Addiction Treatment
“Be tolerant with others and strict with yourself.” – Marcus Aurelius
Are You Or A Loved One Struggling With Addiction?
Have you recently gotten sober and feel vulnerable and alone? Have you disappointed yourself or your loved ones because as much as you try, you can’t commit to making a sustainable change? Or are circumstances in your life challenging your sobriety and you worry about relapsing?
Perhaps you weren’t prepared for how difficult remaining sober would be. Now that the addiction you developed in order to mask underlying mental distress has stopped, you’re no longer finding ways to avoid or ignore what troubles you. Instead, you’re having to sit with your pain.
Between the lack of connection with friends who don’t use and little structure in your new routine, you may be tempted to backslide. Without healthier habits established to replace addictive ones, it’s hard to imagine what life will look like moving forward.
Your Relationship With Loved Ones May Be Strained
What may be making recovery more difficult is the damage that’s been done to those close to you. Although you need their support now more than ever, perhaps you’re realizing for the first time much repair work is required before you can lean on them again.
And if it’s your loved one who is struggling with addiction, your life may feel turned upside down by their substance abuse. As you come to terms with your anger, hurt, and disappointment, you might be looking for solutions on their behalf—perhaps even an intervention.
Fortunately, addiction treatment can help you navigate the winding path of recovery. With the unbiased support of a therapist to keep you on track, addiction no longer has to define you.
Addictions Don’t Discriminate
Addictions are indiscriminate and can affect anyone. There is no restrictive factor such as age, gender, socioeconomic status, sexual orientation, relationship status, or race. Addictive or compulsive behaviors are very common and can range from mildly annoying, like biting our nails, to a severely debilitating addiction to drugs or alcohol. The one thing these behaviors have in common is that when they overcome us, we feel unable to stop them despite our best efforts.
It's no wonder then that in 2019, the National Survey on Drug Use and Health found that “about 20 million people in the United States had a substance use disorder in the past year. However, additional survey data during the COVID-19 pandemic revealed higher reported rates of drinking and drug use among adults.”
Modern Technology Fosters Addictive Behavior
While the statistics make it clear that boredom and isolation throughout the pandemic led many of us to turn to substances for comfort, today’s technological advances often serve to encourage addictive thinking and behavior. Whatever we’re looking for, whether it be sex, gambling, mindless shopping, or even personal validation, our phones can deliver what our heart desires within seconds.
For those of us who never developed healthy coping mechanisms to manage stress and difficult emotions, we’re more than eager to find an easy escape on our phones. And sometimes when we activate this behavior, the floodgates open. Progressively, we may fall into increasingly harmful forms of addiction. Additionally, the overprescribing of painkillers, anxiety pills, and “focus” medications has become yet another gateway into addiction that we would not have otherwise found.
Many of us struggle to admit to ourselves, much less a family member or friend, that we have a substance abuse problem. There is a stigma attached to lacking control over our behaviors. We may have been told by others simply to "stop" but they don’t understand that it’s not that easy. However, once you've admitted to yourself and your therapist that you need help with substance abuse, you’ve just accomplished one of the hardest tasks of recovery.
Treatment For Addiction Can Aid In Your Recovery
If you’re newly sober, you may not realize the high risk of relapse that often occurs after detoxification. Until you examine the underlying issues that contribute to your addiction and make modifications to your habits and lifestyle, you probably won’t achieve the success you’re hoping for. That’s why addiction treatment can be such a beneficial adjunct to your recovery process.
As a therapist, I will never tell you how to live your life or what decisions you should make related to addiction. Therapy is a safe, unbiased space where you can talk about your life experiences, values, and goals. From there, I can assess your behaviors, question your motivations, and help you develop a better view of where you want to be headed now that you’re unencumbered by problematic behaviors or substances.
What To Expect In Sessions
If your addiction is to drugs or alcohol, I will initially perform an assessment to determine the correct level of care for you. Depending on the type, frequency, and amount of use, we may determine that medical intervention is first required before commencing substance abuse counseling. I also work with families who are struggling to get a loved one into drug or alcohol addiction treatment and offer intervention services or counseling to support this.
You may be challenged keeping your urges to use in check if you lack productive ways of dealing with boredom. Similarly, lacking routine or failing to see the importance of effective time management can also result in spending your time and energy unproductively. By establishing a daily routine, maintaining personal connections, developing refined interests, and planning goal-oriented tasks, our focus will be on cultivating healthier alternatives to substances.
We will also identify your triggers—such as places, people, or situations that you associate with your addiction—so that you can endeavor to avoid them. In addition, we will explore the seemingly unimportant events which hastened substance abuse, like being overlooked for a promotion or fear of missing out (FOMO), so you can better understand the underlying reasons why you were triggered.
An Integrative Approach to Addiction Treatment
Successful addiction treatment requires an integrative approach that combines various therapeutic and medical interventions, such as Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) to aid in stopping automatic thoughts and behaviors. I might utilize abstinence-only, risk reduction, or other spiritual or secular models and recommend you attend Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) or Life Ring, a non-religious approach similar to AA.
We may also decide to augment your addiction therapy with support groups, self-help programs, or formal treatment through a facility. Residential or halfway programs and medication-assisted therapies with a physician might also be explored based on your circumstances. We will discuss all the treatment modalities available so you can choose what best suits your goals and needs.
Addictions can be debilitating but they don't have to be. When you commit to addiction treatment, you can find sustainable ways of staying clean, finding new interests, and redefining how you relate to the world.
But You May Wonder If Addiction Treatment Is Right For You…
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Successful addiction therapy requires your commitment. I won’t try to sell you on something that you aren't committed to, but I will give you an honest expert opinion based on my assessment of the full picture. If nothing else, we can chat and I can provide you with options, but there is no commitment on your part beyond our initial session.
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If you don't have an attorney already, get one. They will probably recommend you begin drug and alcohol counseling before your court hearing. The court highly respects someone who voluntarily enters and commits to therapy before it is mandated. After all, do you want to choose your substance abuse therapy and treatment program yourself or do you want the court to do it for you?
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Whether or not you enter a rehab facility is up to you. We may be able to manage your addiction therapy in the context of individual meetings, but you might require additional support. Your success is highly dependent on your commitment to your recovery plan, so you are 100 percent in charge unless alcohol abuse treatment is court-mandated.
I understand and am quite familiar with local programs and the entire system of care and how it works with insurance. Additionally, with over 20 years’ experience in facility-based treatment programs, I’m acutely familiar with the Level of Care Criteria for most insurances and know what criteria are required to access each of these levels.
With The Right Support, Your Recovery Can Be Smoother
When you get the right team in place and commit to treatment, a whole new world can open up for you. If you would like to find out more about the addiction treatment I offer, please call 415-710-9777 or visit my contact page.
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