Alumni Updates – Archive
Smoking: A habit to kick or an addiction to surrender?
By: Wendy Croze, MA CADC
Addiction Professional
Date: March 2013
Cunning, baffling, and powerful! Don’t those words describe addiction to a tee? Experience teaches that when we are addicted, we cannot consistently control how much or how often, nor what happens when we are under the influence. Regardless of how well our will works in other areas of life, when it comes to our addictive substance, we are powerless. +view more
Break the fast: How starting your day with a healthy breakfast can support your recovery plan
By: Beverley Hill MBA, RD
Dietician at Crossroads Centre, Antigua.
Date: October 2012
We’ve all heard how important it is to start the day with a healthy breakfast. In fact, many of us have vivid memories of our parents telling us exactly this when we were children, yet as adults with harried schedules, we can often neglect this critical meal. Starting the day off right is important for everyone, but even more so for people in recovery….. +view more
Realizing Higher Power in This Moment and How the Mind Gets in the Way
By: Greg Liotta, MSW
Primary Counselor at Crossroads Centre, Antigua.
Date: July 2012
There is one idea that keeps most people from realizing their Higher Power (“God”). It is the idea they are separate from Higher Power and something must be done to repair that. We believe that a lot of searching and hard work is involved…. +view more
Anatomy of Exercise
By: Alexis Edwards
Certified Fitness Trainer/ Consultant
Date: June 2012
It is well documented that exercise contributes significantly to improved health and physical fitness. But does it mean that because you exercise that you are fit? Maybe, maybe not. Let us examine what is Physical fitness… +view more
Healthy Eating In Recovery
By: Beverley Hill, MBA, BSc, RD
Dietitian at Crossroads Centre, Antigua
Date: May 2012
When the topic of making healthy food choices comes up, it is usually met with some level of disdain. In many quarters, it is synonymous with rigidity and bland tasteless meals and the elimination of our favorite foods or worse yet, total deprivation… +view more
The End of the Search for God
By: Greg Liotta, MSW
Primary Counselor at Crossroads Centre, Antigua.
Date: April 2012
Occasionally I receive letters from students seeking discourse on spiritual matters. All express one common frustration: the struggle to find – and connect with – their Higher Power. An age old problem, and not just for seekers in recovery… +view more
Getting The Most Out Of Your Journal
By: Greg Liotta, MSW
Primary Counselor at Crossroads Centre, Antigua.
Date: November 2011
Many people recommend journaling as an important relapse prevention tool. Indeed, if you apply yourself to it, you will have a profound advantage. There are many ways to use a journal, all of which foster great benefits to your emotional, mental, and spiritual health… +view more
Relationships and Early Recovery
By: Margaret Gramling LCSW, CATODSW
Primary Counselor, Crossroads Centre Antigua.
Date: November 2010
A newcomer enters the rooms feeling insecure and unsafe and sits next to a pretty girl. They begin talking and it seems she is a newcomer too, insecure and unsafe. They have something in common and they like each other so they begin to look for each other at each meeting, start sharing rides and going out for coffee later. Both feel they have made a friend. They are doing well, each has a sponsor and they are beginning to work the program. But just when things are more comfortable, a sponsor says this relationship is not a good idea at all and shouldn’t go any further… +view more
Re-New, Re-Charge, Re-Fresh your recovery program at Crossroads Centre
Date: September 2010
September is national recovery month and what better way to celebrate your recovery than by participating in a one week intensive renewal program… +view more
The Yoga of Recovery & The Body as Metaphor
By: Greg Liotta, MSW
Primary Counselor at Crossroads Centre, Antigua.
Date: February 2010
A man with rigid beliefs and concrete thinking develops hardening of the arteries; a woman juggling child-rearing and career feels the weight of the world on her shoulders; she complains of a bad back. A man with difficulty expressing and receiving love is diagnosed with heart disease. A child with unexpressed grief shortens her breath and swallows her tears; she develops asthma. A young man full of promise is filled with self-loathing; he feeds his body poison… +view more
Freedom from Tobacco
By: Wendy Croze, MA
CADC Primary Counselor, Crossroads Centre.
Date: November 2009
When should a person in recovery from alcohol and drug dependence give up smoking? There seem to be two popular schools of thought about this and both arguments are equally passionate… +view more
Walk the Walk: Exercise and Recovery
By: John Newport. PhD
Date: August 2009
It’s President’s Day, and I just got back from my morning walk along the Esplanade, a beautiful walking/jogging trail about 3 miles from my home. This was a picture perfect morning, the sun was out and the air was crystal clear – one of those beautiful Southern California winter mornings when the folks visiting from back East resolve to put up their homes for sale and move out here. Being a holiday, it seems that everyone was out on the trail – moms pushing their babies in strollers, couples running with their dogs, beautiful women jogging with their ponytails swaying in the breeze, and a large sprinkling of seniors in their 70s, 80s and beyond… +view more
Spreading the Good Word
By: Tania Lewis
Alumni Coordinator
Date: July 2009
Recovery is possible! These three simple words speak volumes to those who have suffered with addiction and have found hope and renewal in recovery. It is a simple message, and yet it is a message that seems grossly understated. How do you support this message and let others who are still suffering, know that recovery is possible in their lives? As an alumnus of Crossroads you know the value of service to a strong recovery program. Your service in recovery is one way that you can support the message that Recovery is possible. Others may also come to know this message through their mere observation of your lifestyle and behaviour. After all, think of how many of you have, at some point, listened to a speaker and thought to yourself “I want what he’s /she’s got”… +view more
Uplift Your Recovery Program
By: Tania Lewis
Alumni Coordinator
Date: June 2009
We are now approaching the rainy season here in Antigua and although we’ve had considerable amount of rain over the past two weeks it is no way near getting us out of what is now considered “Drought” in the region… +view more
Healing Relationships Through The Steps
By: Chris Dickerson, MSW, LCSW-C, CAC-AD
Primary Counselor.
Date: April 2009
I have often wondered why so many people come into treatment, work Steps 1, 2 and 3 maybe even 4 and 5, and then stop. Most people who enter treatment of their own volition showed up, because of relationship issues-poor relationships with a Higher Power, Self and others. In this article I hope to show how the Steps are all about healing those relationships. Steps One through Five are just the beginning of healing those relationship issues which become glaringly apparent through addiction… +view more
What Is Sponsorship?
Date: March 2009
As winter is drawing to a close and we start to feel the warmth of spring it is a great time to put into practice healthy recovery behaviours that are important in maintaining long-term recovery such as sponsorship. Obtaining and retaining a sponsor after treatment and continuing with twelve step principles is an important first step… +view more
Grief In Recovery
By: Annee Delaware,
Primary Counselor at Crossroads Centre, Antigua.
Date: February 2009
Bereaved Man, “I m not over it.”
Friend, “You know what they say. The best thing when you lose one is to go find another. ”
Bereaved Man, “The best way is to go through it, before you even look for another.”… +view more