Life long recovery is possible.
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Family counseling: for addicts and their family members

The focus of our Orange County Rehab and Detox is about the long-term recovery and success of our patients. No one becomes addicted because their life is too perfect. Addiction is an illness habitually responding to the overwhelming pressures, expectations, and anxieties of our life. The most important aspect of curing addiction isn’t simply taking the drugs and alcohol out of our life because these substances are ubiquitous. Drugs and alcohol will always be shown in television, music, advertisements, and our social circles. To truly overcome addiction means to change ourselves and our environment so we can learn to love ourselves and feel good without them. For many, that journey starts with loving yourself as you are and culminate with acceptance and encouragement from family.

 Addiction is an Illness That Can Be Treated

Addicted individuals suffer through illness. They often feel pessimistic and blame themselves for not healing properly. The fault is never on the victim, yet these harmful feelings are pervasive among people just starting rehab and recovery. One study found that belief in our ability to change is often lowest at the start of rehab. However, people who entered rehab with these low self-expectations, or self-efficacy, often have tremendous rates of recovery as they discover what they’re capable of with the right support and family counseling. Sometimes that means overcoming long-held beliefs that were shaped by negative life and family experiences.

Addiction Often Starts at Home

A strict or toxic home environment can usually breed addiction. If you think about prohibition, the banning of all alcohol didn’t cure alcoholism. Some would say it caused it to become worse.

Much the same way, families that demonize drugs and alcohol often miss a significant point. We become addicted when substances seem to fill a void in us that we can’t understand, let alone overcome. It’s like the substances manage to scratch an itch that’s been deep in our chest for years. Storytellers call this a “shard of glass,” an invisible, but always a present source of pain and frustration from a traumatic event or other negative emotion slowly clawing its way to our core.

Family Counseling

Many families miss this important conversation. The US wouldn’t be in an addiction epidemic if everyone’s life was going perfectly. Rather, the narrative has been that addiction itself is the problem, and the only solution is abstinence. However, abstinence simply leaves us dwelling with our shard of glass. Because this false narrative is perpetuated in public conversation, we pass it down from spouse to spouse and parent to child. In many cases, this can cause disconnect or even resentment between parents and children when it comes to addiction.

Family counseling is a critical tool to bridging these disconnects. Many people in rehab feel like they burned bridges with loved ones, but that’s not often the case. Families are hurt by the addiction, in themselves and their loved ones, and that pain can be expressed in unhealthy ways. Helping families work together to understand the disease, to repair the consequences of addiction, and to address their many shards of glass is the true path to recovery.

If you or your loved ones are considering rehab or if addiction has left a strong, negative impact on your family, we urge you to consider family drug counseling for addiction at our Orange County Rehab. Call us as soon as you can at (714)782-3973.

bipolar disorder

Bipolar Disorder and Substance Abuse

Bipolar Disorder and Substance Abuse – A Likely Combination

When we think of comorbid diseases, we often look for a clear common link, such as with high cholesterol and heart disease. With addiction, however, the links aren’t always so clear. As research is showing, there is a particularly high comorbidity between addiction disorders and bipolar disorder.

What is Bipolar Disorder?

The National Institute of Health (NIMH) recognizes bipolar disorder as a brain disorder characterized by “unusual shifts in mood, energy, activity levels, and the ability to carry out day-to-day tasks.” The defining feature of bipolar disorder is shifting between high-energy (manic) and low-energy (depressive) states, which is why it’s also referred to as “manic-depressive illness.” In the manic states, patients may feel anxious, paranoid, their thoughts may race at a hundred miles an hour and they can embark on many different, sporadic projects without seeing any through. While depressed, they may feel sluggish, miserable, empty, and with little energy to concentrate. In either state, many frustrating symptoms could occur, with no clear end in sight.

How does Bipolar Disorder relate to Substance Use Disorders?

