Treatment

Imagine that everything has been going very well for you in recovery lately. You’ve met all of your goals that you’ve had set for yourself, and your therapist has commended you on your diligence in meeting those goals. You’ve been feeling great…but suddenly it all stops. You become a whirlwind of emotions one evening, and you feel all of this negative energy creeping in. Before you know it, you’ve relapsed, and you feel like it’s all gone terribly wrong. “How did this happen?” you may ask yourself. “Everything was going so well – where did it all go wrong, and where do I go from here?” Recovery is a lot like life. There are ups and downs and, at times, we may act in ways that contradict our values. This doesn’t mean that we have failed – it simply means that more reinforcement is needed, and/or we need a minor adjustment to our treatment regime. Perhaps something you’ve been working on in treatment hasn’t truly “sunk in” for you or you just don’t connect with it – that’s okay, as there are many treatment modalities for this very reason. If you’ve relapsed, you will want to work with your therapist to identify what led to this event. There are a number of triggers that could have affected you without you realizing it, such as:

If you’ve recently started a residential treatment program for an addiction and/or mental illness, you may have learned of the importance of social support to your success in recovery. Oftentimes this form of support comes from family and friends, while other times it comes from team leaders and peers within your program. Making friends in any place can be challenging at times, but connecting with others who are working to overcome their addiction or better manage the symptoms of mental illness can add another level of challenge to the mix. A 2017 study published in Health and Social Care in the Community noted several factors that impeded progress of residential treatment clients’ success in building social support with one another. We will review the reported challenges and provide you with ways to overcome them:

It is estimated that nearly 21.5 million Americans age 12 and older battle a substance use disorder each year; the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) states that men are more likely than women to use almost all types of illicit drugs. Studies have shown that men of just about any age are more likely to have higher rates of use and dependence on drugs, but women are just as likely to become addicted to drugs and may even be more susceptible to craving drugs. Although the rates of use and likelihood of addiction may vary between those two genders, what about addiction experiences? Well, it all depends on the person and the substance. For instance, women generally weigh less than men and have more fatty tissue. Fat retains alcohol while water dilutes it, making women more susceptible to experiencing bodily injury and faster absorption of alcohol into the bloodstream than men. Since alcohol dependence can develop quicker in women, organ injury such as liver disease and brain damage are more likely to occur.  Previous research conducted by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) has shown that women have death rates 50 to 100 percent higher than do men with alcohol use disorders, including death by suicide, heart disease, stroke, liver disease, and more. Marijuana use has also been shown to act differently in women versus men. For example, studies have proven that marijuana impairs a woman’s spatial memory (information about one’s environment) more than a man’s. In previous studies conducted with female rats, it was found that females were more sensitive to the reward sensation achieved by marijuana, as well as pain-relieving and activity-altering effects by the drug. Thus, delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the main ingredient, can produce significantly different effects between men and women. Overall, women have been shown to be more sensitive to the effects of drugs, ranging from alcohol and marijuana to heroin and cocaine. Scientists believe that estrogen is the main reason why women are most sensitive to the effects of drugs. A 2014 study published in Current Psychiatry Reports found that menstrual cycles of women regulated their progesterone and estrogen, with drug use also impacting the levels of these hormones. The study highlights the importance of estrogen in a woman’s transition from recreational drug use towards addiction. Prior research has denoted the higher risks and dangers that women have with substance abuse, meaning that help should be sought sooner rather than later. If you’ve been struggling with an addiction, make the decision to seek help today. Recovery is possible, and there are many tools to help you take back control over your life.

