SMART Recovery Workshop in Jakarta, Indonesia

At the moment there are only two trained SMART Facilitators across all of Indonesia but increasingly we have seen a growing interest in the SMART program from Indonesian rehabilitation and addiction treatment providers. SMART Facilitators Sam & Denis capitalized on this interest by organizing a one-day SMART Recovery workshop in Jakarta last week.  

The goal for the event was to raise awareness, to generate interest in starting a small group of SMART meetings (online and where possible face to face) and to build on the work being undertaken by Sam Nugraha and his organization Yayasan Perkumpulan PEKA.

 The workshop was attended by representatives of twelve key non-government organizations and clinics.  SMART Recovery shirts and banners were created for the workshop.  The attendees heard presentations from SMART Recovery International and SMART Recovery Australia.  Sam and Denis both presented on their insights into the SMART Recovery program and its applicability in Indonesian culture. 

 The workshop had successful outcomes, two of the attendees are now taking the SMART Facilitator training, there is a plan to have five SMART meetings up and running by the end of the year and Sam & Denis have appointments to follow up with the key organizations in the next two weeks.  

SMART Indonesia has begun!

Terimakasih banyak Sam & Denis for your commitment and belief in SMART Recovery and thank you also to the following organizations for your interest in SMART Recovery. Yayasan RASA Bogor, Yayasan Besakih Bogor, Yayasan Sekata Samarinda, Yayasan Karisma Jakarta, Yayasan Lingkaran Indonesia Peduli Jakarta, Ashefa Griya, Pusaka Jakarta.

Video | Interview with Dr Carlo DiClemente, co-creator of the Stages of Change

SMART Recovery Australia recently hosted an exclusive live interview with Dr Carlo DiClemente, the co-creator of the Stages of Change Model, which is a key component of the SMART Recovery program.

Dr Carlo DiClemente answered a range of questions around the Stages of Charge model and SMART Recovery, focussing on how to enable sustained behaviour change, as well as looking at strengths based approaches to learning, sticking to and staying with change.

The webinar was hosted by SMART Recovery Australia National Program Managers Dr Angela Argent and Daniel Raffell.

Watch other SMART Recovery Australia webinars here.

SMART Recovery in Indonesia: Facilitator Profile

Sam Nugraha runs a rehabilitation centre in Indonesia. He has recently completed his SMART Facilitator training with SMART Recovery Australia and plans on integrating SMART into his centre.  We spent some time with Sam learning about addiction in Indonesia and his impressions of SMART.  To understand his approach to working with people with addictive behaviours, he says it is important to know something about his country.

Sometimes Indonesians smile when they are not really smiling. They are smiling, but underneath the smile, they are not. Because our culture tells us we must be polite when we do not know the answer, then we must smile. When we feel threatened, we must smile.  In our culture we are not supposed to expose our shortcomings to other people.

There is an Indonesian word that captures this — malu.  There are a lot of ways to translate malu, but one way is to define malu as a mask.  Everyone knows what's underneath, but you keep the mask on, hiding the stuff that does not look good.

I believe in Indonesia SMART Recovery will be a breath of fresh air.  Originally in the treatment field in Indonesia the only practices available where religious based and psychiatric approached.  As time moved on Therapeutic Community and 12 Step options where introduced.  The existing approaches are complex and require preparations that are costly and timely and to date these have been the only options for anyone seeking services that suit, or not.

I have been working in the treatment field for 15 years and I am so excited about SMART Recovery.  The more I have learned about the programme the more I know it will fit within the cultural context of Indonesian mindsets.  I have been aware for a long time that others are also longing for a new approach that is economical and easy to integrate into existing treatment programmes.

Our organization, Perkumpulan PEKA, has a slogan. ‘When the whole world rejects you, visit us.’  When people have tried so many different options and find nothing has suited them, we are like a last frontier, their last option. 