Decades of studying and treating addiction disorders have debunked several myths about these diseases. First and foremost, the “chemical-hook” theory, that certain drugs are more addictive than others, only explains a small fraction of why we become addicted. During the Vietnam War, there was a growing fear in the US about soldiers returning home addicted to heroin, because so many soldiers were using the drug to cope with the immense stress of the war. However, upon returning home, only a small fraction of veterans continued using. In Vietnam, these soldiers were under constant threat of enemy fire, deadly booby traps, ambushes, and were surrounded by similarly young, terrified, and miserable soldiers using heroin to cope with all these “triggers.” When they returned home after the war, suddenly all these triggers disappeared. Their families weren’t using drugs to cope. They weren’t under threat of violence 24/7. The factors that made them dependent on heroin simply melted away.

Bipolar Disorder and Addiction – A Story Built from Setting and Conflict

Just like victims of bipolar disorder, Vietnam veterans were going through interchanging rushes of paranoid anxiety and cold, dark dread. Neither could know what was going to happen a week, a day, or even an hour later, or if things would ever get better. Drugs and alcohol were an immediate and welcome, if desperate, solution to very severe problems caused by their environment. For veterans, the jungle was full of dangerous and lethal triggers. For people with bipolar disorder, their brains are a journey through a minefield of symptoms that could stretch for days, months, or years without provocation. When drugs offer immediate relief to these constant threats, it becomes clear why so many people suffering from bipolar disorder also grow dependent on drugs and alcohol.

Treating Comorbid Bipolar Disorders and Substance Abuse Disorder

Treatment of Substance Use Disorders in coordination with Bipolar Disorders can be tricky. The manic phase can make staying focused and determined difficult, making the long detox period particularly challenging. The depressive period in bipolar disorder can make it difficult to find and maintain motivation. A skilled therapist can help patients manage both the depressive and manic symptoms through techniques like Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, giving them control of their recovery journey. If you or someone you know is considering drug or alcohol rehab in Orange County or is suffering from addiction and a comorbid bipolar disorder, please call Experience Recovery at (714) 782-3973.

Ideas on How to Have Sober Fun

Ideas on How to Have Sober Fun

One of the main reasons people become dependent on drugs or alcohol is because addiction fills in a lot of downtimes. Just like you’re more likely to go out or cook when there’s less junk food lying around, you’re less likely to turn to drugs when you have other things to fill your time. At our Orange County rehab, we focus a lot on teaching people the essential, healthy habits to lead a sober life, like exercise, cooking, and scheduling. But not every sober activity has to be healthy or tedious. Here are a few fun, simple ideas on how you can not only avoid using drugs and alcohol in your downtime but how you can have sober fun in your free time.

1. Fun and Sober Craft Mocktails

Craft virgin cocktails are a rising hobby because of the tactile and social nature of experimenting with tasty ingredients. The idea of shaking up herbs, juices, and syrups into a cold, flavorful drink has an obvious allure. At your next party or summer BBQ, try making a refreshing blueberry ginger cooler or brew together some peaches, lemons, and sugar into a syrup to add to iced teas or lemonade. Because these drinks are sober and non-alcoholic, they’re also great fun for the whole family, and a hit with kids and adults alike. Making your own juices and sodas also means cutting back on high-fructose corn syrups, artificial flavors, and colors found in commercial brands!

2. Gardening

Did you know the average grocery store apple could have sat in cold storage for 9 months or longer? Growing your own food can give you the experience of sun-ripened, delicious produce that you can’t find at a typical grocery store. This doesn’t mean you need a large backyard or to spend hours pulling weeds. Many home gardeners start out with a small pot of strawberries, tomatoes, or cucumbers. Rare and exotic fruits can even be grown at home for just a couple of dollars.

3. Rebuilding a Sober Social Network – Local sports clubs and leagues

Not everyone is going to be a Soccer or Basketball pro. Nonetheless, sports clubs exist for people of any passion. From paintball to laser tag, bowling to disc golf, or aquatic and weightlifting activities, there are a number of different options to find your perfect sport. YMCA’s, local gyms, libraries, colleges, and other public service facilities sometimes offer cheap or free classes. Less athletic options also include board game nights and card game clubs that are always looking for extra players, all just a Google search away.

Addiction often burns many bridges. Getting in touch with local groups is a great way to meet new people, build a support network that cares about you, and get invited to a number of other fun, sober activities that you might not have even tried on your own.

