Great Lakes Rehabilitation

This rehab used to be called Best Drug Rehab and on some websites it’s still listed that way. The name changed recently to Great Lakes Rehab though it’s the same place. That’s why it looks like both on this site. When I went there it was being called Great Lakes Rehab so that’s the name I’ll use during my review. Going to Great Lakes Rehab changed my life. When you quit something, it doesn’t matter what, it’s not easy. When you using you know you shouldn’t, you wish you weren’t but when you aren’t using you feel like you’re missing out on something. Sometimes you can power through it and stay clean a while longer and sometimes it’s too much and you give in. This is true for drugs, it’s true for cigarettes, it’s true for sugar. If you’re on a diet and you’re not supposed to eat sugar, eating a piece of chocolate cake can be the best and worst thing all rolled into one. The only difference is how much giving in hurts you. What going to GLR did for me was that while I was there, I stopped feeling like I was missing out on something by staying sober and I started living my life again. I’ve been to rehab 7 other times and those places were nothing like GLR. The biggest difference is that I liked being at GLR. The staff working there made the whole thing fun. They were nice and easy to get along with and that made working with them easy. When I was working on my program they made sure I did it right and worked hard at it. When I wasn’t working on my program they made things fun. They were always creating fun activities for all of us to do. Or they’d take us out on the weekends, get us out of the building and give us a break from being in rehab. It made the whole experience of going through rehab more enjoyable and better. It’s always been hard for me to stay through an entire rehab program. I was always bored and a bit depressed in them so I’d stay for the minimum amount of time and I’d rush my program. I didn’t do that at GLR, I took my time, did my program right and that itself was a huge change. I didn’t think about it at the time I was going through my program, I thought the staff were just trying to make it easier to be in rehab but all those activities and outings helped me a lot when I got home. Staying sober was so much easier because when I was at GLR I stopped feeling like I was missing out on something by being sober. I was able to hang out with a friend or my family and just have a good time. There’s a whole lot about GLR that made it a great place. The program, the people, the time spent there. For me the most important thing was that being there and doing my program wasn’t a hardship. It was easy being there and I took my time doing my program and was able to get it right because of that. I’ve been home for 2 months since completing my program and my life is so much better. Staying sober isn’t a struggle anymore because I’m not constantly feeling like I’m missing out on something which is a major change for me. For anyone looking for help or looking to help someone else, Great Lakes Rehab is a place that I would highly recommend.

For the first time in 5 years I was able to spend Christmas with my family and it’s because I went to Great Lakes Rehab. It’s the same place as Best Drug Rehab, they just changed the name. I started using heroin for the stupidest reason ever. I was trying to impress some guy I’d had a crush on and said yes when he asked me if I wanted to try it. Honestly, I can’t believe I was that dumb. I’ve heard people say that heroin is their best friend and their worst enemy and that was true for me too. I loved heroin. I loved the way it made me feel, loved that when I was high nothing could ever possibly be wrong and because of that it ruined my life for 5 years. I didn’t go to college, I finished high school but only because I was almost done before I started using. I couldn’t keep a job and ended up basically homeless. Whenever I thought of being homeless before I always pictured it as living on the street out of a cardboard box or something. I didn’t get to that point but I also didn’t have a home. I’d stay with a friend until they got tired of me then move on to the next friend and the next. Since all this started my parents have tried to get me to go to rehab. I always refused because I didn’t see the point in going when I didn’t want to stop using. Then 6 months ago I finally got sick of it all and asked them for help. My parents sent me to Great Lakes Rehab, which is a really good place. Even still, I had a really hard time there for a lot of my program. In the beginning I really struggled and there were so many times when I wanted to give up and go home. The staff at GLR got me through all that, there are staff there who went through the same thing as me and they helped me get to the point where I was doing good on my own. It took 2 months for me to get to that point but when I did it was like I was a completely different person. I was so much happier, I could talk to my parents again and have a real conversation and I was able to see my addiction for what it was. Great Lakes Rehab is an amazing place. There’s different programs there which worked really well for me. I don’t know why but I didn’t feel comfortable doing a 12-step program so I needed the different choices of programs. The program I did was the SMART program and it was exactly the right one for me. I’ve been home for almost 2 months now since finishing my program and I’m doing good too. Really good. I’m staying with my parents and they’ve been so helpful and supportive and I’m happy that I’m starting to have that kind of relationship with them again. There’s been so many changes in my life since going to GLR, so far the best thing is that I spent Christmas with my family and going to GLR is what made that possible. It’s the only rehab I’ve been to but I struggled so much in the beginning of it and I don’t think any other place or people would have been able to get me to stay and get through it.

