Recovery Guidelines
The
site wide rules give the outline for what is and what is not acceptable in the Recovery, Mental Health, and Physical Health forums. These Forum-specific guidelines clarify those rules specifically for this area of the site.
Recovery is a place for member peer support and encouragement, not as a substitute for professional care, nor a place for ethical/moral discussions. Only those who are seeking help may start threads in the recovery forums. Informational posts may be submitted to the recovery library for review to be posted.
Recovery Staff feel very strongly that members need to seek out real life licensed professional services and local pastoral care in addition to asking for support and advice here.
These things are considered off topic and will not be allowed in the Recovery forums:
Promoting yourself as an expert in your posts, or in your user title
Diagnosing anyone's symptoms
Offering treatment or any kind to other members
Prescribing/promoting medications of any kind, including over the counter or herbal remedies
Discouraging someone from taking prescribed medications, using or seeking professional services, using hotlines or crisis lines.
Ethical and moral discussions are dealt with in other areas of the forum. These discussions will be removed from recovery or moved to another area if possible.
Any posts dealing with spiritual warfare will be removed. Insinuating that members are possessed or that their health issues are demonic or due to sin is not permitted. This includes the devil is the whole problem. Linking to sites offline that address spiritual warfare are not permitted as well.
Asking or requesting that members engage in research topics or volunteer as research subjects, or links directing web-traffice to another site for this purpose is not appropriate and will be removed.
No polls are allowed.
Endorsement of certain topics - This is not allowed and staff will remove any posts which endorse any of the following topics.
- abortion
- alcohol and/or drug abuse
- extramarital or premarital sexual activity
- gambling
- harmful and/or hurtful behaviors of any nature
- homosexuality
- polygamy
- transsexuality
- violence
Recovery is a place people come to stop doing these things and using the Christian faith to help cope with problems. Other areas of CF can be used for discussions of many of these topics including, in some cases, endorsement of them. Included in this rule is posting triggers to self harmful behaviors.
Over the Counter & Alternative Remedies
- Over the counter remedies can interact with prescription medications. Because of that, do not recommend what someone should take, including alternative medications. Limit discussion to your experience with a medication.
- Cannabis (Marijuana) is an illegal drug with much controversy, as it is legal in some areas for medical purposes only. If you live in an area where it is legal, you may find more information on it from your physician. Discussion to promote it as an alternative drug not permitted in the recovery area as this should be addressed with your physician.
Harmful or hurtful posts:
The Recovery Team Staff will remove posts or threads that we think could be harmful in any way to any member or group of members, Even if the post or thread might not be intentionally harmful.
The Recovery Team Staff will edit or remove posts that we see as being a trigger for someone who is trying to stop doing some behavior. For example, a post that "argues a member should do x, y or z anyways because it doesn't matter" or "I'm just going to drink myself sick."
Because of the risk of triggering suicidal thoughts in others, we remove threats and/or endorsement of suicide. This includes posting that another member others know have killed him/herself. If you are having thoughts about suicide but have no immediate plans or intentions your posts may be able to show. Make sure to **Trigger Warn** the top of your post. If you are having serious issues, log off now and contact 800-SUICIDE in the US,
www.imalive.org online, or
www.befrienders.org for international crisis centers (found in the upper right hand corner of their site).
We want to allow you to have support from others but we must be careful not to have posts that might trigger others to follow suit. Staff will err on the side of safety and caution for other members in these situations. Please utilize local professional services such as calling 911, going to the emergency room or to a local medical clinic.
When Staff remove these suicidal posts or self harm posts of any threat or description from view we are encouraging the members to seek professional services in their local area and provide phone numbers to local crisis lines if available. Christian Forums is NOT a crisis center, nor are the Recovery Team members trained in Suicidal Intervention. Members continuing to post outside these guidelines may be banned temporarily to seek help offline.
Please note, the Eating Disorders forum may not have numbers in any format in posts, and they will be edited out without notice.