I first heard about SMART Recovery through the Colombo Plan Drug Advisory Program (DAP).  Under the Mutual-Help Programme SMART Recovery was mentioned in the The Universal Treatment Curriculum for Substance Use Disorders. From that introduction I decided to become a SMART Recovery facilitator.  Even though my internet connection was a challenge at times, the training was refreshing and exactly what I needed. Learning that SMART Recovery does not use labels is hugely positive within the Indonesian cultural context and my realization that the skills and tools can be applied across many life situations was personally very gratifying and positive.

SMART Recovery’s meeting structure simplicity and the 4 Point Programme resonated with my own mindset and the knowledge and experience I have when viewed from an Indonesian cultural context and my personal experience as an Indonesian working with Indonesians. Our organization is already familiar with the skills and tools in the SMART Recovery Program and it fits perfectly with our philosophy of client centredness, which is quite rare in Indonesia.  

You can find out more about our organization by visiting our website.  Supporting our work by being a benefactor, linking us to resources, recognizing our evidence-based practice, campaigning, providing technical support such as writing proposals etc, would also be very appreciated.

 I would like to thank SMART Recovery International for reaching out to me, and SMART Recovery Australia for my training scholarship otherwise I would still have only a limited understanding about the SMART Recovery programme.

Facilitating SMART in Kuala Lumpur

Patrick is an American who calls Malaysia home. An online and face to face SMART Facilitator for over 3 years Patrick recently spent some time reflecting on his relationship with SMART Recovery. 

My marriage, as is often the situation in cases of substance abuse, had hit a breaking point and, my wife knew that AA would not resonate with me.  I will always be thankful that my wife knew me well enough to know what would suit.  After researching services on the internet, she urged me to look at something she found called ‘SMART Recovery’. Being an engineer, I am a logical, science-based guy, so a science-based program seemed a good fit.  Although I am religious, I have never felt that it was God’s responsibility to ensure my sobriety.  So, the “Internal Locus of Control” of SMART Recovery and a program designed to put the power of recovery in MY hands and give ME the tools required to get the job done clearly resonated.

 SMART has helped me to achieve the sobriety goals I needed in my life.  But, beyond that, SMART has taught me how to cope better with life’s inevitable ‘ups’ and ‘downs’, which incidentally, used to be my excuses for drinking.  These days, I seem to use SMART tools like the ABC tool and the Change Plan Worksheet as much for dealing with life in general as for dealing with urges.  For example, if someone cuts me off on the highway, I do a quick ABC and get over the incident in seconds rather than fuming about it and letting it ruin the next 30 minutes of my life.

Whilst I was in residential rehab, I learned the value of community support in recovery.  My recovery counsellor STRONGLY advised me to find a support group as previously I had (unsuccessfully) attempted recovery all on my own.  When I discovered that there really was no SMART Recovery in Malaysia, I just decided to start it.  So, together with two other colleagues, we all became facilitators and SMART Malaysia was born.

 Malaysia is a multi-racial country, so when we talk about the concept of a ‘higher power’, that means vastly different things to different ethnic communities.  That was a main driver behind my wanting to bring the SMART Program to Malaysia; it removes the issue of ‘higher power’. 

 A great deal of stigma still exists in Malaysia, and throughout Asia, around the concept of substance abuse.  Some cultures view it as a violation of their religious principals while others frown upon it as a moral failing.  It is also widely viewed as bringing ‘shame’ to the family.  It often takes great courage for participants to attend a meeting and we need to exercise great care in appreciating how fragile they might be about doing so. This is where SMART’s policy on anonymity pays dividends. Participants draw comfort when I tell them that we will never ask them their name, or their SOC (substance of choice) and that they even have the option NOT to participate in the meeting, but just to listen. 

I will never forget my first meeting.  As a newly minted facilitator hosting the first public SMART meeting in Malaysia, I reached the venue filled with equal measures of excitement and abject terror!  Only to find that, in the end, no one turned up.  So, I did a whole meeting – speaking out loud – just for myself.  I read the opening statement, I did my own check-in, I did a tool based on an event that had happened to me that day, I did a check-out, closed the meeting, threw a fiver in the jar and locked the door.  The building security guard shot me an odd look as I was leaving, but I enjoyed it! 

