A relapse prevention plan should tell you what to do when recovery becomes difficult. It needs your own warning signs, actions you can take, people who have agreed to help and a clear route to urgent care.
Keep the immediate plan to a page you can find on your phone or on paper. Write it with your practitioner where possible. The template below is a starting point for a discussion, not a clinical assessment or a guarantee against relapse.
Struggling to stay on track?
A slip is information, not failure. Talk to Craig about structured support that fits your life.
In IRN's online programme, planning can be worked through in individual sessions and reviewed against what happens between appointments. Suitability for online care is assessed before the programme starts.
A one-page template
| Write down | Make it specific |
|---|---|
| My current treatment goal | What have I agreed with my practitioner? What medical advice must I follow? |
| My higher-risk situations | Name times, places, people or events that have actually been difficult for me. |
| My early warning signs | What changes in my own behaviour should prompt me to ask for help? |
| My first action | What can I safely do in the next few minutes? |
| My support contact | Name, contact method, agreed availability and what I will say. |
| My backup | Who or which service can I contact if the first person does not answer? |
| If I return to use | How will I seek help promptly, check safety and arrange a review? |
| My review date | When will I check whether this plan still fits? |
Do not put a person on your contact list without asking them. Check service hours and whether messages are monitored. Keep emergency contacts separate from routine appointment details.
A worked example
This is a hypothetical example, not a client story or a prescribed treatment plan.
Situation: Friday evening after work, when colleagues usually go to a pub.
Warning sign: I start telling myself that one evening will not matter and stop replying to my agreed support contact.
First action: Leave work by the alternative route I planned and go to the meal I have arranged with a friend.
What I will say: “I am bargaining about drinking tonight. Can we talk through the next hour?”
Backup: If that person is unavailable, use the alternative support arrangement agreed with my practitioner. If there is immediate danger, use emergency care.
The example is useful because it identifies a particular decision. “Avoid all stress” or “stay motivated” gives you much less to act on. Your own plan may need to address a different substance, behaviour, home situation or medical risk.
Plan for situations you cannot simply avoid
You may be able to decline a social event, but you cannot always avoid work pressure, loneliness or family conflict. For each recurring difficulty, write down what can change before it happens, what you can do during it and who can help afterwards.
If the plan depends on money, transport, a private room or a reliable phone connection, check that these are available. Discuss gaps openly. A plan that assumes resources you do not have will be hard to use.
If the home setting cannot meet your needs safely, ask for a review of care rather than rely on a longer checklist. IRN's treatment-placement guidance can help explore residential options when assessment supports that route.
Agree what family support means
Ask for something limited and realistic: a planned call, help getting to an appointment, or a conversation about a difficult evening. Relatives should have room to say what they can and cannot do. Continuous surveillance is not a substitute for treatment.
Where family involvement is useful, agree consent and information-sharing arrangements with your practitioner. Do not make a relative solely responsible for preventing relapse.
Include a response to a return to use
Do not wait to invent this part after an episode. Agree how to contact your treatment team promptly and what information they will need. Record emergency actions separately.
In the UK, call 999 for unconsciousness, breathing difficulties, seizures or other immediate danger. Drug tolerance can fall during abstinence, making a return to a previous dose dangerous. The NIDA treatment and recovery guidance explains why relapse should prompt a review of treatment.
If alcohol dependence is possible, obtain medical advice before stopping suddenly. The NHS alcohol-support page describes withdrawal risks. A written recovery plan does not make an unsupervised detox safe.
Review what worked, not just what went wrong
At your agreed review, ask: did I notice the warning sign, could I use the action, and was the support available? Keep what helped and change what did not. Review sooner after a return to use, a move, a treatment change or another significant change in circumstances.
If you cannot stay safe with the current arrangements, seek an assessment of the level of care you need. Adding more items to the same plan may not address that problem.
For help understanding the term, read what relapse means. For structured individual work on a plan, see what is included in IRN's online programme.
Struggling to stay on track?
A slip is information, not failure. Talk to Craig about structured support that fits your life.
