The course ‘Conversations on Recovery’ is broken in two parts:

1) Beginning Change

2) Maintaining Change

Ideal audience: If you work with people who find themselves trapped in a cycle of addiction and relapse, this course attempts to show how that cycle can be broken and how effective and lasting recovery can begin.

The objective of the both Beginning Change and Maintaining Change is to give people some practical tools that can be learned and then applied when working with people struggling with substance misuse.

We hope that following attendance of Beginning Change and/or Maintaining Change, learners will:

• Have the necessary skills to have a structured conversation on recovery with a person suffering from substance misuse, and to guide them through the process of change towards beginning and then maintaining recovery.

• Understand that recovery from addiction is possible through application of a structured recovery programme.

• Understand that commitment to change can be learned, and that changing thoughts will subsequently change actions and can lead to life-long recovery.

• Learn structured interviewing techniques with the aim of having a results-focused conversation on recovery.

• Develop the skills required to differentiate between beginning to change and maintaining change, and identify how the conversational language of change for each approach differs.

• Be aware of the need to be open-minded, willing, and ready to accept the necessity to be able to change and adapt to life’s unpredictable and challenging events.

• Understand the difference between harm reduction and abstinence, and be able to identify which approach is best suited for a variety of substance misuse scenarios.

• Examine the crucial role our perception has in changing thoughts and subsequently our behaviours regarding substance misuse.

• Be able to apply specific tools for developing substance misuse resilience factors to counter risk factors, and identify how these skills can be life changing when applied in a consistent and structured manner.

• Outline a specific and client-centred review and monitoring programme to maintain change through continued conversations on recovery.

This course is suitable for anyone who wishes to learn more about how complete recovery from substance misuse and addiction is possible, and is presented by a person who has been recovered from alcohol and drug misuse for 25 years.