Anxiety
The great risk in very early recovery is anxiety, not drugs or booze. It isn’t even depression as the chemical depressant has been removed by the act of abstinence.
Newly sober or clean people have little defense against anxiety, and the only relief they know is to medicate it one way or another as quickly as possible. So the wisdom of AA/NA, is to use the slogans such as One Day at a Time or Think, Think, Think or Easy Does it to remind themselves to bring the anxiety into the present moment where it can be mediated personally. And it works.
Mental Health sets up their path at exactly this point by either using Cognitive Behavioral techniques that do not work, or advising either anti anxiety medications or anti depressants. At this point the paths diverge and for many never converge again in natural abstinence. Diagnoses are made to comply with insurance regulations, the client is labelled as mentally ill and the need to continue the medication becomes pivotal to continued care.
It all could have been avoided with the 12 Step approach. But for many it is the beginning of many years of decreased capacity due to mental health drugs they never needed in the first place.
