How To Change Your Lifestyle After Drug Rehab

As many health experts know, drug addiction can be a very problematic condition to grapple with. This is the case for many reasons, including the fact that drug addiction has a profoundly negative impact on one's mind and body. Additionally, drug addiction can dramatically alter the addict's life by alienating her or him from family members who do not want to be exposed to the dangerous environment and lifestyle illicit substance use entails. Moreover, drug addicts may find themselves abandoning activities they formerly engaged in, such as playing a sport or vacationing in the mountains with friends, because the substance abuse addiction begins consuming time and money. For these reasons, it is often important for a drug addict to overcome the negative power of their addiction through the use of drug rehabilitation.

Statistics

To gain a better understanding of the profoundly negative effect that drugs can have, as well as the state of the drug rehabilitation world today, carefully consider the following statistics:

• Of the 23.5 million people aged 12 and up who needed treatment as a result of alcohol or illicit drug use, only 11.2 percent (or 2.6 million) of individuals received it through a specialty facility.
• According to the Treatment Episode Data Set (TEDS), 1.8 million people were admitted to facilities offering treatment for drug and alcohol abuse in 2008. (These facilities reported to State administrative data systems regarding their work.)
• Most of the treatment admissions (41.4%) pertained to the abuse of alcohol.
• Use of heroin and other opiates made up the highest percentage of drug rehabilitation admissions, which totaled about 20%. Marijuana followed with 17% of drug-related admissions.

Once one gains a general understanding of the need for drug rehabilitation centers, the fact that making use of them can be advantageous becomes plain. In addition to offering drug addicts counseling services, a drug rehabilitation facility can direct the addict towards other services that can speed up her or his recovery time. Despite the fact that drug rehabilitation facilities can help addicts, however, individuals who are released from such facilities because of physiological improvement should note that they are responsible for changing their lifestyle once they leave. Here are several strategies that can be employed to do this very thing:

Post-Rehab Lifestyle Change Strategies

1. Build A Support System.

Many recovering drug addicts recognize the importance and efficacy of this strategy. In short, building a support system is important because being able to connect with people who have also struggled with and/or overcome a drug addiction is encouraging. While these types of individuals should definitely be a part of the recovering addict's support system, addicts should also include friends and family members who are generally concerned about their well-being. Although these individuals may not know what it is like to have a physiological addiction to an illicit substance, interacting with them will likely bring the recovering addict a sense of wanted normalcy. Moreover, friends and family members can offer the recovering addict the type of genuine love and encouragement that aids the recovery process.

2. Change Your Environment.

Oftentimes, individuals who want to make their recovery from drug addiction permanent find that they must change their environment. This is the case because the former environment likely increased the former addict's susceptibility to drug use. Indeed, environments where illicit drugs are readily available, and where people make use of them without inhibition or regret, can increase the likelihood that the recovering addict will resume drug use. For this reason, changing your environment by making friends with people who are sober, and avoiding places where drugs are used or sold can help contribute to a permanent recovery. Although the strategies listed above regarding how to change your lifestyle after drug addiction are not exhaustive, they are some common tips that can engender positive results. Other strategies a recovering addict might want to employ include repairing broken relationships which engender a sense of guilt that makes drug use seem ideal. You may also want to try developing new hobbies that can replace the time spent using drugs.

Alcohol: How Much is too Much

How much alcohol qualifies as too much? Many Americans ask themselves this question every day due to concerns over their health, their behavior, or the legal repercussions of public intoxication and driving under the influence. Individuals who find their lives unmanageable due to their alcohol consumption often choose to give it up altogether. Others try to figure out whether they have in fact exceeded a reasonable threshold in an effort to cut down on their drinking.

Accepted Limits vs. "Heavy" Drinking

Medical science has tried to make the issue more straightforward by setting some general rules, establishing two drinks per day, or 14 drinks per week, as an acceptable amount for adult males and one drink as day, or 7 drinks per week, as acceptable for adult females. 4 or more drinks per day for men, and 3 or more drinks for women, enters the "heavy drinking" range. Binge drinking on a Saturday therefore counts as excessive, even if the drinker has abstained throughout the week, because it violates the daily drink limit.

What Is a Drink, Anyway?

But what constitutes a drink? This question seems simple enough, but variations in portion size and alcohol content can make reliable measurements difficult. Accepted general standards for "a drink" include:

• 12 ounces of beer
• 7 to 8 ounces of malt liquor
• 5 ounces of table wine
• 3 to 4 ounces of sherry or port
• 2 to 3 ounces of liqueur or cordial
• 1.5 ounces of brandy
• 1.5 ounces of 80-proof spirits 

Even within these reasonably predictable portion sizes, however, actual alcohol content of the substances at hand can vary considerably. A sweet white wine, for example, will typically have a lower alcohol content than a dry red wine, while beer percentages hover up and down from brand to brand. Individuals must view the percentage marked on the container to get an idea of how much alcohol they are consuming.

