Unwrapping the Gifts of Recovery : Effective Tools for Chemical Dependency Counseling

For forty years, H. Leroy Thompson served as a counselor and a trainer of counselors, with a focus on chemical dependency. During this time, he has come to realize that, as significant as theory is to counseling, when it comes to effective results, practice is the key.

Unwrapping the Gifts of Recovery is a valuable resource for chemical dependency counselors that mentions theory, but focuses on practice. Full of guides, step-by-step processes, and counselor exercises, this book teaches tools that professionals can apply to achieve more effective outcomes in their counseling practices.

Recovery is a joint effort between the counselor and the client, but it begins with and will be unique to the client. Counselors will learn the best way to elicit and engage their clients’ values and beliefs in order to help them successfully achieve abstinence, sobriety, and recovery.

Written for chemical dependency counselors and therapists, this book can be used as a quick reference, additional training, or a re-imagining of how to approach the work of recovery. Readers will be both reminded of why they chose their profession and motivated to continue unwrapping the gifts of recovery with their clients for many years to come.

H. Leroy Thompson has dedicated his life to helping people struggling with chemical dependency achieve abstinence, sobriety, and recovery. As an Oklahoma City University undergraduate, an Emory University graduate cum laude, and an ordained member of the United Methodist Church clergy, he served as a pastoral counselor in an inner-city social action ministry for ten years. This experience led him to join the staff of a hospital-based chemical dependency unit, first as an outpatient counselor, then director of outpatient services, clinical director of the inpatient unit, and, eventually, executive director.

A certified chemical dependency counselor at the state, national, and international levels, Thompson saw the importance of the bigger picture: training counselors to better help their clients. He was a co-developer and co-director of the Summer School on Chemical Dependency conducted at Oklahoma City University for more than thirty years.

Now retired, Thompson and his wife reside in Edmond, Oklahoma, with their Boston terrier, Jazzi.