Drug Addictions

Dual Diagnosis: Drug Addiction, Alcoholism and Associated Psychiatric Disorder

A person who suffers from alcohol abuse / alcoholism, drug abuse / drug addiction and an emotional/psychiatric problem is said to have a dual diagnosis. To recover fully, the person will require addiction treatment and psychiatric treatment for both problems.


How Common Is Dual Diagnosis?


Dual diagnosis is a common diagnosis. According to a report published by the Journal of the American Medical Association: * Thirty-seven percent of people with alcohol abuse and fifty-three percent of people with drug abuse also have at least one serious mental illness. * Of all people diagnosed as mentally ill, 29 percent suffer from alcohol abuse or drug abuse.


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Drug Addiction and Alcoholism: Relapse Prevention

Addictive behaviors do have special characteristics related to the social environments in which they originate. All of the environmental cues surrounding initial drug or alcohol use and development of the addiction actually become “conditioned” to that drug use and are thus critical to the development of the addiction. Environmental signals are paired in time with an individual’s initial drug use experiences and through classical conditioning, take on conditioned stimulus properties. When those signals are present at a later time, they elicit anticipation of a drug experience and thus generate drug craving. Trigger-induced craving is one of the most frequent causes of drug use relapses, even after long periods of abstinence. Environmental triggers help explain why reentry to one s

Drug Abuse Treatments
...try to get treatment, especially from public facilities, but are put off by waits of over a month to get in. Assessment of the effectiveness of treatment is difficult because of the chronic nature of drug abuse and alcoholism. And ...
community can be so difficult for addicts leaving the controlled environments of a drug rehab, addiction treatment center or alcoholism treatment center. It is no wonder that so many people that are chemically dependent cannot simply return to their home environment immediately after completing their drug rehab, addiction treatment or alcoholism rehab program.


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Gay Drug Addiction

Gay drug addiction or alcohol addiction problems?


Addiction is a primary, progressive, and fatal illness, which if left untreated can result in premature death or a life plagued with despair. Addiction has also been described as a pathological relationship to a substance, person, behavior or process.


The idea that drug addicts or alcoholics are weak willed or morally corrupt has long ago been debunked. That attitude keeps people from seeking addiction treatment or drug rehab and fosters shame, resentment and fear around their illness.


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Drug Addiction or Eating Disorder: Which Came First?

When a person enters drug rehab or an addiction treatment facility and is diagnosed with a drug addiction and eating disorder, the question arises which addiction developed first and how do you treat two addictions?


First, let us define an eating disorder as the quality of one s thinking as it relates to food and weight and not how much someone weighs. Then, we may take a look at various behaviors and address other criteria. In most cases, one s thinking regarding food and weight became distorted way before they ever began using drugs or alcohol. It is not uncommon that after a period of time of trying to achieve certain self determined goals through binging, purging or restricting

Drug Addiction Support: Don't Go It Alone
...unconditional love of a family is the very best drug addiction support for those addicts lucky enough to have it. That s What Friends Are ForThose friends who were not involved in sharing the addicts substance abuse can provide exceptional ...
and not achieving those goals, that the person would turn to drugs as a means to accelerate the process or deal with the emotional whirlwind of depression, shame or self hatred. At this point we have an eating disorder and drug addiction going full throttle in an attempt to by the person to gain control. It rarely happens and is described as the great illusion by most treatment professionals.


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Drug Addiction Intervention - When You’ve Had Enough

Drug addiction is not a problem only for drug addicts; it reaches into the lives of everyone who cares about, or has to deal with the addicts, and can throw their lives into turmoil. If you are one of those people for whom someone else s addiction is becoming a life-altering- and not for the better–experience, it may be time for you to consider a drug addiction intervention.


Drug addiction interventions confront addicts not to heap them with verbal abuse, but to give them a clear look at how badly their lives have careened out of control. Drug addiction interventions are appropriate no matter the type of addiction involved; they will be equally effective with abusers of

Drug Addiction or Eating Disorder: Which Came First?
...Whether it is binging, purging or restricting, the patient must be willing to address the behavior to achieve recovery. Realizing that abstaining from the eating disorder behavior will initiate cravings for drugs, the clinical staff at the addiction treatment facility ...
alcohol, speed, heroin, crack, or even prescription meds. All they are intended to do is give the addicts the impetus they need to get help.


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