Health Considerations

Pre-existing health conditions may force some drinkers to call it an evening earlier than others. Impaired organ function, for instance, may reduce alcohol tolerance to the point where one drink causes drunkenness. These individuals can do their health a tremendous favor by swearing off alcohol altogether, despite its association with certain cardiovascular benefits. The combination of prescription drugs with any amount of alcohol can have wildly unpredictable results. For those who take medication on a regular basis, any amount of alcohol may prove excessive or even dangerous.

The Tricky Nature of Blood Alcohol Levels

Drinking's effects also vary by gender. Women tend to show elevated blood alcohol levels more quickly than men, due to their relatively slighter build and higher percentage of body fat. Police use blood alcohol levels to determine whether drivers have operated their vehicles while intoxicated. While the intoxication level can vary from state to state, "legally drunk" generally means a blood alcohol level between .08 percent and .1 percent. Since different people can reach this number after differing degrees of alcohol intake, anyone who drives regularly has an excellent reason to simply give up drinking for good.

Making the Right Choice

Beyond all of these other determining factors, however, drinkers must ask themselves a personal question -- whether their behavior has had a damaging effect on their everyday lives and health. Concern over drinking habits doesn't generally occur in a vacuum; many people begin to question their drinking only after a specific incident brings the subject to the fore. These incidents, however regrettable they may seem at the time, can provide a powerful incentive to change things for the better and embrace rehabilitation or other treatment. In the end, the individual must choose what kind of life he wishes to lead as the ultimate benchmark for the question, "How much is too much?"

How methamphetamine detox works

Methamphetamine is a highly addictive drug that stimulates your central nervous system. In 2011, about 5.9 million people over the age of 26, in the US alone, had taken methamphetamine at some point in their life. Meth has gotten a lot of media coverage over the years. It seems we keep hearing about an illegal meth lab that has exploded due to the chemicals used, or seeing the famous Faces of Meth collected and advertised by The Meth Project. But, how does meth create such a terrible change within a person, and what exactly does it do to your body?

Physical and Mental Addiction to Methamphetamine

Most drugs affect the brain in a way that encourages addiction. Some addiction is mostly psychological. Some addiction is mainly physical. Meth addiction is often both psychological and physical. Using methamphetamine floods the brain with the chemical dopamine. This chemical tells your body that it is doing something good – or has accomplished something pleasant. After flooding the brain with this pleasure chemical, it then stops the chemical from absorbing back into the system. When you experience reward or pleasure without a drug, your brain is releasing this chemical, then absorbing it, then releasing it back into the system again as a natural process. But meth stops the absorption process, so the feeling of pleasure is even more intense than you would normally experience naturally. Addicts pursue this intense high. Using the drug over and over again can actually change the structure and function of the brain. The physical effects of meth are extremely negative. Because it is a stimulant, it increases heart rate, breathing rate, and blood pressure which can lead to heart attacks, seizures or strokes. Use of meth can also lead to hyperthermia (abnormally high body temperature). Additionally, the drug itself is so bad for the body that it can cause dental decay and infections in the lining of your lungs, kidney, or liver. Even with these effects, those addicted to the drug will keep taking it because of the intense physical craving they experience for the drug. A person can become addicted to this drug after only one use. How fast they become addicted depends on their emotional state, their genetic structure, and their physical health.

Short and Long-Term Effects of Methamphetamine

Some of the effects of methamphetamine use:

• Increased heart rate, blood pressure, and body temperature
• Nausea
• Appetite reduction or loss
• Malnutrition and weight loss
• Depression
• Insomnia and disturbed sleep patterns
• Liver, kidney, and lung damage
• Extreme tooth decay
• Apathy
• Brain damage
• Stroke
• Epilepsy
• Short or long term memory loss
• Violent and bizarre behavior
• Hallucinations
• Panic attacks
• Convulsions and seizures
• Psychosis

Death After a high is reached when using meth, the user can experience a severe crash or breakdown. Additionally, meth is a stimulant, so while taking it a user can experience insomnia, but the insomnia can actually continue after the crash. Lack of sleep has its own set of side effects and symptoms including extreme irritability, depression, and psychotic episodes.

Medical Methamphetamine Detox

The process of withdrawing from meth can be extremely uncomfortable. The former user becomes depressed, loses energy and loses his or her ability to feel pleasure. Other withdrawal symptoms include anxiety, paranoia, insomnia, and suicidal thoughts. The most effective method of detoxing from meth is to get involved in an inpatient treatment program which features tightly monitored medical detox. This type of detox is designed to make the person withdrawing more comfortable utilizing medication, nutrition, and therapy to help them through the withdrawal process. The end result of a medical detox is a completely drug-free individual. It is also extremely important to continue rehab after detox in order to address the root causes of the addiction using therapy, support groups, and other means.

Sources:

www.DrugAbuse.gov
www.MethProject.org
www.DrugFreeWorld.com