Finding the right treatment program for you can be a daunting experience. With so many options and so much to consider, it may feel easy to simply select a program that’s the most convenient, affordable, or straight-forward. While all of these options provide some benefit, a key component of your decision-making should be focused on whether or not the treatment center works with you to develop a customized treatment program that will best suit your needs. As a 2015 study published in the Yale Journal of Biology and Medicine emphasizes, personalized programs are an emerging paradigm since many people have experienced misdiagnoses, late and inadequate treatment that has required them to re-enter programs, and unsuccessful attempts to recover due to a lack of support in other areas of life such as employment and finance management. Perhaps you have been on the receiving end of one of those unfortunate cases. If you have, you’ve likely found that there was a component of your initial program that was missing – something that didn’t quite speak to what you needed. For a customized treatment program, the following must be taken into account:

Author Cathy Malchiodi, experienced professional of art therapy, expressive therapy, and counseling, stated in her book titled, “Expressive Therapies”, “Expressive therapies offer unique ways to enhance communication as well as fresh directions for therapeutic work for both the client and therapist…they have several specific characteristics not always found in strictly verbal therapies, including, but not limited to: 1) self-expression, 2) active participation, 3) imagination, and 4) mind-body connections.” If you’ve ever created something by painting, drawing, playing an instrument or something similar, you’ve taken part in a component of expressive therapy. However, expressive therapy is not simply doing one of these activities – it involves engaging in a creative activity to express oneself and learn more about oneself and others, typically through the direction of a therapist. Expressive therapies didn’t become popular until the 1930s and 1940s, when psychotherapists and artists learned that these modalities could help those with mental illness. According to the California Institute of Integral Studies, psychologists utilize expressive therapy to help promote clients with their self-awareness, emotional well-being, healing, and self-esteem. In therapy, you need not worry about the end result of your creative project. In fact, you most often will be asked to draw or create something that represents what you are going through. Your therapist will not be judging your artwork, and you will be able to engage in conversation about what your project means to you and how you view the situations that are occurring in your life. Consider expressive therapy as an extension of your feelings and thoughts. You may not know what you will create until you are the process of creating; expressive therapy has been shown to help people who have difficulty talking about the way they feel. A 2010 review published in Art Therapy: Journal of the American Art Therapy Association identified numerous studies that assessed expressive therapy and their correlated benefits for participants in each study. The results of these studies further confirmed that expressive therapy has been reported to help reduce stress, reduce cognitive distortions, enhance coping mechanisms, provide a safe place to explore feelings and grief, show positive change and growth, improve behavioral functioning and mood, and more. Speak with a representative at a reputable treatment center today to learn more about how expressive therapy could be of benefit to your recovery.

In any treatment center or organization for social welfare and advocacy, optimal treatment for all people should be the focus. Although the Sanctuary Model could benefit many other types of organizations, these organizations in particular utilize this model because their core focus is to help people better themselves through use of medication, therapy, activities, case management and more. Developed by Dr. Sandra L. Bloom, a board-certified psychiatrist and graduate of Temple University’s School of Medicine, the Sanctuary Model is an evidence-based, trauma-informed, complete system of organizational change process. There are four main pillars that the model is based on: 1) shared knowledge, 2) shared values, 3) shared language, and 4) shared practice. Through the use of shared meaning, organizational members can work towards building a future that supports everyone involved, in every way possible. By establishing a shared system, team members and clients can be prepared for future events and can easily navigate daily challenges by referring to the system’s core values and commitments. The Sanctuary Model implements commitments to nonviolence, emotional intelligence, social learning, open communication, democracy, social responsibility, growth, and change. In organizations that deal with mental illness and/or addiction, unforeseen circumstances may arise and, if not prepared for, could be detrimental to the people involved. All organizational members must feel confident in their capabilities to handle emergency situations just as they should feel confident handling daily interactions with clients. This knowledge base and confidence builds trust between employees and clients alike –  ultimately strengthening a lending-learning environment. There are a variety of ways in which the Sanctuary Model focuses on the future:

Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is an evidence-based, time-sensitive, structured, present-oriented psychotherapy that assists clients in solving problems and developing skills to help modify dysfunctional ways of thinking and doing. CBT has been shown to treat a variety of disorders, including anxiety disorders, depression, addiction, sleep problems, chronic pain and fatigue, and more. If you’re considering seeking therapy, your therapist may choose to use CBT with you. Here are some facts that you may not have known about this popular, effective treatment method:

