Cannabis Addiction
Executive Director of Narconon Arrowhead Gary W. Smith reports, ‘Although the number of people coming to us who are abusing pot is a smaller percentage of our total clientele, in the 30 years I have been in the drug
rehabilitation field I have not seen these numbers of individuals literally hooked on marijuana and unable to stop on their own.
We’ve known for a long time that marijuana use can lead to other drugs but it is shocking to see people whose lives are being destroyed by smoking pot just like others we are treating who are addicted to crack or alcohol.
I believe this is happening because the strength of the pot that is being smoked today is probably ten times stronger than the pot of 20 years ago.’
Drug Rehab Information By State
Cocaine
addiction can involve the use of powder cocaine or the more potent form of cocaine known as crack.
Both are highly addictive, but crack creates an almost instantaneous short lived feeling of euphoria.
More and more of the substance is used more and more often in an attempt to regain the feelings of euphoria.
The cocaine initially filled some sort of need for the individual.
Perhaps it was only the need to fit in. Cravings, guilt, and depression soon set in and only get worse as the individual violates his own values and those of his family and loved ones in an attempt to simply get back to some feeling of normality. It is a deadly trap that can only end one of three ways – jail, death, or sobriety
How does one go about determining when
drug use crosses the line into drug
abuse and addiction?
Drugs are used as a solution to pain, be it mental, emotional, or physical.
Fore instance one takes a painkiller and physical pain subsides or one take a street drug and the emotional pain of feeling like an outsider goes away.
There are many motivations but they all come under the heading of handling pain in one way or another.
Drug
abuse sets in when the drug is being used more and more to mask and cover up the pain rather than addressing the actual causes of the pain itself. From abuse one quickly moves on to
addiction where tolerance to the drugs builds up to the point where the individual can’t conceive of life without them for fear of unbearable pain of one type or another. Ones life then becomes centered on acquiring and using more and more drugs at any cost or sacrifice. Along with this comes all the cravings, guilt and depression that results from harm done to self, family, loved ones, careers, etc.
Prescription drug
addiction generally occurs with those medications which suppress pain of a physical or emotional nature.
Painkillers suppress physical pain and many are taken at levels exceeding recommended dosages and tolerance builds up fast,
abuse then continues in an attempt to handle the pain, or just out of fear of future pain.
Medications such as anti-depressants are designed to suppress various forms of mental stress or duress.
Abuse of these is similar to painkillers in that dosages are exceeded and tolerance builds leading to more and more of the drug needed in an attempt to maintain emotional balance.
Prescription drug
addiction in both these cases results from trying to mask the symptoms rather than treating and resolving the underlying causes of the physical or emotional pain.
Long term drug
treatment is proving to be more and more effective in handling
addiction and
alcoholism for a lifetime.
With the majority of
rehab participants entering
treatment with multiple drugs of
abuse and
addiction a long term
drug treatment becomes more and more an important point in obtaining lifetime sobriety. There is also marked increase in potency of many of the drugs on the market these days to say nothing of the epidemic increase in the
abuse of
prescription drugs many of which have life threatening side effects.
Treatment needs to be monitored not in terms of days spent in treatment but rather in terms of lasting results for a lifetime.
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