One of the most surprising facts we’ve learned about addiction is that most people who struggle with a substance use disorder will eventually leave addiction behind, even though they never go to treatment.
Yes, you read that right.
It’s called “spontaneous recovery,” “ageing out,” or “natural recovery.” This was the topic of a clip from our podcast episode with Stacey McKenna that gained more than 20K views in 48 hours on TikTok. It has gone on to become our most popular social media post ever.
If you’re not familiar with natural recovery, you can read more about it here from a scientific perspective and here in an analysis of data in layman’s terms. Our favorite, though, is this piece Stacey wrote about her own experience of natural recovery coupled with journalism on the broader topic.
Here’s a glimpse into her journey: “It was 22 October 2001 and, at almost 22 years old, I had begun to age out of methamphetamine. Over the next several years, I would gradually, and without treatment, abandon binge-drinking, cigarette-smoking and even occasional marijuana use. Though this is the path that’s most common among people who have tried or even become addicted to drugs, it’s the one least discussed.”
The data is clear that Stacey isn’t alone and that natural recovery is the primary way people exit addiction, but the comments on TikTok also give a peak into real-world experiences of other people who have found this path:
“I stopped drinking April 2018, became pregnant May 2018 and just stopped and never wanted it again after having our girl.”
“This reminds me of how I quit smoking. I was at work and my mom called me to tell me my Dad had Stage IV lung cancer. I walked home and threw a nearly full pack [in the] trash. And I’ve never had another one.”
“My second semester senior year of college, I was hanging on by a…thread. And every day I’d tell myself ‘you just have to graduate and it will be over’ and it was true, it ended immediately upon graduating. Environment change + rhythm of a full time job.”
“Eventually life became the euphoria… when you wake up literally high on life, there is no need to take anything.”
Changing roles and responsibilities, clarified priorities, and seasons of life are all triggers that lead many people (though certainly not all) to change their relationship with substances. Quite a few people commented that their natural recovery was prompted by physical changes as they aged. They hit their 30s, and their bodies just couldn’t take the substance use anymore.
Highlighting natural recovery in no way diminishes the potential harm of substance use. What we hope it does is help us as a society approach addiction more effectively. The goal shouldn’t be to force everyone into treatment. While treatment can be helpful for some people, the majority of people won’t finish the program, and many of the ones who do will relapse. Meanwhile, many people will recover with no treatment at all. So treatment is no guarantee of recovery, and recovery most often happens without treatment.
Why bring this all up? Because it changes our focus. Instead of singularly focusing on getting people to go to treatment, we can focus on helping people stay alive, stay healthy, stabilize their lives, and take positive steps forward. Those steps may include treatment, or they may be steps to embrace connection, relationships, and the roles and responsibilities of adulthood that help many people exit addiction without treatment.
There are as many individual pathways to recovery as there are individual people who struggle with addiction. One size fits one.