When my best friend started using she was in college. Working towards getting her veterinary degree. I’ve known her since we were 8, she decided she wanted to be a vet when she was 6 and in all the time I’ve known her she has never wavered from that. When she started using her whole life got derailed. For 12 years she used on and off and she tried so many different things to get sober. When she first told me that she had been using she also told me that she started going to NA meetings. After that didn’t work for her she went to detox, thinking that if she got everything out of her system that she’d be able to take it from there and keep herself sober. She went to a couple of those before she agreed to her parents and my urging and went to rehab. After that first rehab things seemed to get better. She went back to school and was doing pretty well but 6 months later she relapsed and things deteriorated again after that. She’s been to 12 more rehabs since then and while she’s had some clean time after a couple of those rehabs, for the most part it wasn’t very long and not very often. Before she went to Great Lakes Rehabilitation I hadn’t seen or spoken to her in 2 years. Mostly because she would disappear for months at a time and I just couldn’t find her. Since she started using, unless she was in rehab, she would at least call her parents or I every once in a while and let us know where she was and what she was doing. So her parents and I kept in touch and kept each other posted whenever she called one of us. So, when her parents put her into treatment at GLR I knew she was back in rehab but I didn’t talk to her until she had been there for about a month. When I did talk to her I was amazed at how happy and upbeat she was. She liked it there and liked the people there which was a great start for her. I don’t know much about GLR besides what she told me and what I’ve read on their website. What I do know about the GLR though, is that they got results where everything else didn’t. She was there for 6 months and she changed a lot in that time. All for the better. When I first saw her when she came home it was incredible. I couldn’t believe how happy she was and how healthy she looked. It had been more than 12 years since I had seen her like that. As I said earlier she was in college when she started using. She went back to school once after her first rehab but never again after that. I asked her once why that was and she told me that while she wanted to stay sober she was never confident that she’d stay that way and didn’t want to waste anyone’s time or money going back to school just to relapse again. So, when she made the decision to go back to school it was a big deal and says a lot about her confidence level. Going to GLR gave my friend the tools she needed to stay clean and the confidence to start moving forward again in her life.

I didn’t go to Great Lakes Rehabilitation because I wanted to. I honestly had no desire to get clean. I went because I didn’t want my parents to cut me off and they would have if I hadn’t gone. Before GRL I had gone to 4 other rehabs and I did the same thing at each of them. Which is nothing. I never worked on whatever program I was doing at the time, never did more than the absolute bare minimum I had to in order to complete the program. I didn’t care to get help and it showed. I also reverted as soon as I was home. I expected to do the same thing at GRL. That all changed a couple weeks after I got there. My counselor was beyond amazing with me. In the beginning I was pretty horrible, I was hateful of everything I had to do and everyone I had to work with and it was hard on those people who had to work with me. My counselor finally sat me down and made me take a really good look at my life. The way I viewed my life before this was completely wrong. I felt like I was doing okay, that I was in control of my addiction and my life. She made me go over every part of my life with her. From how often and well I ate to how much money I spent on gas, to my past relationships and how decent of a relationship they were and why they ended. I realized how much my life revolved around my drug use. I finally saw that I wasn’t happy living that way and made the decision to do my program and avail myself of the help that was being offered. It was hard for me. I had been using for 10 years and spent those 10 years solving all my problems with drugs. Having to actually deal with my problems and issues was hard for me. Having to deal with my emotions was even harder. My counselor and the rest of the staff were great with me tough. They were always very supportive while still making me find the answers for myself and someone was always available when I needed to talk. I really truly hated it there when I first arrived, after making the decision to actually do the program that all changed. I ended up totally loving the staff there. They were amazingly good to me, even in the beginning. About halfway through my program I wanted to go home. I still wanted to stay sober but I convinced myself that with what I had learned so far, that I’d be able to. It took a while but my counselor convinced me that I really did need to finish my program. I stayed at Great Lakes Rehab for 3 months doing my program and it was completely worth it. I ended up really enjoying myself there. I had a lot of fun and remembered how enjoyable my life could be without drugs or alcohol. Since coming home I’ve come to see how much that’s helped me. Just being able to have fun and enjoy myself without drugs has been a huge help. It isn’t always easy for me but I’ve been sober for 11 months now. Since coming home my life has been great. My parents and I are getting along really well and they’ve starting trusting me more. I have friends from before I started using that I hadn’t talked to in 5-10 years and I’ve started talking to them again. Having them trust me enough to let me back in their lives has been awesome. By going to Great Lakes Rehab I got everything I needed to live a happy and sober life. I’m a much better person now since going to Great Lakes Rehab and a much happier one.

