The past few months I've learned a lot about substance use addiction, treatment, and recovery. It's not because I'm an addict myself or anyone I know (that I'm aware of) is. I'm a marketing intern for Sanford House, a local addiction treatment center. It's my job to reserach and learn about different social network platforms and all things relating to addiction and recovery. I help create content that is entertaining, engaging and informational for people that are affected by the disease. Some of the most recent research I've done is on why rigorous exercise is important for someone's recovery. It's pretty well known that regular exercise is good for everyone's health in general. But for people in addiction treatment and recovery, it can have incredible benefits and make a big impact on their recovery journey.

Community:

Exercising can help build community. Working out with others can help keep you accountable. Sometimes it can be hard to find the motivation within yourself to keep going. By committing yourself to working out with a friend, you have someone that is going to make sure you show up and follow through with your workout. A partner will also help keep you on schedule, giving you a routine. Working out with another person can be great motivation to not only stay on track with your goals, but to challenge yourself, and to try exercises or routines you normally wouldn’t. In addition, being around others that might be faster or stronger than you can be an inspiration to work hard and improve.

Camaraderie:

Humans are social beings. For the most part, we enjoy being around others. However, addicts tend to isolate themselves. Exercising with others is one way to fight off the old ways of isolation. Working out with someone involves face-to-face interaction and can create a distinctive bond between people. By joining new classes and trying new things, you can start to create a new social group. You’ll have the opportunity to make new friends that aren’t addicts. The misery, struggle and physical pain of exercise is a unique way to connect and bring people together. New friends can help encourage you to come back, which continues to reinforce your routine and healthy, recovery lifestyle.

Time Consuming:

People in recovery often find that they have a lot of free time that they’re not sure how to use. Their time used to be spent thinking about, acquiring, and using substances. Working out and exercising can take up a lot of that extra time that would be spent on boredom or stressful thoughts about using. Regular physical activity fills up your schedule, in a positive way. Not only does the actual work out take time, but the time spent getting ready, commuting, and showering and cleaning up afterward take up time too.

Focus on the Activity:

Workouts can also be used as a distraction or practice in focus. A workout is time that is specifically set aside. During your workout, you have to focus on what you’re doing and you concentrate on the present moment. You’re thinking about your body movements and not the other things happening in your life. A regular workout routine puts order and structure into your life. This can build discipline, which can be incorporated into other parts of your life, making you less likely to use.

Sleep More Soundly:

Not getting enough sleep can make someone more susceptible to stress, depression, and anxiety. Your body heals faster when you’re well rested. Exercising helps your body return to a healthy and balanced state. This makes your sleep schedule more natural and it restores it to a normal cycle. Regular exercise a few hours before sleep can not only make it easier to fall asleep, it also improves the quality of your sleep.

Look and Feel Better:

Substance use disorders can lead to many physical and physiological changes. There can be shifts in blood pressure, heart rhythm, and weight; drastic decrease in muscle tone; lung, liver, or kidney damage; hair loss; bone damage; and changes in skin, nails, and teeth. However, exercise can begin to reverse some of these negative impacts on someone's health. Exercise can decrease blood pressure and increase smooth muscle. If someone is overweight, exercise will help get rid of unnecessary fat that may have been gained during addiction. If underweight, it can help bring back muscle tone and a regular appetite. In addition, exercise reduces stress and pumps endorphins through your body, putting you in a better mood and clearing your head. With regular exercise you’ll not only start to look healthier and better, you’ll start to feel that way too.

Heals Your Body and Mind:

Substance use can change how your brain’s rewards patterns work. Exercise increases the brain's plasticity, or ability to change. This makes it easier for a person to quit old habits and develop new ones. Regular workouts increase the amount of new nerve connections in the brain; these help heal the brain from the effects of substance use.

Outlet for Anger:

In general, tension builds in our bodies during everyday interactions and activities. This tension can come from a lot of different things like bad posture to an unpleasant conversation with a co-worker. In addition, it’s not uncommon for recovery addicts to have trouble with rage and frustration. During their addiction, they may not have learned how to express these emotions in a healthy way. Exercising and moving your body eases this tension and lets you get rid of negative emotions that you might have been keeping in. Focused exercise uses and manages physical and emotional energy that might have otherwise escaped in an unhealthy way.

Helps Dispel Depression:

Regular exercise can reduce symptoms of depression. Exercise stimulates the growth of neurons in certain brain regions that depression can damage. Exercise also releases feel-good brain chemicals (neurotransmitters, endorphins) that may ease depression and reduces immune system chemicals that can make depression worse.

