Chemical Dependency Treatment

There are three major components to the Narconon Arrowhead chemical dependency treatment. 1. A full and complete handling of the mental and physical cravings that come from any form of dependency. There is more to this than mere withdrawal from use, though this is a vital starting point. 2. Handling the guilt and depression that comes from the dependent life style and the damage done to self and loved ones. Most addicts, given the know-how and chance will jump at the chance to relieve these devastating feeling that have been keeping them using more and more drugs and alcohol in a failed attempt to find some relief. 3. This involves having the needed skills and abilities to fix what damage they can and then go on to create a truly drug free and productive life. Once the individual feels better without drugs or alcohol than they do with them the need for these substances fade away. This is what chemical dependency treatment is all about.

There are various forms and methods of ingesting drugs and toxins. Orally, nasally, injecting, and smoking are a few of these. The effects from smoking drugs as opposed to orally ingesting them or nasally generally creates a more intense effect faster. This is one of the factors that make crack cocaine a tougher addiction to break than powder cocaine. Drugs like Oxycontin are often ground up and mixed with other drugs and smoked for faster more intense highs as well. Also many times the harder drugs like heroin are smoked under the misunderstanding that the risk of addiction is lower and this is definitely not true. Addiction is addiction, some methods of taking drugs will take you to addiction faster and with more devastating effects.

Cravings are extremely powerful urges to use drugs or alcohol again. When triggered,they often cause a person to imagine all kinds of reasons they should begin using drugs or drinking again. Once he or she has relapsed, the addict is now trapped in an endless cycle of trying to quit, craving, relapse and fear of withdrawal. In many drug rehab programs, these cravings are addressed by administering medications that prevent the onset of withdrawal, and that replace the body’s need for the original drug with a substitute substance. The problem with this approach is that the body’s cravings are masked by the substitute drug and are not eliminated and the individual is not learning to build a new drug-free life. If the medication is dropped, the cravings show up and the person is very likely to lose the battle to stay off his or her drug of choice.

Addiction is a chronic, relapsing condition, characterized by compulsive drug-seeking and drug use which is accompanied by functional and molecular changes in the brain. In addition to being addicted to methamphetamine, chronic methamphetamine abusers exhibit symptoms that can include violent behavior, anxiety, confusion, and insomnia. They also can display a number of psychotic features, including paranoia, auditory hallucinations, mood disturbances, and delusions. The paranoia can result in homicidal as well as suicidal thoughts. With chronic use, tolerance for methamphetamine can develop. Users may take higher doses of the drug, take it more frequently, or change their method of drug intake. In some cases, abusers forego food and sleep while injecting as much as a gram of the drug every 2 to 3 hours over several days until the user runs out of the drug or is too disorganized to continue. Chronic abuse can lead to psychotic behavior, characterized by intense paranoia, visual and auditory hallucinations, and out-of-control rages that can be coupled with extremely violent behavior.

The first challenge of rehab centers in addiction treatment is to help the individual with their drug and alcohol cravings. Cravings are strong, uncontrollable, urges that drive the addict to use over and over. Some withdrawal symptoms and cravings are caused by poor nutrition and depletion of vitamin stores in the body that the drugs are sucking out of the body. Depletion of nutrition and vitamins can cause the person to be tired and moody and can also cause shakiness and pain. The drugs accumulating in the body stress the various systems in the body including nerve systems. At this point more drugs are used in an attempt to alleviate feelings and emotions that the drugs themselves are creating. This is why treating drug addiction with more drugs only makes the problem worse and is now being rejected as a workable therapy by many rehab centers.