4. New Hobbies and Skills

Youtube and a number of other sites have every tutorial on anything you might ever need learning languages, cooking, painting, playing piano, or a million other skills. If you spend 15 minutes of your lunch break learning a single skill, by the end of the year you’d have accumulated 65 hours of practice in a new skill or talent. Ever had an idea for an app you wanted to create or a novel you wanted to write? Replace a single smoke break with a few minutes of a new, fun skill and you can make it happen.

At Experience Recovery, we focus on helping our patients find their passions in life after recovery. Interested in seeing what your life would look like beyond addiction? Call us at (714)782-3973 and we can help you plot your path forward.

Insane in the Membrane – The Crazy Truth About Crystal Meth

Insane in the Membrane – The Crazy Truth About Crystal Meth

There are millions of different germs, viruses, and diseases that our body has to fight off every day. While our skin, our biggest immune-defense organ, does a terrific job at keeping most things at bay, it’s not perfect. Small breaks in the skin, airborne germs, and our own stubborn nature of finding ways to put germs in our body can all make us ill. As a rehab in Orange County specializing in the long-term health of our patients, we like to understand exactly how the less obvious aspects of addiction can impact our physical health and our immune system. Methamphetamine, in particular, has a very complicated way of inhibiting our body’s defenses. As crystal meth is returning in society, it’s important to take a look at what meth is, and how it can impact our health.

The Visible Risks of Crystal Meth

Although it’s been known for a long time that meth can lead to a number of different comorbid diseases, the process behind it was never clear. As we said before, there are a number of different ways our bodies can get sick. The most obvious with meth addiction is that the drug can make us behave in risky, unhealthy, and life-jeopardizing ways. Meth not only increases libido but also limits inhibition, increasing the urge for sex while lowering the critical thinking that could normally keep someone safe. Men with HIV, for example, are more likely to engage in unprotected sex under the influence of methamphetamines. Both men and women are more likely to engage with multiple, unprotected sexual partners on meth. This and other risky behavior is the first way that methamphetamines break our natural immune-system membranes.

The Effects of Crystal Meth Beneath the Surface

Adults using meth often experience tachycardia or drastically increased heart-rate, and children exposed to meth environments have shown similar symptoms. Other blood-related problems can occur with the use of crystal meth, and greater risk of infection can occur through open cuts, lesions, and punctures related to meth use. Meth is one of the rare addictions where users are often creating the drug in home labs, so severe burns, toxic inhalation, and meth-tainted skin and clothing is common. “Meth mouth” is a common phrase, describing the appearance of a meth addict’s oral cavity. The dry mouth caused by meth consumption, combined with unhealthy, sugary diet and little care for hygiene can create the perfect environment for tooth rot, open lesions in the mouth, and other injuries. This mix of poor hygiene, open wounds, blood disorders, and risk behavior all weaken our natural membrane against diseases, making meth users more likely to be exposed to pathogens.

Crystal Meth Can Devastate Our Immune System

Less visibly, meth use affects our body on an inter-cellular level. Called “killer T-Cells,” our body produces a number of cells that are designed to destroy cancer and pathogens attacking our body. The introduction of meth into our system can directly damage T-cells, which then impact then calcium levels within our cells, interrupting the function of mitochondria. The mitochondria, now overactive in their membranes and growing physically more massive, cause a series of reactions that in turn impair the killer T-cells. The potential effect is a feedback loop of damage that continues to strip away the immune system.

These various risk factors, all working together to strip away our bodies natural defenses against viruses and pathogens, all contribute to the growing death rate from meth addiction. Like many other drugs, meth can cause tremendous physical damage not just from direct use and overdose, but from a series of chain reactions that put is in dangerous circumstances. If you or someone you know is struggling with an addiction, we urge you to visit our Orange County rehab and detox center or to call us directly at (714)782-3973.

Why Being of Service Helps Ourselves

Why Being of Service Helps Ourselves

We started Experience Recovery because our local Orange County community was in need of skilled rehab and recovery services. Through the years, we’ve found that being of service is actually the best way of helping ourselves. Problems that are unique to our hometowns have to be taken care of by the community; we can’t always rely on government programs or policies to be nuanced and effective enough for the unique needs of our hometowns. By being of service to those around us, we empower our communities, solve local problems at their roots, and gives ourselves a purpose.