Being a SMART Recovery Facilitator is an extremely rewarding experience and it does a great deal to support my own recovery.  When you can get the group ‘engaged’ so that everyone participates in working a tool and you eventually see the ‘proverbial penny drop’ on so many faces when you reach the end of the exercise, THAT makes the volunteering worth all of the effort and sacrifice. But best of all, in my time as a facilitator I have learned so much from my meeting participants.  It is a two-way street and I often leave my own meetings feeling enriched. 

Building rapport and conveying empathy is much easier in the face-to-face environment.  Plus, it is much easier to ‘read the room’ and tell whether participants are following the discussion or have lost interest.  This allows the facilitator to ‘change on the fly’ and easily take the meeting in a different direction.  The online environment presents a greater challenge because many of these cues get lost.  Plus, participants drop into and out of the meeting at odd times.  People leave the online meetings because they have other things they need to do; perhaps their baby might be crying in the next room or they joined the meeting via handphone whilst commuting and then reached the office to start their day at work.  This does not happen in the face-to-face environment.  I took this personally at first and it took me awhile to accept (thanks to a quick ABC), that they WEREN’T leaving because they did not like my meeting.

It is so easy to align with the SMART program as a volunteer. The training is thorough and professional, the community is so tremendously supportive, and the outcomes are so powerful. SMART empowers you to help yourself, but, through volunteering, it also gives you a chance to touch other people’s lives, both inside and outside of recovery.  It has helped me to grow in so many areas outside of recovery.  I view SMART as a life kit…tools to help me live a more balanced life.

SMART Recovery's Response to COVID-19

With the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, SMART Recovery Member Countries around the globe suspended their face to face meetings and faced the challenge of increasing or creating online offerings that were both appropriate and would replicate what could be expected at a face to face meeting.   

It is important to make sure that people have a resource available to them during this time, a resource that promotes and builds motivation, helps with the challenge of urges, as well as managing damaging thoughts, feelings and behaviours while allowing for growth and ultimately helping the participant to live a balanced life.  

Embracing an online meeting can be challenging for people and we try and make it as informal as possible but we still have meeting guidelines in place to ensure that the meeting is conducted in accordance with the standard guideline.  This is to ensure that, although the “location” is different, it is still conducted in the same way.

You can explore the SMART Recovery Online Meetings and find one running in a timezone convenient to you through the COVID-19 Response page at our website. 

Getting SMART in Honduras

I am an American living in Honduras. I came here in 2011. My name is Kelly Ryan and I am a SMART Recovery Facilitator.

I worked initially with an international NGO for a few years but began feeling that I needed a change, to move on, a transition.  But I wanted to stay in Honduras. I slowly started getting online work and built a profile as a business or NGO administrator at a discount.  Working from home gave me the opportunity to follow other interests I had. Interests that would eventually lead me to SMART Recovery.

 Soon after starting online work, I was asked by an American friend to help two young men who had left a children's home but needed help navigating adult life and living on their own. Starting with the two of them and then growing through their friend groups, I started offering English classes as well as formal education and job opportunities. They were clearly struggling with smoking too much marijuana as they would come to meetings with me high, but I soon learned that was just the tip of the iceberg. 

One of the young men I was working with was arrested in 2014 for drug offences and criminal activity. I visited him in prison each day for 2 years to try and keep him from getting even more lost in the system.  I learned much about the Honduran prison system and through my friendship with him and his friends, I also learned about the realities of street and drug life in Honduras. Honduras is a corridor for the global drug trade and so drug abuse and violence are very real options for youth, especially these youth who were dealing with abandonment in their childhood and had no security net.

