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Substance Abuse Treatment

For drug addicts and their families, substance abuse treatment is the ultimate open door: a pathway to drug recovery and long-term sobriety. The fight against drug dependency is an enormously difficult one, though, and only proper care from a qualified drug rehab center can help you and your loved ones get where you want to go.

Substance abuse recovery is never easy, not least of all because drug addiction is an exceptionally resilient disease. Drug use and abuse don’t just go away, you might say: They have to be beaten back, time and again, in a way that will try even the most resolute drug recovery patient. If you want to get sober and stay sober, in other words, you’re in for a nasty fight.

But it’s important to remember that substance abuse treatment is a real thing: Drug rehabilitation works for millions of people around the world every year, and there’s no reason you can’t be among them. Successful drug programs really do help patients get better, provided those

patients are willing to be helped and are cognizant of the challenges facing them.

Indeed, substance abuse treatment is in an important sense a fundamentally patient-contingent process. Yes, you need help if you want to beat drug addiction and drug abuse, but that help is only and ultimately what you make of it: You’ve got to be an active participant in your own healing, and an effective agent for your own recovery. Substance abuse treatment isn’t a spectator sport, and anyone who makes the mistake of believing otherwise dooms his chances for a successful drug rehab center experience.

The fact that you’ve made it this far says a lot about you: You know what’s at stake; you know that drug addiction

ruins lives, and you know that drug rehab can make it better. What follows is a brief overview of substance abuse treatment and substance abuse recovery, designed with an eye towards helping you make an informed decision about your drug treatment options.

Again, no one can help you get sober unless you’re willing to let them, and willing to make sobriety real for yourself. In the fight against drug addiction, you’re the one calling the shots: You’re the one who controls the future, and has the ultimate say in whether sobriety can work for you. Here’s hoping that you have the strength and the courage to make the right choice.

THE SCOPE AND SYMPTOMS OF DRUG ABUSE

Beating drug addiction means understanding drug abuse: what drug addiction is, and how drug dependency works. Successful substance abuse treatment depends first and foremost on a person with substance use disorder’s ability to recognize the symptoms of drug addiction, and his subsequent willingness to want to get better.

Some government studies indicate that as many as twelve million Americans show signs of drug abuse. That’s a startling figure, to say the least; it represents almost five percent of the total national population, and cuts across the full spectrum of social distinctions: race and class, age and gender. No less importantly, those twelve million drug users have succumbed to the full sweep of drug dependency: They suffer from cocaine addiction and heroin abuse; they need meth rehab and crack rehab and marijuana treatment. The bottom line, of course, is that no one is immune to drug addiction, and that effective substance abuse treatment is, to say the least, an exceedingly complex undertaking.

But it’s an undertaking that can’t begin, we should note, without the consent of drug addicts themselves. Again, substance abuse treatment is meaningless if it isn’t met with an active effort on the part of the patient, and such can effort can only come when a drug addict recognizes the full extent of his self-destructive behavior. It can be, to say the least, a difficult admission to make: It’s not easy to accept that you have a problem, and to accept that you cann’t fix it on your own. But such acceptance is nothing short of vital to the ultimate success of the substance abuse treatment process, and so it is that recognizing the symptoms of drug abuse is an important first step on the road to drug recovery.

If you or someone you love is addicted to drugs, the warning signs should be hard to miss: compulsive or secretive behavior; spiraling patterns of withdrawal and isolation; physical malaise and unhealthful appearance. In many cases, the hardest part of recognizing the symptoms of drug abuse lies in accepting what’s already obvious, and seeing the truth as it actually is. As trying as it might be, though, such recognition might just be the most important thing you’ll ever do.

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SUBSTANCE ABUSE AND DRUG DEPENDENCY

Substance abuse treatment is a difficult undertaking because of the obstacles involved. Drug dependency is, if nothing else, a most stubborn enemy, an affliction that never yields ground without the bitterest of fights. Getting sober, in other words, means paying a price…but knowing exactly what that price is can help ensure the long-term success of a patient’s drug rehabilitation experience.

Drug addiction, as noted above, is a disease, one with discrete and clinically identifiable roots. It’s important to understand above all else that drug abuse stems from two distinct causes: physiological one hand, emotional on the other. Only substance abuse treatment which addresses both dimensions of drug dependency can help patients achieve and maintain lasting sobriety.

Physical drug dependency is that which operates on metabolic pathways in the human brain. Chronic drug abuse distorts the body’s natural chemical balance, ultimately rendering a person with substance use disorder incapable of functioning “normally” without the artificial stimulus of a drug high. The physical dimension of substance abuse treatment, it follows, aims to break that reliance by cleansing a person with substance use disorder’s systems of drugs and drug byproducts. Drug detoxification, overseen by qualified drug detox professionals, helps addicts navigate the straits of drug withdrawal with a minimum of physical side effects, thus preparing them for the later stages of the drug rehabilitation process.

