Blog

Spending Christmas In Rehab? Yes!

It May Be Your Best Idea Yet to Spend Christmas in Rehab! Chritmas is fast approaching, again.  Countless will wish you a "Merry Christmas". Oh, "bah humbug", may cross your mind! That’s a sentiment expressed by many people at this time of year. The pressures can be unbearable for such a joyous time, even more so for addicts and alcoholics, even if they are sober in recovery. But Why? Old Wounds Cut Deep Let’s forget about the stresses of buying gifts and how much...
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Thanksgiving, Sobriety & Your Family

Your Thanksgiving Sobriety & Your Family The US is about to celebrate Thanksgiving. From John & Jane at Serenity Vista, we wish you a very Happy Thanksgiving! Another opportunity to be grateful for all we have. It is especially important at this time of serious geopolitical, macroeconomic, and health related concerns. In spite of such issues, practicing acceptance reminds us that even now, there is much to be grateful for. The 'attitude of gratitude', fostered by 'being grateful', changes everything. "Change the way...
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Addiction Treatment in Central America for English Speakers Worldwide

Beautiful Central America Central America is showing up on the radar in North America, South America, the UK, The Netherlands & Europe as a desired destination for vacation travel, eco-tourism, and medical tourism including for alcohol & drug addiction treatment ("drug rehab"). Central America, famous for its warm and welcoming peoples including many self-governing indigenous groups. Both the Pacific and Caribbean oceans border most countries. Delicious exotic fruits, spectacular flowers and the world’s best shade grown and handpicked specialty coffees. The mountain...
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How to Tell Your Loved Ones About Going To Rehab

Do your loved ones support you going to rehab? Usually, family and loved are grateful you are making  the decision for healing in your life. It is likely no surprise to them that you need rehab, nevertheless, there are sometimes reasons why they might be against you going to rehab. You may need some assistance in the process of how tell your loved ones about going to rehab. They tell you you’re not really that bad. (If you are “that bad,” they must be...
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Sober Through Halloween Shenanigens

Staying Sober through Halloween Hauntings If this is your first year sober at Halloween – Congratulations! If this is your 2nd, 3rd or more Halloweens sober – Congratulations! If you aren’t sober yet, but hoping to be really soon – Congratulations! I guess this covers everybody except the non-alcoholics and the alcoholics who still consider their shenanigans fun. There, now everybody is covered. Some of you may be wondering how to get through this Haunting Holiday without the ‘trick or not-treat’ of...
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Hitting Bottom – How Low Do I Have To Go?

Before it's 6 Feet Under   Hitting bottom refers to a place that a person suffering from addiction needs to get to in order to be able to fully surrender. The question is, how low do I have to go? The truth is that everyone’s bottom is not the same and it takes very different things to make a person in active addiction admit defeat. Where is the Bottom? For a lot of alcoholics or addicts, eating from a dumpster, losing custody of children,...
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Thanksgiving: Attitude of Gratitude in Addiction Recovery

Thanksgiving in our society and in most families is a special day to express gratitude for the wonderful abundance of life. For those working a program of addiction recovery, gratitude becomes an essential daily practice, vital to ongoing serenity, sobriety, and life itself. How can something as simple as being grateful with an attitude of gratitude help with addiction recovery? From a young age, perhaps influenced by media, societal messages, or limiting self beliefs, many develop an attitude based upon...
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Why Are Older Women at Higher Risk for Alcohol Misuse?

Physiological factors Various physiological and psychosocial factors influence why older women may be at greater risk of over-consuming alcohol and face greater negative consequences. For instance, older women experience a natural decline in both lean body mass and total body water as they age, which causes alcohol to become more concentrated in their system when they drink. On the psychosocial side, women tend to outlive men, which means older women are more likely to experience loneliness, isolation, and depression that can lead to drinking....
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Serenity Vista Marks 10 years in Beautiful Panama!

Ten years ago, Jane and John arrived at the shores of Panama having sailed from Canada. Their mission was to establish a world-class, international alcohol & drug rehab in a non-clinical, beautiful retreat, get-away tropical destination. What a journey! Now, 10 years later, Serenity Vista is recognized as one of the world's most novel, highly effective, and best addiction treatment facility in the world! Serenity Vista is recognized as an outstanding facility in an idyllic setting with a comprehensive, holistic...
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Successful Career → Retirement → Rehab

A Common Scenario College years There is a common scenario for late-blooming female alcoholics of a certain age. There is a typical story of this style of the up and coming drinker. When they were girls, they may have done some light or heavy drinking, perhaps even some “soft” drugs in college. Early adulthood Pregnancy and child rearing, planned or otherwise, became the impetus for many women to stop using alcohol or any other drugs.  Maybe her husband clearly drank too much, and she...
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