My friend lived in my house when he was released from prison, but unfortunately, he continued consuming and ended up leaving my house. We stayed in touch and when he asked for help, I started to investigate rehabilitation option(s) that could assist his addiction issues. It was during the last 4 years of helping him and others go through rehab that I was able to identify the areas where interventions fall short: primarily in street outreach and transition/maintenance post-rehab. I now partner with a local rehabilitation centre that does a great job, especially during the initial 6-12 months when individuals are resident based.  We are attempting to develop a transition program to assist those individuals who do not have a support network or families to return to.

I brought up my desire to further my learning and study during a meeting here in Honduras with a psychologist that specializes in drug addiction intervention. I explained that my interventions so far had been very personal, with people I know; lots of guess and check, but that I was trying to scale and allow opportunities to access a wider community. I wanted to educate myself more and was looking at whether I should get a Master’s degree.  He recommended that I should look into SMART Recovery.

I want to continue my street outreach and interventions, but I feel a responsibility to continue educating myself as I attempt to take on more of a leadership role. That is where I believe SMART Recovery Facilitator Training will give me the balance that I need in order to move forward and expand services. I want to expose the local rehab to the SMART Recovery program and the tools.  But the main goal, post COVID-19, is to open a community centre in El Progreso, Honduras.  It will be called the Recovery Workshop or "El Taller" in Spanish and it will be a place for SMART meetings, activities, events and for information about the scope of resources available. I am also a fan of Homeboy Industries and would love to follow their model of providing tools to improve emotional intelligence and reach individual goals. I feel that the modalities will complement each other.

My personal and living expenses are quite low in Honduras and online work is not always consistent. I also currently pay for 3 people who are in rehab. The scholarship provided by SMART Recovery USA allowed me to start studying at a time when I did not have a job and was struggling to make ends meet.

I hope to empower local Hondurans so they can change, so they can have the best life for themselves, their families, their communities, and hopefully in the long term, their country.

Starting SMART Recovery Ireland

Initially, SMART started as a local pilot programme in Bray, Co. Wicklow.  This was through the Bray Community Addiction Team (BCAT) which is a long-standing community-based initiative.  BCAT was the first to start a number of SMART Recovery meetings in Ireland, between April 2013 and April 2014. The ultimate aim was and is that SMART be a self-sustaining network of peer-led groups with its own governing body and infrastructure.   

In 2018, SMART Recovery Ireland CLG was formed to develop and implement a governance structure, training programme and a strategic plan to bring forward peer involvement for the long-term sustainability of SMART Recovery in Ireland. SMART Recovery Ireland CLG operates under license from SMART Recovery International.

With the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, all SMART Recovery Irelands face to face meetings have been suspended leaving the organisation with the challenge of putting together an online offering that was appropriate and would replicate what could be expected at a face to face meeting.  It was important that the online setting was welcoming, practical and a productive platform for those existing participants as well for those that wished to address their problematic addictive behaviours.  

It is important to make sure that people have a resource available to them during this time, a resource that promotes and builds motivation, helps with the challenge of urges, as well as managing damaging thoughts, feelings and behaviours while allowing for growth and ultimately helping the participant to live a balanced life.  

Embracing an online meeting can be challenging for people and we try and make it as informal as possible but we still have meeting guidelines in place to ensure that the meeting is conducted in accordance with the standard guideline.  This is to ensure that, although the “location” is different, it is still conducted in the same way.

You can find out more about the work of SMART Recovery Ireland through their website.

Amanda Quigley is SMART Recovery Ireland’s National Coordinator. Amanda holds a Hons degree in Counselling and Psychotherapy from ICHAS and also holds, a BSc in Business Studies, a Diploma in addiction and is currently completing a Master’s in Education. With many years’ experience of working within the community and voluntary sector in recovery, both in mental health and addiction challenges. Amanda is a trained SMART Recovery facilitator and she brings experience and knowledge from Education, Counselling, Project Management and Training. Amanda is an accredited counsellor with Addiction Counsellors Ireland (ACI), and National Association of Professional Counsellors and Psychotherapists (NAPCP).

