Recovery Resource Center
Recovery glossary
Use this page when a treatment, sober-living, mental-health, family-support, or faith-related term needs a plain explanation before you keep reading.
How to use it
Start with the word that is slowing you down.
Definitions stay plain, practical, and connected to deeper articles when you need more context than a short answer can provide.
Good to know
- The glossary explains terms. It does not replace assessment, therapy, medical care, or detox guidance.
- Definitions here are educational and not individualized clinical advice.
- Use the related article links when a short definition is not enough for the decision in front of you.
Popular starting points
1
Recovery support
12 Steps
The 12 Steps refer to a recovery framework used in fellowships such as Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous. They often emphasize surrender, honesty, inventory, amends, fellowship, service, and ongoing spiritual growth, though people and programs may understand them somewhat differently.
Also searched as: 12-step, 12 step, twelve step
A
Recovery support
Accountability
Accountability in recovery means staying honest, visible, and answerable to agreed supports, expectations, or next steps. Healthy accountability is not humiliation. It is a practical structure that helps reduce secrecy and drift.
Also searched as: being accountable
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Understanding addiction
Addiction
Addiction is a pattern of compulsive substance use or other behavior that continues despite harm and becomes difficult to control. It often affects judgment, relationships, health, work, mood, and daily functioning rather than staying limited to one part of life.
Also searched as: addictive disorder
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Treatment planning
Addiction assessment
An addiction assessment is a structured conversation used to understand substance use history, withdrawal risk, mental-health concerns, safety issues, treatment history, and what level of care may be appropriate next. It is not only paperwork. It helps clarify urgency, fit, and what support may be needed now.
Also searched as: assessment, screening
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Treatment planning
Aftercare
Aftercare refers to the support planned for after a person leaves a higher level of care. It may include outpatient treatment, sober living, meetings, therapy, medication follow-up, support contacts, and relapse-prevention planning.
Also searched as: post-treatment plan
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B
Family support
Boundary
A boundary is a clear limit about what a person will do, what they will not do, and how they will respond if that limit is crossed. In recovery support, boundaries help reduce confusion, repeated rescue, and emotionally reactive decision-making.
Also searched as: boundaries
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C
Treatment planning
Case management
Case management is practical coordination support that helps organize appointments, referrals, housing questions, benefits, treatment communication, transportation, and other real-world needs that affect follow-through. It is a support function, not the same thing as therapy itself.
Also searched as: care coordination
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Therapy and clinical education
CBT
CBT stands for Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. It is a structured therapy approach that looks at how thoughts, feelings, and behaviors interact, then teaches people to challenge distorted thinking, respond differently to triggers, and build more workable coping patterns.
Also searched as: cognitive behavioral therapy, cognitive behaviour therapy
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Spirituality and faith
Church community
Church community refers to relationships, worship, fellowship, mentoring, service, and support within a local Christian congregation. In recovery, church community may offer belonging and accountability, but it does not replace treatment, psychiatric care, or crisis support.
Also searched as: church support, christian community
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Treatment planning
Clinical assessment
A clinical assessment is a structured review of symptoms, substance-use patterns, safety concerns, mental-health needs, treatment history, medications, functioning, and risk so the next step can be planned more accurately. It is educational to learn about, but the real process should be individualized.
Also searched as: clinical evaluation
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Treatment planning
Continuing care
Continuing care refers to the ongoing support that helps sustain recovery after the first phase of treatment. It often overlaps with aftercare and may include therapy, medication management, peer support, recovery housing, or periodic reassessment.
Also searched as: step-down care, ongoing care
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Triggers and cravings
Craving
A craving is a strong urge or pull toward substance use or another old coping pattern. It can involve thoughts, body sensations, memories, planning, and a sudden narrowing of attention around relief. A craving is serious, but it is not the same thing as a final decision.
Also searched as: urge, urges
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Housing and support
Curfew
A curfew is a house expectation that sets a time residents are expected to return or check in. In sober-living settings, curfews are often part of broader structure, accountability, and safety rather than a punishment by themselves.
