Mental Health

A family of four sits on a couch, with the parents in the middle and two children, a boy and a girl, on either side, laughing and playing together—a scene that contrasts sharply with enmeshment, an obstacle to healthy relationships.

Enmeshment – An Obstacle To Healthy Relationships and Finding Your True Identity

Enmeshment. Have you ever heard of that term? It’s a fairly common term used by therapists to describe the interaction between some family members where one or more of the family members has a substance use disorder. Often those who are enmeshed are completely clueless that there may be a problem – they have no […]

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Mindset: Substance Use Disorder and Compulsive Behavior

Initially, a substance use disorder may be a way to numb feelings around trauma or abuse. At some point, however, the mindset and the motivation changes around addiction and becomes more about compulsive behavior than trauma or abuse. The trauma once buried by the substance use becomes an obsessive behavior that ultimately interferes with relationships

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Achieving Health and Wellness through your Recovery from Substance Use Disorder

People with substance use disorders in recovery need support to successfully manage their conditions and achieve wellness in their lives. Wellness is often taken for granted. It is important to create wellness habits as tools to be used to successfully obtain and maintain sobriety. Recovery is where people improve their health and wellness, become self-directed,

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Mental Illness And Suicide; A Common Factor And Powerful Stigma

How Survivors Heal From The Trauma To Move Forward . . . According to The Foundation for Suicide, suicide is the 10th leading cause of death in the United States. In 2017, 47,173 Americans died by suicide and 1,400,000.00 suicide attempts. Of every successful suicide, there are an estimated 6 or more survivors who are

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Did you know? Human Connection just might be the Opposite of Addiction

If the human connection is the opposite of addiction, can there be addiction where there is a connection? In a 2015 TED Talk entitled “Everything You Think You Know About Addiction is Wrong,” British journalist Johann Hari talks about the underlying causes of addiction, concluding that the opposite of addiction is not sobriety, it’s the

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Co-Occurring Disorders and Substance Use Disorders– How do they relate?

We hear a lot about Co-occurring disorders but what is it? A Co-occurring disorder is the presence of both mental health and a substance-use disorder. For example, an opioid substance use disorder coupled with depression is a common co-occurring disorder. Clients with co-occurring disorders (COD) typically have one or more disorders relating to the abuse of

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Finding True Happiness Inside of Substance Abuse Recovery

“Happiness is an inside job”- Abraham Hicks Substance abuse often starts as self-medication against internal struggles. At some point, we may extend this concept into other parts of our lives—just as we may have relied on the comfort provided by drugs, we may also rely on the comfort provided by people or things. Depending on

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Why the allure to anger is an addiction?

America seems to be addicted to Anger. A public epidemic, promoted by media coverage of road rage, mass shootings, and war. Anger affects our personal lives in many ways, from workplace frustrations to family arguments. Some symptoms of anger addiction are- self-stimulation, compulsion, obsession, denial, withdrawal and craving syndrome, and unpredictable behavior. Like alcoholism or substance abuse, anger

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Substance Use Disorder Is Rapidly Growing for Senior Citizens

Substance use disorder among the elderly population is a rapidly growing health problem in the United States. Addiction among people 65 and over is underestimated and under-diagnosed. According to the Office of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Services, substance use among senior citizens are classified either as the “hardy survivor,” or the “late onset” group. The

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