Servicing the Needs of Our Communities

If the epidemic drug problems of the 21st century have shown us anything, it’s that different communities are susceptible to different problems. The melting pots of urban, industrialized cities like Los Angeles and New York have their own pockets and sub-communities, separated by wealth, ethnicity, geography, among a number of other factors. Yet all of these have been afflicted with their own drug epidemics. Native American reservations and Orange County college towns might seem worlds apart, but both have seen countless victims to drug and alcohol addiction, stemming from their own unique histories, economies, and cultures.

In the past couple of years, we’ve seen rural communities being torn apart by opiates and prescription drugs. Reports of illicit drug use are on the rise in rural areas. The distance between rural homes poses a two-fold problem. Traveling, home-visiting doctors have to spend hours on the road between patients, making travel inefficient and impractical. Likewise, seeking out a doctor or care program can be difficult for hard-working rural families, and that extra difficulty poses a real possibility of discouraging patients from seeking help when they need it most.

In urban communities, a number of different circumstances bar patients from adequate care. The high cost of living, fear of medical bills, debt, and other financial woes are married with a growing distrust in public services, especially among minority groups.

Problems like these can prevent patients from finding adequate treatment, and because addiction spreads from parents to children, this can leave intergenerational roots of drug and alcohol dependency.

Why Healing a Community Means Tending to the Roots

After rehab, patients some patients are actually at the highest risk of overdose. Rehab flushes the chemicals out of your system. With exception to a few specific opiates, many addictions aren’t treated with a supplement to replace the initial addictive substance. As we remove the drug from our system, our tolerance for the drug slowly reduces. If a patient leaves a recovery program and returns home to the same environment that caused their addiction in the first place, their chance of relapse is greatly increased.

As such, adequate treatment often involves understanding the roots of the patient’s addiction, and either tending to those roots through therapy and acknowledgment or strengthening the patient to withstand similar pressures.

As we work with our community, we often see similar patterns emerge from one addiction to another. Whether they are exacerbated by financial insecurity, depression, stress, or other cultural influences, we can better understand the needs of our community. By working at the very roots of the problem, we not only stem the current growth of addiction but also manage the problems of our community first-hand. By helping our community, we’re really helping ourselves. We’re restructuring the foundation of our own homes, and building the very village where we’ll raise our own families.

How Narcotics Anonymous Helps Addicted People

How Narcotics Anonymous Helps Addicted People

The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) reported a 9.6% rise in overdose deaths from 2016 to 2017, with opiates being one of the major narcotics responsible for the fatalities. Orange County rehab and recovery programs like Experience Recovery are essential for treating local communities by providing on-site care and long-term support. However, many local rehabs rely on the support and structure created through national programs, such as Narcotics Anonymous (NA). NA offers practical guidelines for recovery success, a supportive care network, and most of all the publicity to raise awareness about the importance of rehab and recovery. As we step in to quell the growth of the narcotics epidemic in the US, we feel it’s important to understand how NA and other programs are paving the way for more local success.

How Narcotics Anonymous Helps Addicts

Narcotics Anonymous is an international community for addiction support. They’ve been helping communities by offering information, guidance, and sponsoring meetings since 1953, and are now holding weekly meetings in over 130 countries. Following similar principles to Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) and other programs, NA focuses on healing through community and simple, straightforward principles.

Is Narcotics Anonymous right for me?

NA is a great place to get the conversation started. What NA can offer is a chance to meet people on a similar recovery journey, who share similar pains and struggles, and to be able to support one another, and learn from successful patients in recovery. Ultimately, every person’s journey will be different.

Rehab is the most difficult part of the recovery journey, and where most people relapse without professional help. As such, NA is generally suited as an entry-point for recovery, or to supplement a more direct rehab program like Experience Recovery. If you’d like to learn more about the recovery process, and how to get started, we encourage you to contact us directly at (714)782-3973.

Does Narcotics Anonymous Work?