Going to Great Lakes Rehabilitation changed my perspective on sobriety. Before going to Great Lakes Rehab I didn’t want to get sober, didn’t think I needed to. I viewed sobriety as something I’d have to deal with later. I thought I had been doing okay and that once I wasn’t doing okay I would do the work needed to get sober. I don’t know why I thought that way, it’s a dumb way to view your life but that’s what I thought. So the first time I went to Great Lakes Rehab I went because my mom and sister begged me to go but I didn’t go because I wanted to get help. When I was there doing my program I did the absolute bare minimum. Just enough to get through the program and go home. It’s not a big surprise that when I finished my program and went home I relapsed the first chance I had. Things changed for me when I was in rehab, things that I didn’t realize. About 3 months after I had relapsed I realized how miserable I was getting high. That I didn’t feel the same way about sobriety as I had before going there. That I now actually wanted to get sober. So, I asked my mom to send me back to Great Lakes Rehab, this time with the intention of doing the program the right way and getting everything out of it that I could. It was kind of a good thing for me to have done things the way I did. I finally saw my life for what it was and finally saw my life for what it could be as long as I did the work. Doing my program again there, I did it with the knowledge of what I wanted to get out of it. What I wanted to accomplish and knowing that as long as I did the work, I would accomplish it. The staff were great with me and never made me feel bad for having relapsed. They just made me work all the harder to ensure that I didn’t have to go back there a third time. I’ve been doing really well since coming home again. This time I stayed in contact with the aftercare specialist who’s helped me a lot in staying stable and staying sober. I’ve been repairing the relationships in my life, especially my relationship with my mom and my sister. That’s been amazing. I’m getting to know them again, this time sober and it’s awesome. Going to Great Lakes Rehabilitation changed my life. Both times. The first time I went made me realize that having a life of sobriety was something I actually wanted. The second time I went I was able to get the help I needed to get and then stay sober.