De-stress and Weather a Crisis:

When you’re feeling overwhelmed, exercise can be a go-to tool. Working out can help reduce stress, regain composure, and allow you to do something proactive for you and your recovery all at the same time. Similarly, if you’re experiencing a crisis, regular exercise can be something you rely on to help you get through the period and have a clear and calm mind.

Builds Self-Confidence:

The more you exercise the better you get at it. By gradually adding more time and intensity to your workout routine, you’ll start to see physical and mental health benefits. Feeling stronger and more competent from this can bleed into other areas of your life, helping you to overcome challenges in recovery. With regular exercise comes the possibility to lose weight or fill out, get clearer skin, and stronger nails and hair. You’ll start to actually look healthier, which can make you feel better. Even if your body doesn’t change, being able to achieve fitness goals and improvements, like running faster or longer or lifting more, can improve your self-esteem and body image.

Alters Brain Chemistry:

Abuse of drugs and alcohol causes an imbalance with a person’s ability to feel pleasure, happiness, and satisfaction. Dedicated physical activity in treatment and recovery helps reintroduce natural levels of endorphins. This not only helps your recovery, but re-teaches your body that it is capable of regulating your own brain chemistry and mood in healthy, natural ways. By having access to another source of pleasurable feelings, the choice to exercise instead of use becomes easier.

Meditation in Motion:

Concentration on our physical self can lead to psychological and emotional benefits that are achieved through meditation. Focusing on the movement of your body while exercising allows you to temporarily forget what is going on in your life elsewhere and shed daily tensions. It’s not uncommon to leave a workout with a clear mind and a more optimistic feeling. This clarity within chaos can make recovery more manageable. This calmness and clarity after working out and focusing on a single task can remain while moving on to other parts of your day.

Improves Outlook and Optimism:

Studies have shown that people who exercise regularly report increased feelings of self-confidence and optimism and reduced feelings of depression and anxiety. The body regulates itself during exercise which leads to a more balanced and healthy mind. An improvement in outlook is also due to feelings of accomplishment, pride, and self-worth as you see your body transform and your goals reached. Reaching goals makes you feel more accomplished and reinforces the overall goal of continued sobriety.

Sense of Accomplishment:

When you finish a workout, you get the immediate reward and satisfaction of knowing you have accomplished something. When you continue to exercise and set goals and reach them, you also start to feel a continued sense of success. These new options for rewards are an alternative to using drugs. Exercise also frequently leads to improved self-esteem, including a boost in body image from getting in shape. This makes people feel accomplished as well.

Biology of Exercise:

There are a lot of reasons why exercise is good for your brain. Exercise increases blood flow. An increase in blood flow improves your brain’s health and delivers vital oxygen and glucose to the brain that nourish it while also carrying away waste products. Exercise also releases neurotrophic factors like BDNF that stimulate the growth of new neurons.

According to studies, physical activity is also associated with improved white matter integrity. White matter is made up of glial cells and myelinated axons that act as communication lines between different regions in the cerebrum. White matter carries nerve signals between the gray matter in one brain region to another region. The more streamlined and compact the white matter in your brain is, the faster and more efficiently your brain functions. Research has found that exercising improves the microstructures and integrity of white matter in the brain. So by exercising your body, you’re creating more efficient communication between your brain’s regions.

Also, the brain is a neuroplastic muscle, meaning it can be re-wired and changed through activities and experiences like exercise. New thoughts and skills create new neural pathways. Repetition and practice strengthen these pathways, leading to less use and weakening of old pathways, and ultimately forming new habits. Learning new skills, like exercise, is what engages the brain’s plasticity and keeps it in good shape.

Continued Performance:

During an exercise program, a common difficulty is plateauing or staying in your comfort zone. This can demotivate people. But by staying with your routine and setting new goals, you can continue to build strength that allows you to perform other activities. When you have more physical strength and self-confidence, you’ll stay even more committed to continue working out so you can be better.

Challenges You:

As you challenge yourself and achieve new goals, you may start to notice that throughout the rest of your day you feel more energetic and have a better mood. This makes daily tasks a bit easier and can make you feel more powerful and in control. By pushing yourself to do what you actually can do instead of what you just think you can do, you become stronger and build endurance. Also by challenging yourself, you can start to set new and bigger goals with more confidence. You can reach an unfamiliar effort level, and see that you’re able to achieve more than you thought possible. With new levels of physical strength and endurance and confidence, you can start to look for new activities and exercises that you haven’t tried. You’ll be more excited and willing to try instead of dreading it.

I always knew exercise was good for you. I just never realized how good it is for you and why. Working out and getting your body moving not only makes you look and feel better, it actually helps improve your brain's functions and reverses a lot of negative impacts of addiction. You'll strengthen relationships and build new bonds while challenging yourself and feeling accomplished when you make rigorous exercise a priority in your recovery and overall lifestyle.