Also searched as: house curfew
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D
Therapy and clinical education
DBT
DBT stands for Dialectical Behavior Therapy. It is a skills-based therapy model often used to help with emotional intensity, crisis survival, urges, impulsive behavior, and relationship conflict through mindfulness, distress tolerance, emotion regulation, and interpersonal effectiveness.
Also searched as: dialectical behavior therapy
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Treatment planning
Detox or withdrawal management
Detox, often called withdrawal management, refers to support during the period when a person stops or sharply reduces certain substances and may experience withdrawal symptoms. Detox is about immediate stabilization and safety, not the full work of long-term addiction treatment.
Also searched as: detox, withdrawal management, withdrawal
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Mental health
Dual diagnosis
Dual diagnosis usually means a substance use disorder and a co-occurring mental-health condition or significant mental-health symptoms are both affecting the person. Integrated treatment matters because untreated symptoms on either side can destabilize the other.
Also searched as: co-occurring disorder, co-occurring conditions
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E
Family support
Enabling
Enabling usually means reducing pressure to face reality while the core pattern stays unchanged. It can look compassionate in the moment, but repeated rescue, secrecy, or consequence-removal often makes recovery less likely rather than more likely.
Also searched as: enable, enabler
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F
Spirituality and faith
Faith-based or Christ-centered recovery
A faith-based or Christ-centered recovery approach openly integrates Christian themes such as prayer, Scripture, fellowship, grace, confession, service, and identity in Christ. In a responsible setting, those supports complement treatment, therapy, medication questions, and level-of-care decisions rather than replace them.
Also searched as: christ-centered recovery, christian recovery
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Family support
Family boundary
A family boundary is a limit set by relatives or loved ones about what support remains available, what behavior changes access or contact, and how the family will respond if the limit is crossed. Healthy boundaries aim for clarity, not punishment.
Also searched as: family boundaries
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Spirituality and faith
Grace
In Christian recovery, grace refers to God’s undeserved mercy and help. Healthy recovery language about grace should lower shame without lowering truth, accountability, or the need for concrete next steps.
Also searched as: christian grace
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Coping skills
Grounding
Grounding is a practical skill that helps bring attention back to the present moment when stress, cravings, panic, or emotional flooding make clear thinking harder. It often uses breath, sensory awareness, movement, or physical contact with the environment to reduce overwhelm enough for a safer next step.
Also searched as: grounding technique, grounding techniques
I
Levels of care
IOP (intensive outpatient program)
An intensive outpatient program is a non-residential level of care that usually provides more structure and treatment hours than standard outpatient care while allowing the person to live at home or in recovery housing. It is treatment, not housing.
Also searched as: iop, intensive outpatient
L
Relapse prevention
Lapse
A lapse often refers to a brief return to substance use or another old behavior pattern. Different programs use the term differently, but the main issue is not the label. The important question is what happened, what risk is present now, and what support should change immediately.
Also searched as: slip
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M
Treatment planning
Medication-assisted treatment
Medication-assisted treatment, often shortened to MAT, refers to the use of approved medications alongside counseling, therapy, and recovery support for certain substance-use disorders. Medication questions should be handled by qualified clinicians rather than stigma, guesswork, or pressure.
Also searched as: mat, medications for addiction treatment
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O
Local resources
Orange County recovery navigation
Orange County recovery navigation refers to the local process of using county, community, program, and crisis resources to identify the next appropriate step. Good navigation separates emergency needs from planning needs and keeps practical details organized.
Also searched as: local navigation, orange county resources
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Levels of care
Outpatient treatment
Outpatient treatment is a non-residential treatment level where the person lives elsewhere and attends scheduled therapy, counseling, or recovery programming. The amount of structure can vary widely, so it is important to ask how much support is actually provided.
Also searched as: outpatient care, outpatient program
P
Recovery support
Peer support
Peer support refers to encouragement, accountability, and practical help from people with lived recovery experience or from recovery peers who understand the process from the inside. It may happen in meetings, sober living, church community, or other recovery settings.
Also searched as: peer recovery support
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Levels of care
PHP (partial hospitalization program)
A partial hospitalization program is a higher-intensity non-residential treatment level that often involves several treatment hours on multiple days each week. It provides more structure than IOP or standard outpatient care, but it is still distinct from sober living and from inpatient treatment.
