An Oxford house is a house that provides a clean and sober living environment for men and women who are recovering from active drug and alcohol addiction and is any house which falls under the Oxford House model, conceived in 1975 by Paul Molloy, a former senate committee staff member and recovering alcoholic. An Oxford house provides a group living environment and an effective means of keeping people clean and sober.
Statistics show that when a person is in early recovery it is important for that person to have access to an environment that is conducive to maintaining complete and total abstinence from drugs and/or alcohol. An Oxford House somewhat guarantees this based on its purpose and how it is run.
There …show more content…
House finances are maintained, bills are paid in a timely manner, the house is kept clean by way of weekly house chores assigned to each house member, the property is kept clean and maintained and every effort is made to create and maintain a good relationship with neighbors and the community. This last is particularly important because many people can be apprehensive about having a group home filled with recovering alcoholics and addicts in their midst so a good relationship with neighbors is a …show more content…
The average tenure of an Oxford House member is approximately six months. A person must first be adaptable to a group living environment but must also be adaptable to the fairly rapid rollover of house members. When a member leaves the house it means that the other house members must first adjust to that person no longer living there and then adjust to the incoming member who takes the departing member’s place. Many conflicts between house members can also arise which is the norm in any group living environment. Some of these conflicts are resolvable while others are not. Since the house must be democratically run, important decisions pertaining to the house are made by a majority vote. So if a member is in the minority and in disagreement with the decision, it can create problems or inconveniences for the dissenting house member. For example, when a house decides by majority vote to move the mandatory weekly house business meeting from Monday to Saturday, it could create scheduling conflicts for some house members. If a member plays in a softball league that has scheduled games every Saturday then the member might be required to quit the softball team in order to be able to make the weekly house meeting. Finding solutions facing a house that works for all house members can often be difficult or even