The simplest answer is that it can improve the odds of recovery, but this requires a little more nuanced understanding. Addiction is a potentially fatal disease that is known for its challenging healing process, so it’s natural to be searching for the most effective and proven strategies to recover. Harry Anslinger’s Federal Narcotics Bureau escalated a massive drug war in the US which has stunted decades of research and understanding, leaving decades of research and knowledge underfunded, ignored, or wrongfully refused. Because of backward policies, addiction care and subsequent research was often left to smaller-scale or private, anecdotal studies. As such, programs like NA rely on community-gathered information to monitor success rates and improve techniques.

As we understand more about addiction, we come to realize it’s a complex disease fueled by biological and environmental factors. If factors in your life, such as stress, depression, exhaustion, family, or friends encouraged your addiction, then entering rehab and going back to that same lifestyle can leave you susceptible to relapse. What NA offers is a chance to either change your surroundings, by providing you with supportive friends and sponsors who are invested in your recovery, or to develop the skills, knowledge, and practice to better overcome the life stressors that could have originally fueled your addiction.

Managing Mood Swings in Early Recovery

Managing Mood Swings in Early Recovery

As an Orange County rehab provider, we’ve noticed that our community is often very sensitive about health. If you’ve ever changed your diet, your sleep schedule, or even come back from a vacation, you know how drastic changes in your environment can mess up your mood. The same effect happens with addiction recovery and detox. The receptors in our brain become used to having a certain substance in heavy abundance. Taking such chemicals away gives our system a sudden shock.

Early Recovery

Early recovery consists of purging the body of all those chemicals that we’ve grown dependent on. This is often considered the most grueling and difficult part of recovery because this detox has a number of unpleasant withdrawal symptoms. When detoxing from certain drugs we could feel nausea, vomiting, fevers, irritability, painful headaches and a number of other symptoms. Many people suffer from nightmares and disorientation. These symptoms can last as long as a week.

Medical supervision is always recommended as you go through detox simply because this first week can be so challenging and even dangerous. With established, heavy substance dependencies, many people can suffer serious illness without supervision. Acute Alcohol Withdrawal is one such case.

In other cases, such as with opiates, new medicines like methadone and other substances can be used to reduce or even erase the withdrawal symptoms as you go through recovery. These medicines are often watered-down versions of illicit opiates or synthetic variations designed as a transitional drug in addiction recovery. Managing the symptoms

Mood Swings in Early Sobriety

Mood swings can be detrimental to recovery because they can hurt motivation, make us feel like we’re not making progress in recovery, or scare others away from helping us. Professionals in rehab and detox are used to these mood swings, and we understand that they come from pain, nausea, and a mix of powerful chemical reactions. Rather than fighting them, it’s important to understand them, manage them, and understand our own bodies in this turbulent journey of recovery.

Techniques to Manage Mood Swings in Recovery

Healthy eating is one part of feeling better and gaining control of your mood. Fat, greasy foods can leave us feeling queasy, irritable, and moody. While eating more greens and drinking water won’t immediately counter-balance the sudden loss of addictive chemicals, it’s one step towards feeling better and being in control of your bodies mood.

Meditation, exercise, and yoga are also important parts of feeling better and regulating our bodies healthy moods. Getting our blood pumping can help us achieve natural dopamine highs, similar to the effect of drugs, but with healthier results all around. A study at Harvard found that including exercise during treatment resulted in higher rates of continued sobriety post-recovery.

Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is another important technique for understanding our own physiology and moods. In CBT, patients learn to read their own bodies’ warning signs, such as stress, tension, and exhaustion. Through this, patients can understand when they are truly feeling uncomfortable or burnt out, or when their body is just moody as a reaction to detox or other stressors. By analyzing their own bodies, patients also learn how to predict potential triggers for mood, stress, or other physiological responses, and can prepare for them.

Addiction recovery and detox can seem like a mountain of challenges, but with the right care, an easy system of health maintenance, and the right tools and training, managing detox and the mood swings that come with can not only be manageable and rewarding but can pave a lifetime of healthy habits.