Also searched as: php, partial hospitalization
Mental health
Psychiatry
Psychiatry is medical specialty care focused on diagnosing and treating mental-health conditions, often including medication evaluation and broader psychiatric management. Psychiatry is related to psychotherapy, but it is not the same role.
Also searched as: psychiatric care
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Therapy and clinical education
Psychotherapy
Psychotherapy is a professional clinical treatment process that helps people work on emotional distress, mental-health symptoms, relationships, trauma-related concerns, behavior change, or addiction recovery through structured therapeutic conversations and interventions.
Also searched as: therapy, talk therapy
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R
Recovery support
Recovery
Recovery is the ongoing process of building a healthier life after addiction or severe instability. It usually involves more than stopping substance use; it may also include treatment, support, housing, routine, mental-health care, spiritual growth, and steadier relationships.
Also searched as: long-term recovery
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Relapse prevention
Relapse
Relapse is often described as a return to substance use after a period of reduction or abstinence, but in practice many clinicians and recovery communities also talk about relapse as a process with emotional, mental, behavioral, and environmental warning signs that begin earlier.
Also searched as: return to use
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Relapse prevention
Relapse-prevention plan
A relapse-prevention plan is a written guide that covers warning signs, triggers, coping skills, support contacts, safe places, environmental safeguards, and what to do if risk rises quickly. It should stay specific enough to use under stress.
Also searched as: prevention plan, relapse plan
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Levels of care
Residential treatment
Residential treatment generally refers to a live-in clinical treatment setting where treatment and supervision are built into the environment. It is different from sober living, which is recovery housing rather than licensed clinical treatment.
Also searched as: residential rehab, inpatient rehab
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S
Housing and support
Sober living
Sober living is a structured recovery-housing environment designed to support abstinence, accountability, daily routine, and connection to outside recovery supports. It is housing, not detox, psychotherapy, medical care, or licensed residential treatment.
Also searched as: recovery housing, sober home
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Spirituality and faith
Spiritual routine
A spiritual routine is a repeatable pattern of practices such as prayer, Scripture reading, gratitude, journaling, worship, church connection, or reflection that supports truthfulness and steadiness in daily life. In recovery, it should remain realistic and not become a performance measure.
Also searched as: spiritual discipline, daily spiritual routine
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Recovery support
Sponsor
A sponsor is usually a more experienced member in a 12-Step recovery community who provides accountability, guidance, and practical support in working the program. A sponsor is not the same thing as a therapist, psychiatrist, or prescriber.
Also searched as: 12-step sponsor
Understanding addiction
Substance use disorder
Substance use disorder is the clinical term for a pattern of alcohol or drug use that leads to impairment, loss of control, risky use, or continued use despite harm. It can range in severity and may involve withdrawal, cravings, relapse risk, and co-occurring mental-health concerns.
Also searched as: sud
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T
Daily structure and life skills
Transportation plan
A transportation plan is a practical plan for getting to treatment, meetings, work, court, church, medical appointments, or safe places reliably. In recovery, transportation problems can quietly destabilize the whole week if they are ignored.
Also searched as: transportation, ride plan
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Mental health
Trauma-informed care
Trauma-informed care is an approach that pays close attention to safety, choice, trust, pacing, and the way trauma can affect reactions, treatment engagement, and recovery. It avoids forcing disclosure or pushing trauma work too fast.
Also searched as: trauma informed
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Triggers and cravings
Trigger
A trigger is a cue, situation, state, memory, or pattern that raises the urge to use substances or return to another unhealthy coping behavior. Triggers may be external, such as people or places, or internal, such as shame, loneliness, exhaustion, or body tension.
Also searched as: internal trigger, external trigger, triggers
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W
Relapse prevention
Warning sign
A warning sign is an early emotional, mental, behavioral, or environmental indicator that relapse risk may be rising. Warning signs often include secrecy, resentment, sleep disruption, skipped support, romanticizing use, or reconnecting with high-risk settings.
Also searched as: warning signs, early warning sign
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