And what of those later stages? Again, drug addiction is a two-headed problem, and substance abuse treatment must mount a two-pronged offensive against it. As important as physical drug recovery is, the psychological treatment afforded by addiction counseling programs is the ultimate harbinger of drug treatment’s success or failure. To be effective, drug rehab programs must help patients rediscover the self-esteem and self-control necessary for long-term sober living. Nothing less could ever offer drug addicts meaningful hope for lasting substance abuse recovery.

DRUG REHAB AND SUBSTANCE ABUSE RECOVERY

Remember, no one beats drug addiction alone. On the contrary, substance abuse recovery requires the expert guidance of drug rehab professionals: doctors and caregivers who understand the mechanisms of drug abuse, and who know that the most effective drug treatment addresses every recovery patient as a unique individual.

That said, though, it can be hard to know where to turn in the search for the right drug treatment center. The drug rehabilitation market is full of options, and distinguishing one substance abuse treatment program from the next is no mean feat. Indeed, for the untrained consumer, the profusion of drug rehab models can be almost literally overwhelming: Faced with so many different choices, the consumer’s most logical response might be to simply assume that every drug rehab center is the same.

But nothing could be further from the truth. The essence of successful substance abuse treatment lies in individualized care: care that recognizes the unique needs of every individual patient, and understands that no two drug addicts alike. It should go without saying that you are your own person; no one has lived your life, and no one else can get inside your head. By the same token, your addiction recovery plan must ultimately belong only and entirely to you: To get better, you need to find a drug rehab center that will work for you as an individual.

Some substance abuse treatment centers purport to have discovered a universal care plan for drug addiction. Such a claim, of course, implies that all addicts are the same, and that what works for one drug dependency case should work for every drug dependency case. Unfortunately, such thinking isn’t even close to accurate. Again, you are your own person, and the “right” drug treatment center is the one that recognizes and treats you as such. In the fight against drug abuse, that sort of uniquely personal treatment is the last best chance you’ve got.

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MAKING DRUG TREATMENT WORK FOR YOU

Again, for emphasis: Even the best drug rehab program is ultimately only as successful as its patients allow it to be. Drug treatment is a participatory proposition, one that demands active agency on the part of recovering addicts. You can’t get sober without addiction counseling, you might say, but addiction counseling can’t work unless you make it go.

Part of that involvement, of course, is facilitated by a substance abuse treatment program itself: Those drug rehab programs that cater to the specific needs of their individual patients stand a better chance of getting those patients actively engaged in the treatment process. But such catering can only go so far. In the end, a patient’s engagement with his drug rehabilitation experience is most significantly a function of his own knowledge base, and the level of awareness created by it.

With that in mind, self-education is a vital precursor to successful substance abuse treatment. Addiction recovery, you might say, is founded on wisdom: on the wisdom dispensed by drug treatment experts, on the wisdom digested by drug treatment patients. Only a a functional synergy between the two parties can help addicts make sobriety real for themselves and their loved ones.

It’s also worth noting that a person with substance use disorder’s loved ones have a role to play in the education process. Because drug addiction engenders a state of myopia in the individuals it afflicts, drug abusers are very rarely able to see the full scope of their self-destructive behavior. With that in mind, interventions often play key roles in the substance abuse treatment process: By confronting a person with substance use disorder with the truth about himself and his drug habit, an intervention can be an important impetus to healing and recovery. There is, in the end, no educational force quite so powerful as that of love and support.

ADDICTION RECOVERY AND MEANIFUL SOBRIETY

Addiction recovery, on its most fundamental level, is a state of being. Meaningful sobriety is that which a recovered addict can maintain over the long run, without relapsing into cycles of drug use and abuse. With that in mind, successful substance abuse treatment necessarily entails long-term care, with a particular emphasis on helping patients make sobriety a way of life.

There is, strictly, speaking no “end” to the substance abuse treatment process: no point at which drug treatment is finished; no moment at which drug recovery is over. Again, sobriety is a lifestyle, not a destination. A recovered addict is always and in all ways actively choosing to stay clean, and so it is that the most effective drug rehab programs are those that provide support long after patients leave a drug treatment center.

A key element of that support lies in aftercare programs, which help recovery patients negotiate the transition from intensive substance abuse treatment to independent sober living. 12-step support groups like Alcoholics Anonymous also factor heavily into the long-term success of drug rehab; by placing them in communities of kindred souls, organizations like AA serve to remind recovered addicts that they aren’t alone in their struggles, and that they don’t have to face the challenges of sobriety by themselves. For many drug rehab graduates battling the lingering effects of addiction, such comfort can make all the difference in the world.

Remember, substance abuse treatment isn’t easy. The way is hard, and the way is long, and anyone who travels it would be lying if they said they’d want to repeat the experience. But make no mistake: The experience is well worth the struggle entailed, and no recovered addict ever misses compulsive drug abuse. In the end, substance abuse treatment is about hope, and healing: about helping drug addicts and their loved one rediscover live as it ought to be lived. For you and the people who care about you, nothing else could ever be more important.

THE BEST CALL YOU WILL EVER MAKE

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