Out of the Woods: A Woman's Guide to Long-Term Recovery

by Diane Cameron

Overview

Real solutions to the unexpected threats that endanger long-term recovery written for a woman's unique experience.
Women new to recovery find much support; sponsorship and fellowship are new, and everything about the recovery life seems fresh and exciting. With time, recovering women face challenges from complacency to burnout, menopause to weight gain.
Author Cameron has been there, and shares her "experience, strength, and hope" to teach readers how to handle the unexpected trials of double-digit recovery. Topics include sex, family, work-life balance, the empty nest, caregiving, aging, health and fitness, complacency, program burnout . . . and much more.
Diane Cameron is a blogger, journalist, and columnist in long-term recovery. Her newspaper columns appear in the Albany Times-Union, USA Today, the Christian Science Monitor, Chicago Tribune, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, and the Washington Post.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781937612481
Publisher:	Central Recovery Press, LLC
Publication date:	01/20/2014
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	160
File size:	495 KB

About the Author

Diane Cameron is a blogger, journalist, and columnist in long-term recovery. She gives workshops and blogs about unique problems faced by recovering women as they reach double-digit recovery. Out of the Woods began as an article which appeared in Grapevine, the magazine of Alcoholics Anonymous, and in Spring 2011, Diane received a first place award from the New York State Press Association. Her newspaper columns appear in the Albany Times Union and other papers across the US, including USA Today, The Christian Science Monitor, The Chicago Tribune, The San Francisco Tribune, The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, and The Washington Post.

Table of Contents

Introduction 1

Chapter 1 Stages of Recovery 11

Chapter 2 Physical: Bring the Body 21

Chapter 3 Mental: Our Thinking Got Us Here 35

Chapter 4 Spiritual: Came to Understand 51

Chapter 5 Making Meetings Work 67

Chapter 6 Love and Romance Later 83

Chapter 7 Take This Job and Love It 105

Chapter 8 Aging, Dying and Death 121

Chapter 9 Mirror, Mirror on the Wall 139

Chapter 10 We Keep Saying Thanks: Service and Gratitude 153

Chapter 11 The Way We Do Recovery Changes 167

Chapter 12 The Scary Reality of Relapse and the Rewards of Revitalizing Recovery 179

Editorial Reviews

Diana Cameron has illuminated the special challenges and opportunities that women with several decades of addiction recovery share, and has brought the wisdom of that journey to all who decide to get on that path. She knows what it takes to stay in recovery as you weather financial, sexual, professional, and interperosnal challenges, and she shows that while you don't need to worry about relapse all the time, there are always new things you can explore to become the best version of yoursel. —Caroline Adams Miller, Master of Applied Positive Psychology (MAPP), Author of My Name Is Caroline and Creating Your Best Life

Diane Cameron's stunning new book maps the territory of long-term recovery, acknowledging that the process at its best inexorably promotes the transformation of almost every area of life. Out of the Woods is an important achievement because it systematically explores territory that—remarkably enough—has simply not been mapped in any serious fashion. We're fortunate that it was Cameron who undertook this important task—fortunate in no small part because she is a superb writer. Her voice radiates the maturity og long-term recovery, never doctrinaire, lively, fun, inspriing, engaging, and nonreactive, but relentlessly challenging stale assumptions wherever she finds them. I predict this book will soon be on the night-tables (and in the purses) of untold numbers of recovery explorers! —Stephen Cope, Director, Kripalu Institute for Extraordinary Living, Author of The Great Work of Your Life

With the clear-eyed view of a woman with over thirty years in recovery, Diana Cameron's Out of the Woods is like an intimate conversation with a wise and loving sponsor. She shares the tools of the Twelve Steps in ways that speak to women in long-term, who are dealing with life changes, body changes, an evolving spirituality, and an expanding sense of service to a larger community. —Amy Weintraub, Founder of LifeForce Yoga, Author of Yoga for Depression and Yoga Skills for Therapists

From the Publisher