Recovery Coaching with Ria Health
Ria Health provides comprehensive treatment for alcohol use disorder (AUD) from home. In addition to medications, online support groups, and app-based tools, we offer regular, weekly meetings with a licensed recovery coach.
Our coaches use evidence-backed techniques, such as cognitive behavioral therapy and motivational interviewing, to help members learn new skills and move forward with change. For many Ria members, these check-ins are a crucial part of their recovery, giving them the support they need to stay on track.
What Is Recovery Coaching?
While medications for alcohol use disorder can make a huge difference, they can’t always do everything for a person. In many cases, addiction is more than just a chemical dependency—it’s a means of coping with difficult emotions, or a long-standing set of personal habits. With or without medication, having someone to talk to can be crucial. If that person has the appropriate training or experience, they can offer solutions and support that might be hard to find otherwise.
A recovery coach is a person who advises and supports others through the process of overcoming addiction. In some cases this can be an experienced peer. In others it can be a licensed professional. At Ria, our coaches are all fully trained and licensed in their field, providing expert, customized support to each of our members.
Recovery coaches are different from therapists—they focus specifically on helping people overcome barriers to recovery and stick with treatment. Within that role, however, they can provide crucial behavioral and mental health support. Our members often credit our coaches with keeping their spirits up, boosting their motivation, and helping them stay committed to long-term change.
What Do Recovery Coaches Do?
A recovery coach’s job is to support a client in pursuing their own goals. While a person classified as a counselor or a therapist might diagnose addictive behavior and prescribe treatment, this is not the coach’s focus. Instead, a coach offers someone the tools and guidance needed to follow the path they’ve already chosen. This can include:
- Helping a person form a plan of action
- Directing that person to the right resources
- Helping them navigate the medical system
- Providing accountability and support
- Offering guidance in developing new behavior patterns
- Helping them view their progress objectively
- Assisting in harm reduction for addictive behaviors
In other words, a recovery coach helps people with the gritty, day-to-day process of overcoming addiction. At Ria Health, our members rely on their coach for moral support, skill development, and troubleshooting throughout their recovery journey.
What Does Coaching Look Like in Practice?
Recovery coaching varies based on the program. Some coaches meet with clients in person, others remotely through video chat. Some coaches may act as “sober companions” to help a person through challenging situations. Others might provide support to the family of a person in recovery. The coach’s involvement can vary from 24/7 support in the context of a halfway house, to more casual weekly check-ins.
In the case of weekly meetings (as in the Ria Health program), a coach often begins by getting to know a person’s history with substances, and their individual perspective. From there, the coach helps that person set clear goals, and create a step-by-step plan for reaching them. As time goes on, the coach helps the person assess what’s working, what isn’t, and how they can continue to move forward.
Recovery coaches practice active listening, maintain a positive tone, and try to keep a client’s mood up. Coaches encourage self-care, and point clients toward helpful strategies. These can include mindfulness, and replacing drinking with new activities, rituals, and hobbies.
Coaches also support people in taking daily steps toward attainable goals. If someone is abstinent from alcohol, for example, their coach can support them in rebuilding their life and relationships. If someone is still drinking, coaches can help them set realistic reduction goals, and help them stay accountable to themself.
What Does Coaching Look Like at Ria Health?
The Ria Health program includes weekly one-on-one coaching meetings through a smartphone app. These happen on your personal schedule, and you can join from anywhere with internet access. These weekly check-ins give you a chance to discuss your progress, setbacks, challenges, and concerns, and receive helpful support and guidance.
Ria Health’s online recovery coaches help members:
- Set achievable weekly and monthly goals
- Identify challenges, drinking triggers, and other barriers to recovery
- Assess their progress accurately
- Develop techniques and coping mechanisms to overcome the challenges they’re facing
- Find local resources, such as therapy and support groups, if needed
- Evaluate whether their treatment plan is effective, and if it needs to be adjusted
- Reduce stress, shame, and stigma throughout the process
Outside of weekly meetings, Ria members can also chat with coaches through our secure app, and access additional group sessions led by a coach following specific recovery topics.
How Does Recovery Coaching Help?
While medications can do a lot to manage cravings, recovery from AUD often requires psychological and behavioral support as well. Adding coaching to the mix helps people identify habits, patterns, and motivations linked to their drinking, and develop new skills to overcome these.
Recovery coaching also humanizes the recovery process. Sticking to a plan, staying positive, recovering from setbacks, and keeping motivated is much easier with the support of another person. Coaches give you that edge which comes from having someone in your corner. They can also help programs understand a person’s needs and optimize treatment.
Some of the main ways coaching helps in Ria’s program include:
Customized Treatment
Each person has their own drinking patterns, and their own goals. Life also changes from week to week, bringing new challenges with it. At Ria, our coaches check in with members every week, assess their progress, and give them tools to manage the ups and downs of their unique situation. Coaches also communicate with our medical team, helping us adjust treatment as necessary.
Resilience and Accountability
Recovery is a challenging process. As a regular presence in members’ lives, Ria Health coaches help people stay positive, and accountable to themselves. If someone is doing better than they think they are, our coaches can help them realize this. And if someone is experiencing setbacks, our coaches can help them identify the problem and bounce back.
Structure
It’s one thing to choose a treatment program. It’s another thing to stick with it for the months or years needed for lasting change. Weekly coaching meetings, plus daily breathalyzer readings, help keep Ria members on-track towards their goals. Our coaches also guide members in learning techniques and daily practices to help them stay engaged in their recovery.
Psychosocial Support
While each person struggles with alcohol for their own reasons, it’s common for people to have stress triggers or underlying mental health challenges that motivate them to drink. While recovery coaches are not therapists, they can help people identify these triggers, develop better coping mechanisms, and direct them to further care as needed.
Where Can I Find a Recovery Coach?
An increasing number of clinics and treatment programs include coaching. However, qualifications for coaches can vary (as can the quality of recovery programs), so the search can be complicated.
One of our missions at Ria Health is to broaden access to coaching for alcohol use disorder. Our program includes weekly one-on-one coaching meetings, as well as messaging and coach-led group sessions, all through a secure smartphone app.
All of our coaches are fully certified in their field, and licensed to practice in all 50 states. Coaches work in partnership with our medical team to ensure members are getting well-rounded care that meets their individual needs. Many members stick with us for a full year, getting coaching support through each chapter in their recovery.
Speak with one of our enrollment counselors to learn how our coaching team can support you or a loved one through recovery. We’re happy to answer any questions you have about how coaching works, with no obligation to join the program.
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