Dreams Awaken and New Possibilities Arise in Recovery

Dreams Awaken and New Possibilities Arise in Recovery

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One July, 17 years ago, Robert Downey Jr. (RDJ) completed rehab for the last time and restarted his life in sobriety. The A-list actor had reportedly used drugs since his early childhood, and was unable to shake the addiction even as he was earning Golden Globe and Academy Awards. After back-to-back arrests for possession of illicit substances, Downey could no longer be insured to play feature roles. To continue working, his close friend Mel Gibson had to pay for the insurance for him to have another shot at a starring role. RDJ entered court-appointed rehab one last time in 2013 and stuck to his goal of overcoming addiction ever since. Recovery is not easy for anyone, and even the most influential celebrities in the world need help, support, and even sponsors to overcome the disease. But if you have a real and honest dream to strive for, you can awake new possibilities when you commit to the recovery journey.

Persistence to Sobriety Awakens Dreams

Possibilities arise at any moment, and you have to be ready and willing to seize them. The average Joe might not have A-list celebrities willing to sponsor us, but we do have friends, family, or care providers who want to see us thrive. Ultimately, we are responsible for our own success in sobriety, and everything else is just resources we can leverage. As the old saying goes, we fall to our lowest level of preparation.

How to Make Possibilities Arise in Recovery

Committing to sobriety is just as difficult as committing to any healthy habit. Many of us have long-term goals we want to achieve, like a slim or muscular body, wealth, love, and a beautiful home. However, we fail when we don’t outline exactly what it takes to get there. Running for an hour once a month doesn’t make you feel or look like a runner. Ignoring a craving for fast food doesn’t mean you’ve overcome bad eating habits.

We allow ourselves to fall into bad habits when we don’t have clear, attainable goals and dreams. Consider this… does it feel like a win if you haven’t had a cigarette in a week? Surely it does. Does it also feel like a win if you haven’t had one for a single day? It definitely still does. If you set simple, easy-to-win goals, you encourage yourself every time you complete a task.

Rehab works in much the same way. There’s measured, necessary steps to overcoming every stage of addiction. You have to get through it one day at a time. Sometimes you have to set yourself even smaller goals for yourself. “Eat a salad tonight.” “Drink a single glass of water with dinner.” Slowly but surely, these positive habits form.

As you progress through rehab, these healthy habits become easier and easier. They feel more natural, more a part of your daily life. Just as you remember to brush your teeth or turn off the lights each night, exercise, budgeting, and other health habits can feel just as natural.

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The Dangers of Adderall for Weight-Loss

The Dangers of Adderall for Weight-Loss

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The Dangers of Adderall for Weight-LossA growing number of people across the US are suffering from legal, prescription drug addictions straight from doctors and pharmacies, and using them in dressing rooms, gyms, and yoga groups. The truth of addiction is inevitable—it is not a moral failing ‘nor a character flaw. It’s a serious, medical condition that is tearing through the US. With the wide variety of drugs on the market, both legal and illicit, it’s important that detox centers in Orange County are prepared and aware of the trends in addiction that could be shaping the lives of our community. One such trend is the growing use of Adderall as a weight loss drug. Originally prescribed to ease the symptoms of ADHD and other disorders, the weight loss side-effects of Adderall quickly gained recognition and it became used in unhealthy ways as a diet drug.

Adderall uses and side-effects

Adderall is FDA-Approved strictly in cases of ADHD and Narcolepsy. The side effects of Adderall include raised blood pressure, loss of appetite, weight loss, increased heart rate, anorexia, mood swings, insomnia and more. It’s particularly dangerous for people with heart problems or high blood pressure.

Children have often been prescribed Adderall as a way to calm them down and help them focus. While it can be vital to some children who are otherwise disruptive or inattentive in class, it can have some physiological side-effects. Children who used Adderall showed lower BMI in earlier years followed by above-normal weight gain as they grew older.

Adderall directly affects the brain and can be addictive if used frequently. While it can cause weight loss through side effects, like loss of appetite, it poses the risk of addiction and overdose if used in excess. Overdose symptoms of amphetamines like Adderall can include seizures, trouble breathing, twitches, vomiting, and psychosis.

