How to Use Exercise to Help You Overcome Addiction

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parts

1Choosing Activities

2Dealing With Side Effects

3Adopting General Guidelines

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Tips and Warnings

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There are many ways to use exercise to help you overcome addiction. Just about any form of exercise can help you overcome addiction. You should select activities that you enjoy, and that help you cope with the side effects of addiction like anxiety and sleeplessness. You should start exercising as soon as you’re ready to overcome your addiction, and incorporate exercise into a treatment plan alongside more traditional treatment methods like counseling and 12-step programs. Set realistic goals for yourself and experiment with a variety of different types of exercise to see which best helps you overcome your addiction.

Steps

Part 1

Part 1 of 3:

Choosing Activities

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   Go for walk. Walking can boost dopamine levels. Dopamine is the neurotransmitter that the brain produces when experiencing pleasure. When you engage in addiction behavior, your dopamine production increases – what’s why it feels good to “get high.” But you can also feel good by walking around the block or hiking in the woods.

   • Walking about can also produce new brain cell growth to replace the ones that were killed during your addiction behavior.
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   Do some strength training. Strength training basically involves lifting weights. Free weights, bench presses, and weightlifting machines can all help you burn fat. And most importantly for you as an addict, strength training can help you adjust your sleep schedule. Addicts often suffer from insomnia due to their addiction. Strength training can help you reset your sleep cycle so that you get a good night’s sleep.
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   Try yoga. Yoga is a form of exercises that improves strength and balance. It also increases dopamine levels. Yoga can help you by making you less stressed, less anxious, more focused on overcoming your addiction.

   • Traditional yoga, which focuses on a series of strength-building poses and actions is helpful. But you might find restorative yoga useful, too. Restorative yoga incorporates meditation into the mix, helping you become more mindful and reflective on your own addiction experience, and helping you find ways to center yourself to fight cravings.
   • Look online or in the yellow pages for yoga centers in your area, or ask a friend for a recommendation.
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   Join a sports team. Sports teams will help you rebuild the social circle that you may need to abandon when you give up your addiction. Contact your local community athletics or public health department to find out what sort of team sports are available in your municipality. If you’re in school, you could contact the coach of the team you’re interested in and inquire about trying out for the team.
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   Play sports with friends. Even if you don’t join a sports team, you can still play team sports. Find friends or family who don’t use drugs (or who won’t influence you to engage in addiction behaviors) and invite them to a game of soccer or rugby.

   • Finding ways to bond with others that don’t involve addiction can help you forge new relationships and feel more a part of society.
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Part 2

Part 2 of 3:

Dealing With Side Effects

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   Realign your sleep schedule. Addicts often have poor sleep schedules. You may have even developed insomnia. Exercise can realign your sleeping habits to ensure you get a better, more fulfilling night’s sleep. If you’re an addict looking to correct your sleeping habits through exercise, your best bet is to engage in some moderate-intensity aerobic activity like walking or riding your bike.
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   Use exercise to treat your anxiety. A common side effect in addicts is anxiety, though some people become addicts in order to cope with their preexisting anxiety. In either case, exercise can help you treat the anxiety you may experience alongside your drugs addiction.

   • There’s no specific form of exercise that will help you cope with anxiety, so do whatever you enjoy most. However, you may find your anxiety reduced if you become more mindful of what you’re doing during exercise. For instance, if you’re playing baseball, feel the sun shine on your face. Keep your eye on the ball as it comes toward you and note the direction of its spin. Feel the impact as you catch it in your glove.
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   Manage your weight with exercise. One of the common side effects of quitting drugs or other substances is weight gain. In order to avoid this unhappy result, you should use exercise to keep your weight down. All you have to do is know how many calories you need, how many calories you’re taking in, and how many calories you’re burning.

