Recovery homes – places where people who are trying to stay clean and sober can live during a transition period – are all across the country. Unfortunately, people in some areas are frightened to have this kind of home set up in their neighborhood. They think they will soil the atmosphere and expose their kids to drug addicts. In some cases, that may be true. But the recovery homes known as the Oxford house may offer something entirely different.

First – everyone who’s there has to have a job. If they can’t hold down a job, they can’t live there. They also have to participate in the management of the house - they cook together, clean together, and so on. And if they have even one drink or take one drug, they have to pack their bags and be out of there in 15 minutes.

Only people who are really serious about staying clean and turning their lives around are going to go for something like that.

Some people getting out of drug rehab really have nowhere to go. Not that they were homeless when they started the program, but they may have lived alone or with a dysfunctional family that would drive them right back to drinking or drugs.

They also may have surrounded themselves with people who drank and took drugs and, back with the old crowd, they might not be able to resist temptation – especially when going out with a bunch of guys who are drunk or high when you’re not will put you in a position where you really aren’t in sync with them. They’re stoned, you’re straight. It can be almost impossible to just have a conversation. A stranger in a strange land.

A recovery house gives you a place to live, with a group of people who are also changing their lives. As follow up on a drug rehab program in an addiction treatment center, it may be just what’s needed.

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