A mood is defined as a temporary state of mind or feeling. As an emotional state, a mood may be expressed as one of the following, for example: serious, humorous, amused, angry, playful, cheerful, gloomy, and more. Put simply, moods summarize what’s favorable or unfavorable to us, based on external and internal information. Some psychologists believe that our mood is based somewhat on a stress threshold – researcher Roy Baumeister, for example, believes that when we’ve used up all our willpower to avoid a temptation – such as eating fast food when we’re on a diet, for example – we become irritable because we’ve drained up all our cognitive resources. Consequently, a bad mood causes us to have tunnel vision, making it more difficult to see things more openly and creatively. On the opposite side, a good mood can open our minds to a world of possibilities. We all love being in a good mood, but what happens when we are in a bad mood? Can we easily change this? If there is no mood disorder present, there are a few things that we can do to help improve our mood:

Engaging in a treatment program can be a bit frightening, especially when you haven’t formed a support system yet and you are still learning the process. You may not know what challenges you’re going to face or how to overcome them, but the right treatment center will prepare you for these things. Over 3 million people each year receive treatment for an addiction, and around 1.2 million people in the United States seek treatment for both a mental illness and an addiction. Although these numbers are quite low in comparison to the total number of people who need treatment, they do have one benefit: many of these people have come back to help others. Not all therapists and healthcare staff at treatment centers have experienced first-hand mental illness or addiction in their personal lives. Many have experienced the struggles of those closest to them. Either way, there are many benefits to having professional health workers who have been through the process of mental illness, addiction, treatment, and recovery before:

Residential treatment programs can provide intensive help to those with a serious addiction or mental illness. While receiving residential treatment, clients temporarily live outside of their homes while being monitored and supervised by a supportive healthcare team. If you’re wondering if residential treatment may be a good fit for you, here are some ways to decide:

Many people who struggle with addiction and/or mental illness experience a lot of conditional love – they have been neglected, abused, abandoned, forgotten, ignored, or disengaged. As humans, we all experience pain, but it can be particularly painful to experience the pain of conditional love. A treatment center should not be a place where these painful feelings continue – it should be a place of love, acceptance, and nurturing to promote optimal growth in a supportive environment. In many cases, both addiction and mental illness have developed out of feelings of anger, isolation, shame, loneliness, grief, sadness, and more. Treatment programs that focus strictly on changing outward behavior, or ones that only provide support for the direct addiction or mental illness cannot offer unconditional love because they reject all the other parts that need nurturing – the parts that make you human. Your family relationships, financial and employment status, general health, and home life may all need attention, too, which is why unconditional love is so incredibly important. Dr. Mark Willenbring, former director of the National Institute for Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, stated in an interview, “You don’t treat a chronic illness for four weeks and then send the patient to a support group. People with a chronic form of addiction need multimodal treatment that is individualized and offered continuously or intermittently for as long as they need it.” You deserve to have full support throughout your recovery. Not receiving this could be very detrimental to your success in recovery; Dr. Willenbring cited a case of a 43-year-old woman who had been in and out of rehabilitation 42 times because she wasn’t receiving the proper medical and support services that she needed. This case, as well as previous research, underlines the importance of full love and support as you work to better yourself in recovery. You should feel that your voice is heard and that your preferences – if they are in line with what you need – are met. The journey to recovery is a lifelong endeavor and should not be taken lightly. It all begins with treatment, making the right treatment center a crucial foundation point.

According to a Pew Research Center survey conducted in August of last year, 46% of U.S. adults say they have a family member or close friend who has an addiction now or has had one in the past. The illicit drugs included in the survey were marijuana, cocaine, heroin, hallucinogens, inhalants, methamphetamine, and misuse of prescription drugs. Along with these different drugs comes different short and long-term consequences, as each person’s history with drugs are different. There are many reasons why each addiction is different: