Addiction treatment that doesn’t entail substantive psychological therapy isn’t really addiction treatment at all. Treatment, after all, can’t work unless it confronts the full scope of addiction itself…and addiction is a disease with jointly physical and psychological origins, one that infects the minds of its victims as surely as it infects their bodies. Addiction treatment, simply stated, can’t work if it fails to recognize as much.

Successful drug and alcohol treatment is above all else that which helps addiction treatment patients remake themselves: which gives addicts the power to change the way they relate to themselves and the world. Addiction is an overwhelming disease precisely because it warps addicts’ engagement with reality, and leaves them unable to understand anything except their need to use drugs. Addiction treatment, when it works, changes that perverse dynamic. Addiction treatment that works is addiction treatment that gives an addict mastery over his impulses, and over himself. For your own sake, for the sake of the people who care about you, make today the day you decide to seek addiction treatment. You’ve got an important road ahead of you. It’s well past time you started walking.

This entry was posted on Sunday, August 5th, 2007 at 8:59 pm and is filed under Addiction Treatment. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.