   • Talk to a doctor if you’re curious about whether or not you’re at a healthy weight. If you are, you should still exercise regularly, but you don’t need to adjust your weight.
   • If you’re overweight, simply calculate the number of calories you eat in a given day. You can do this by finding calorie totals in the nutrition facts label on the side of packaged foods, or looking up calorie values for fresh foods online. You could also get a fitness tracker like FitBit to help you count your calories.
   • Count the amount of calories you burned. Use a fitness tracker or an exercise calorie counter like the one available at https://www.healthstatus.com/calculate/cbc to figure out how many calories you expended during exercise.
   • To lose weight, the calories you take in each day must not exceed the calories you burn through exercise and other activities.
   • If you were a heavy drinker, you may find that you actually lose weight when you cut back.
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Part 3

Part 3 of 3:

Adopting General Guidelines

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   Schedule exercise at regular intervals. Just as addiction behavior occurs at regular intervals, so too should you get regular “doses” of exercise. The number of doses you require to help you overcome your addiction depends on you. You should aim to get at least 2.5 hours of exercise weekly, but you might require more. For instance, perhaps exercising 5 hours each week will help you better overcome your addiction than exercising 2.5 hours each week.

   • Experiment with different exercise schedules. Perhaps you can start out by exercising one hour each week, then increase the time devoted to exercise to two hours each week, then three hours each week. Monitor your feelings relative to your addiction at each commitment level. If you find that more exercise is making it easier to overcome your addiction, increase your level of exercise until you’ve conquered your addiction.
   • You might also consider working out at those times you were most likely to use drugs or alcohol.
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   Experiment with different types of exercise. Depending on your personality and addiction, you might find that different forms of exercise affect how well you can overcome your addiction. For instance, if you ride a bike, you might have little to no need to engage in addiction behavior. But if you go for a swim, you might find that your urge to engage in addiction behavior is only slightly decreased. Try a mixture of activities and record your reactions as they relate to your addiction behavior and urges.

   • Emphasize physical activities that help you significantly, and minimize or avoid physical activities that don’t help you as much.
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   Exercise while breaking your addiction. Don’t use exercise merely to help you cope with addiction after you’ve already kicked your habit. Instead, incorporate exercise into your routine as one part of your addiction treatment program.

   • As you gradually begin to wean yourself away from your addiction behavior, exercise just before you feel that you are about to give in to your addiction cravings. You might be less interested in your addictive behavior if you go a long period without engaging in your addiction and then exercising.
   • For instance, go about 15 hours without smoking a cigarette, then run or ride your bike for 15 minutes.
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   Add exercise to other addiction treatment methods. Your best bet to overcoming addiction is not to rely on any particular method to overcome your addiction. Don’t go exclusively to group meetings, don’t exclusively attend therapy – and don’t exclusively exercise. Instead, make exercise one outlet among an array of others that help you overcome your addiction.

   • If you need help figuring out how to devise a personalized drug treatment program, talk to your physician.
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   Don’t be intimidated. You might think that in order for exercise to be useful in your fight to overcome your addiction, you’d have to do a whole lot of it. But in fact, exercising even a little bit can help you overcome your addiction. Try to walk for 15 minutes each day. Gradually increase your speed until you’re running 15 minutes each day. Then gradually increase the length of time you run for.

   • Try to get at least 2.5 hours of exercise each week.
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   Set realistic goals. Any effective exercise regimen begins with setting realistic goals. If you set unrealistic goals – for instance, running five miles each time you engage in your addiction behavior – you won’t be able to meet them. But if you set realistic goals based on an honest assessment of what you’re able to accomplish, then exercise can be a useful way to reaffirm a sense of self-control and self-confidence.
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Tips

• Enjoy yourself. Exercising to overcome addiction shouldn’t be a chore. You should be happy to do it – after all, you’re not only overcoming addiction, you’re doing something positive for your health. If you’re outside hiking or mountain climbing, savor the fresh air. If you’re riding your bike on a sunny day, look around and appreciate the view that people who don’t ride bikes never get to see.
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• Regular exercise has been linked to lower levels of depression, diabetes, and heart disease. That’s a good reason to be happy about what you’re doing!
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• Be patient if you don't like exercising at first. Stick with it!
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