Darren O’Brien is the Chairperson of the Board of SMART Recovery Ireland. Daren has an Hons degree in Counselling and Psychotherapy and a Masters in Cognitive Behavioural Therapy and is currently working in the Addictions services. Darren was one of the first to train as a SMART facilitator in Ireland prior to the pilot phase. In addition to his involvement with SMART Recovery Ireland Darren is also an active board member of a number of community and voluntary organisations and is an accredited counsellor with Addiction Counsellors of Ireland (ACI).

Let's Talk About Urges.

Urges are a natural part of life. But what ARE urges, and what AREN'T they? When it comes to successful recovery, we need to better understand the basic mechanics.

We are pleased to announce the release of SMART Recovery USA’s newest Tips & Tools for Recovery that Works! video Let’s Talk About Urges.

In this video we define urges, identify misconceptions about urges, and offer tools for coping with urges. Checkout the SMART USA Toolbox for additional resources.

Subscribe to the SMART Recovery USA YouTube Channel

Video storytelling is a powerful tool in recovery, and we are proud to share our SMART Recovery content free-of-charge, available anywhere, on any device. Our videos hope to inform, entertain, and inspire anyone in the recovery community.

Subscribe to our YouTube channel and be notified every time we release a new video.

[Video] SMART Recovery Meeting Facilitator Spotlight – Dennis Rosenfeld

When Dennis Rosenfeld, of LaGrangeville, New York, realized he needed help, he found it through SMART Recovery.  SMART worked so well for Dennis, that he decided to give back. In 2017, he became an online volunteer.  Dennis now facilitates four meetings a week and since 2018 is on the SMART Recovery Online (SROL) Leadership Team.  He says SMART meetings offer “security, support, and safety”. 

Find out more about the work of SMART Recovery USA by visiting this LINK.

“We think about the person holistically” – inside the MSIC: News from SMART Recovery Australia

SMART Recovery Australia embraces a harm minimisation approach to the problems of addictive behaviour. This means different things for different people. For some, the way to minimise harm is total abstinence. For others, using a small amount of their drug, substance, or behaviour of choice is the best way to take care of themselves. Whatever the method, we support anything that reduces harm.

One of the most powerful, if controversial, harm minimisation resources in the southern hemisphere is the Kings Cross Medically Supervised Injecting Centre, (or MSIC). The MSIC, like the SMART program, recognises each patient as an entire, complex person. This holistic,  person-centred approach is no small part of the MSIC’s success.

“It’s not about being cured. It’s about respecting life.” says William Wood, clinical nurse consultant and referral coordinator.

The Medically Supervised Injecting Centre has, for decades, provided a place where people who choose to inject drugs can access clean needles. The simplicity of that description belies the complex web of human experience connected to those on the margins of our society.

It means no need to share needles, and a massively reduced risk of spreading HIV and other diseases. It means basic health care, like seeing a GP for the first time in 5 years. Flu jabs. Being treated like a human. It means trained medical staff on hand in the event of an overdose. That means no deaths from overdose. Zero. Not once has an individual died of overdose at the Medically Supervised Injecting Centre in all its decades of practice. 

People, as we are often reminded, are complex and often contradictory. It can be easy to see the path to recovery as a race, with “addiction” at the beginning and “cure” at the end. However, human beings are rarely this simple, and rarely this straightforward. Recovery can be an unfathomably complicated process, with pitfalls, lapses, and unique challenges to every single individual on its long and winding path.

There are many stages of recovery and many places suited to these. For some people, SMART Recovery meetings might not be the best thing at that moment – such as someone in need of immediate, acute care, rather than a structured self-help approach. However, this does not mean that any link in the recovery chain is any less vital than another. 

For further information about the Uniting MSIC, go to https://www.uniting.org/community-impact/uniting-medically-supervised-injecting-centre–msic or read https://www.nursingreview.com.au/2020/05/inside-the-southern-hemispheres-first-medically-supervised-injecting-centre/

For further information about SMART Recovery Australia visit their website at this LINK