize their own resources to develop a better quality of life.