I went to Best Drug Rehabilitation 2 years ago. Since then, they’ve changed the name to Great Lakes Rehabilitation but everything about the facility is still the same. It doesn’t really matter what they’re calling the facility now, it’s still the best drug rehab out there. Before going to BDR 2 years ago I had been using pain pills for 12 years. I had been to 8 different rehabs and none of them were able to help me even a little bit as much as BDR did. After completing those other programs, if I stayed clean for 3 months it was a minor miracle. Now, after completing BDR, I’ve been clean for 2 years. There’s a major difference in how I felt after each of those other programs and how I felt after BDR. The biggest difference is that after completing BDR I was ready to live my life without any drugs or alcohol. For the first time in 12 years I felt confident that I could and would keep myself clean. When I completed those other programs, I wasn’t really living at all. I was absolutely terrified to leave my house. Because in all honesty, I wanted to get high desperately and I never trusted myself to make it back home sober whenever I had to go somewhere. After finishing BDR it was completely different. I could go to the beach with my friends, could go shopping with my mom and know without any sort of doubt that I wouldn’t relapse on my way home. Part of the reason for that is that going through the program at BDR isn’t the same for everyone. They understand that each person’s recovery is different and that what works for one person won’t necessarily work on someone else. So, they have different programs available and the staff at BDR worked really hard to make sure that I did a program that would be benefit me the most. Something else that’s different about BDR is the atmosphere of the facility. Everyone there is generally happy being there. It might not seem like such a big thing but being in a room full of depressed people who aren’t even trying to work on their recovery, well that kind of attitude tends to rub off on everyone else. Conversely, being in a group where everyone is happy to be there and is ready and willing to work hard on their recovery, that attitude also rubs off and I got more out of my program because that was the general attitude there. Having a bad day shows more there and whenever I had one the staff and the other clients always noticed and helped me to deal with whatever was bothering me at the time. Going through my program there, I figured out a ton of different things about myself. Mainly, I figured out how I wanted to live my life and I found out how happy I was just being sober. I didn’t just deal with my addiction while I was there. Every aspect of my live that was messed up because of my addiction was either dealt with or with things that couldn’t be fixed without being home, a place was put into place to help me deal with them. Like the fact that my family and friends didn’t trust me to stay sober. That’s not something that could be handled with words and they actually had to see me working hard and staying sober. Getting home, the longer I was sober, the more my family trusted me to stay that way. Now, I can call my mom and I know that she’s not worried that I’m only calling to get something from her. I know when I get together with my mom or my friends that they aren’t spending the whole time we’re together wondering if I’m lying about being sober. It’s been 2 years of sobriety now and I can’t believe how happy I am and how great my life has become. I wouldn’t be doing nearly this well if I hadn’t gone to Best Drug Rehab. Or Great Lakes Rehabilitation as it’s called now.

Going to Best Drug Rehab was the greatest thing I could have done for myself. It’s the first and the only place that has actually helped me with my drug addiction. When I started using I didn’t think I’d become addicted to anything which I’m sure is a common assumption. I started smoking weed when I was a teenager and truthfully, if I had just stuck with weed I would have been fine. I didn’t just stick to weed though and ended up trying pain pills which I became addicted to. For a while I only used occasionally. When I used though became more and more frequent until eventually I was completely dependent on them and couldn’t function if I hadn’t taken anything. When I first decided to get help I thought if I could just get off the pills I’d be able to stay off them. I couldn’t do it by myself and so I went to a detox. There, they put me on Suboxone and then weaned me off that. It didn’t help though and as soon as I got home I was using. After that, I went to rehab where I hated it. Everything about the place just rubbed me the wrong way. It was depressing and everyone seemed so miserable. I was miserable there and didn’t want to stay. My parents convinced me to at least finish the program hoping that would help me. I did finish but, it didn’t help. Again, I used as soon as I got home. This continued at the next 3 rehabs I went to. In total, I went to 4 rehabs and a detox before going to BDR. I lost hope that any place would help me. My parents found BDR and they were excited about it. I was not. The facility is actually called Great Lakes Rehab now but when I went it was Best Drug Rehab. Either way, I figured if going to rehab was going to help me it would have already but I went anyway. They thought that with the way the BDR operated I would have the best chance at getting and staying sober. I didn’t agree with them but I went anyway. Thing is, BDR was different. It isn’t some magical place that helped me when all the other places didn’t. I worked harder there because they got me to work harder there. They understand that there isn’t one program that will work for everyone, that every person is different and so they have many programs there and I was able to find and do a program that fit me. The staff that work at BDR are good at what they do and they’re really nice people on top of that. There’s a lot of people working there who have dealt with addiction themselves and because of that they fully understand what their clients are going through and how best to help them. They’re easy to talk to and just as easy to listen to with is much more important. While going through my program it wasn’t just my addiction itself that I dealt with. Instead, I was learning who I was as a person, who I wanted to be and just how to go about becoming that person. I learned how to handle difficulties in my life without relapsing. Going to BDR gave me the tools I needed to make my life into something I was proud of. I have no desire to use anymore and I have the ability and confidence to keep myself drug-free. The biggest difference since going to BDR is that I’m actually looking forward to the rest of my life.