Ways to Bond and Reconnect with Your Teen After Rehab

When your teen gets back from rehab, they may still be a little distant. Rebuilding a relationship after rehab takes time and patience, but it is more than possible. With a little cooperation, you can repair your relationship with your teen and get back to where you were before their addiction started. Today in the Ozarks Teen Challenge blog, we’ll give you some tips to guide you through this process.

Communicate With Them

The most important thing you can do is make sure you let them know that you’re always free to talk and communicate with them. This goes both ways. Make sure you communicate any feelings you have to them. If the addiction really destroyed the relationship, it may take some time to reach completely open communication, but it’s important.

Honest Communication

Of course, communication can’t just be open, it has to be honest too. If you hold back your feelings, then you’re not really communicating honestly. Both you and your teen need to be completely honest with each other at this point in time.

Attend Meetings with Them

If your teen is open to it, come to their meetings with them. Meetings and outpatient treatment are a big part of their recovery, and by going with them, you show them that you really support them. Plus, the things they say at the meetings might give you a chance to get some more insight on how they’re feeling and what’s going through their head.

Put Yourself in Their Position

Try to understand where your teen is coming from and what they’re going through. Obviously, if you’ve never struggled with addiction, this can be difficult, but you can still listen to your teen and do your own research to get a good idea of how hard recovery can be for them.

Be Patient

This is going to be one of the most difficult things to do, but it’s also extremely essential to repairing your relationship with them. You have to be patient and let them open up to you on their own terms. You also can’t expect everything to go back to normal quickly.

It will be faster for some, slower for others. You can’t put a time limit on repairing a broken relationship. With time, communication, and healing, you and your teen can reconnect and have a real relationship again.