Why is Adderall used in weight loss?

Adderall is a common prescription used throughout the US. Because it’s so ubiquitous, people have noticed the “weight loss” side effect of the drug, especially among teenagers and young adults who are often sensitive about their own weight. Although the drug is only FDA approved as a treatment to specific disorders, off-market versions have been prescribed for weight loss. As the growing trends of reality tv, social media, and celebrity worship continue to promote unrealistic body expectations, many people are turning to dangerous ways to modify their body as quickly as possible. It’s largely for this reason that Adderall prescriptions have doubled in a 5-year time frame.

How to treat Adderall addiction or dependency

Because Adderall’s most common illicit use is weight loss, it goes hand-in-hand to say that Adderall addiction is often tied to disorders or anxiety about weight or body image. Quitting any drug cold-turkey, without assistance, support, or systems often results in relapses that are worse than the initial addiction. The mentality, social pressure, and other conditions that originally caused the addiction don’t go away when you try to quit. Therefore, a big part of overcoming addiction revolves around being prepared to adjust to the very circumstances that fueled the addiction, to begin with.

A successful recovery program would not only ease the patient off the drug, but would also focus on training, dieting, therapies, and social support networks that would help the patient feel comfortable and confident in their own skin. Group and individual therapies help patients overcome their own stigmas and fears about body image and give them the fortitude to make healthier self-reflections.

If you know someone who is coping with stress, body image anxieties, or other illness with an addictive substance, please seek help immediately. Experience recovery can help you from addressing the addiction to treating it and developing healthy habits. Call us at (714) 782-3973 to set up a consultation.

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Help for Family Members Who Have an Addicted Loved One

Help for Family Members Who Have an Addicted Loved One

Addiction is a growing epidemic, with new forms of opiates and amphetamines constantly being introduced to the community. For local residents, it’s critical to know about detox centers in Orange County, either for yourself or for an addicted family member. Not only is addiction becoming more prevalent, but new drugs on the market, which can be as much as 100x more powerful than morphine, have extremely high risks for overdose and fatal side-effects. It’s now more important than ever to be proactive about helping your loved ones recover from addiction.

There are a number of reasons why your loved ones might not be seeking help. Here are some reasons your family member’s addiction might be going untreated, and what you can do to help detect a potential addiction and get your loved one the help they need.

Addiction Treatment is Difficult to Enter on Your Own

Many people are afraid of pushing family and relatives away by admitting their own addiction. Centuries of abstinence-only education, coupled with powerful stigmas about drug and alcohol consumption, have made it difficult for people to admit when they may be dependent on a substance. This barrier to entry keeps people from taking the first step to better their own health.

The system for receiving care can also be complicated, from insurance providers, different programs, the options varying with each recovery facility. At Experience Recovery, we offer counseling and guidance to help you make the right decisions to match your needs. Call us any time at (800) 970-3973.

Family Interventions for an Addicted Family Member

Interventions are often what we picture when we talk about family and addiction. Your husband or brother or niece comes home one day, and the whole family is waiting for them in the living room. These types of interventions are theatrical, but a lot of people use them to show the widespread support for someone’s recovery and to address the gravity of the concern with numbers. There’s no evidence that a staged intervention like this is any more effective than an informal, heart-to-heart conversation with a loved on however.

Think about your loved one and their needs. Are you the best person to talk to them? Would it be more impactful, easier, or kinder for you to speak with them in private? Do they make excuses and avoid confrontation, making a staged recovery more impactful?

Often times, the family environment may unknowingly be encouraging a dependence on addiction. We also offer family therapy to help address many of the environmental concerns that might be making an addiction worse, or to help reconnect families who have been impacted by addiction.

Experience Recovery and Professional Substance Addiction Recovery

There’s no easy solution when trying to help a loved one recover from a substance addiction or dependency. If you are concerned about the best way to help them, or how to determine if their problem requires a professional recovery program, we always recommend you give us a call. Our experienced staff will help guide you through the process and determine the best way to help your loved ones. We are always available for you at (800) 970-3973, so call as soon as you suspect an addiction may be impacting the quality of life of you or a family member.

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