Mental Health And Addiction Go Hand-In-Hand
August 8, 2007 by Alicia Sparks, Mental Health Notes
Filed under Diseases & Conditions
I went to a Narcotics Anonymous (NA) meeting last night to show support for a very close person in my life.
Although I grew up in an area riddled with drug addiction, and now live in an area riddled with drug addiction, I’ve never truly understood how easy it is to become addicted to drugs and how difficult it is to get control of the addiction.
Sure, I knew from common knowledge and the millions of “Don’t Do Drugs” signs in my schools growing up – but I never really grasped the fact that once you’re addicted, you’re always addicted, and it’s nearly, if not completely, impossible to just wake up one morning and say, “I’m never using drugs again.”
NA teaches you to take it one day at a time, which makes sense. It’s easier to wake up and say, “Today, I’m not going to use drugs” than it is to say, “I will never use again.” The former statement gives you a more reasonable and attainable goal – something you can “see” and for which you can feel rewarded once you succeed. The latter statement, however, makes people feel overwhelmed – and you can’t exactly pat yourself on the back once “never” rolls around.
I thought a lot about the mental health issues many people are dealing with when they initially begin using drugs. I can identify with mental health issues, and to what lengths people will go to alleviate the pain. However, I can only imagine what additional mental health problems using drugs and the recovery process must bring.
Aside from that, I found a lot of useful tactics at that NA meeting I think would benefit people with mental illnesses – personally and at group meetings – such as understanding the importance of having someone to whom you can really open up and talk, as well as having someone you can contact when you really feel that danger is on the horizon.
Mental health and addiction go hand-in-hand. I discovered that within the last couple of years, but last night’s meeting drove it home for me.
I told the group about the local NAMI support meetings, and that our next topic would be depression. The next time I attend the NA meeting, I’ll take brochures and flyers. I’d love to see them all there.
Do you have any experience with addictions and mental health issues? A family member, or a friend? What have you learned from it?
If you’d like to read more on addictions, I encourage you to visit A Dozen Steps by Mark W.
I completely agree. The addiction is often the symptom and not the actual cause of the problem. Bad mental health is probably what has led most people to find an escape. Also taking it one day at a time is great advice. Goals must be broken down into small manageable size so one can incrementally gain success and confidence. Good Post!
IPMAH: “Manageable” – that’s exactly the word I was looking for this morning! It’s much easier to manage it when you take it one day at a time. The same goes for gaining control of your mental illness. I can’t say, “I’m never going to be manic again!” but I can say, “If I start to feel manic today, I will take the steps to regain control.”
Mark: No problem
I’m going to pass it along to my friend because, even though it’s AA, it has a lot of similar approaches.
I am an addictions therapist. Depending on what set of numbers you look at 50-80% of people with addictions have co-occuring mental health problems.
There used to be turf wars about which gets treated first, mental health or addictions. The more progressive trend now is to look at both problems as primary and get treatment for both at the same time.
Bill: I can see the reasoning behind that. I imagine it would be difficult for a counselor and a person with an addiction to focus on treating/getting control of an addiction of there are mental health issues lurking in the background.
What are your thoughts on being “an addict” for life?
A pdoc in the facility I work in says that in 95% of the cases of someone with an addiction—if they were to become clean—the mental illness pops up—he says the addiction is the persons way of self medicating. If they were then treated properly for the MI and remain compliant—there would be no need for the use of street drugs.
BamaGal: That makes perfect sense to me. I’m not a pdoc, but I’ve had tons of exposure to the mental health field and I’ve just recently (within the past couple of months) told this close person in my life that I know realize he was/is self-medicating and that aside from rehab (which is done) and NA, he needed to see a professional (therapist, counselor, whomever) to learn to solve these issues he has without the drugs.