Best Way To Quit Addiction

Resources: Identifying Strengths And Weaknesses Developing Skills To Fill The Gaps

Overcoming addiction requires you to evaluate your strengths and weaknesses and to address your weaknesses effectively. This involves two related sets of activities:

• First, you need to assess what resources you already have and what resources you currently lack.
• Then you need to develop the skills that will allow you to expand your resources. Moreover, these skills themselves are critical in overcoming addiction.

Not all people are created equal in terms of kicking addictions. You might think, Sure, I could lose weight if I had a personal trainer and chef like Oprah and those Hollywood stars. However, compared to someone else who cant afford a health club membership, you may be in a relatively good position to get in shape. Take someone working at a marginal jobsay, a single mother who waitresses. What does she do during a break or following work in order to relax? Smoking seems like the cheapest, easiest relief she can turn to, while a better-off person might take an aerobics class.

Research shows that the more resources people have and develop, the more likely they are to recover from addiction. Resources are not limited to money. Here are key assets in fighting an addiction:

Key Assets in Fighting Addiction

• Intimacy and supportive relationship

5.1. Assessing Your Strengths and Resources

• I quit smoking.
• People turn to me in crisis.
• I have always held a job.
• I have good relationships with my children.

Resist The Impulse To Run

The best and healthiest way to cope with your problems is by facing them.

Bring your problems out in the open, admit them to yourself and reach out to your support network who can help you sort them out.

Remind yourself that you dont have to be perfect.

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Why Is It So Hard To Overcome Addiction

As earlier mentioned, drug and substance abuse negatively affects your brain. This drives people to indulge in harmful behaviors despite the harm addiction brings.

Luckily, with the right resources and the appropriate treatment approach, anyone can wade through the challenges preventing them from overcoming addiction.

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Is Cold Turkey The Best Way

Even with the risk of death associated with quitting cold turkey, the method might have more support from addiction professionals if it actually worked from time to time. It doesnt. Look at any website that covers addiction and recovery. None of them, including 12keysrecovery.com, cite cold turkey as a viable treatment. Even those articles that talk about withdrawal do so in the context of medically assisted detox.

The fact is, recovering from drug or alcohol addiction isnt simple. Only 5 percent of smokers manage to stay smoke-free by going cold turkey, compared to a 20 percent rate overall. The relapse rate among those struggling with addiction in all types of recovery might be as high as 90 percent, so its hard to see how cold turkey could ever be successful.

There are many reasons why someone would start abusing alcohol or drugs, and none of them are addressed by simply stopping. Here are some of the reasons why a treatment program is better than the cold turkey approach.

Cbt And Watching Too Much Tv

1. Set a reasonable amount of time for TV and stick to it.

2. Schedule activities for yourself to do instead of watching TV.

3. With time, reduce your time in front of the TV and do more and more of the other healthy activities.

4. Every time you complete any of the other activities, reward yourself with something other than watching TV. This will help you associate the positive feelings you get from your rewards with not watching TV.

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Addiction Doesnt Exist In A Silo

Alcohol or substance abuse doesnt just happen.

Environment: Even if your family isnt vulnerable to addiction, exposure to drug use can lead to future use. So can childhood abuse or violence, peer pressure or easy access. Growing up in a troubling environment increases your risk of developing a problem.Mental Illness: People with depression, bipolar disorder or schizophrenia may turn to alcohol and drugs to even out wild mood swings or to cope with hallucinations and delusions. They may also lack the judgment to control their intake, upping their risk of both building up a tolerance and overdose.

Quitting cold turkey might keep you clean for a few days, but it does nothing to address these factors that might have led to the addiction in the first place. Without the right interventions, these factors will eventually come back and lead to a relapse.

Get Support For Nicotine Addiction

The first thing you should do when you want to stop using nicotine is to make others aware of your goal and get a support group, even if it’s just one person. While some behavioral research suggests that keeping your goals to yourself is the best way to reach them, that’s not true for addiction.

When it comes to addiction, you should have a supportive circle of people who can help keep you accountable and on the right track. Plus, sharing your intentions means you’ll also be able to share and celebrate your progress down the road, which can serve as further motivation for quitting completely.

Speaking to an expert might be what you need to quit for good. While you might not find a rehab center near you that treats only nicotine addiction, most rehab centers for alcohol and other drugs are equipped to treat nicotine addiction. For a more personalized approach, try outpatient counseling that includes cognitive behavioral therapy and motivational interviewing.

You can also use a free, confidential text or call line to talk to an expert about addiction. The National Institutes of Health offers both a and an online chat system, and provides nicotine cessation resources specifically for men, women, teens, military veterans and seniors.

Truth Initiative, a nonprofit that works to end tobacco and nicotine use, offers a text-to-quit messaging system specifically to help people quit using e-cigarettes.

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Avoid Replacement Addictive Behavior

The psychological and neurological processes of all addictive behaviors are the same. This is why people who give up smoking or drinking addiction find themselves eating obsessively. This behavior stems from underlying mental health problems and a constant urge to seek pleasure. To quit drugs once and for all it is also important to stop all kinds of addictions and fix the underlying problem causing the addiction. To avoid such addictions, one needs to find satisfaction and contentment from normal life experiences.

What Is The Best Way To Quit Heroin With The Highest Success Rate

While there are many options for quitting heroin, some treatment methods have a proven higher success rate. Interestingly, methadone has the highest success rate for helping people to quit heroin.

Buprenorphine and naltrexone are also very high in their success rates, helping many people to quit heroin. Medication-assisted treatment in general, has a higher success rate than rehab, group meetings, or therapy alone.

If you are thinking about quitting heroin, you may want to discuss your options with your doctor. Additionally, it is good to be open-minded, with a willingness to consider scientifically proven treatments that can work even better than the most prestigious rehab programs.

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Come To Reality With Your Addiction And Decide To Take Action

In many cases, drug addiction happens as a result of trauma in your life. However, there are many other cases when it happens almost by accident. An example of this is athletes who get addicted to painkillers. Either way, the first step to coming out of an addiction is facing the truth.

It can be easy to tell yourself that you dont have a real problem or that its not causing any damage, but these lies actually deepen your addiction. Admitting that there is a problem and being willing to reach out for help is the first step to recovery. It takes courage and strength to admit this to yourself and to anyone else, so dont diminish the importance of this first step.

Here are a few more tips to help you come to terms with your addiction.

Reflect on How Drugs Impacted Your Life

Think about the first time you tried drugs and what you were feeling. Ask yourself these questions:

• Have I seen my family recently?
• Have I seen my friends recently?
• Does my drug use make me feel shame or guilt?
• Have I broken the law because of these habits?
• Have I tried to stop and failed?
• Are these habits taking my life in a direction that I want?

You cant outsmart your addiction. But these questions can help you think about the difference between the life that you want to have and the life that you will have because of drugs.

Think About the Positive Changes When You Quit

Involve Your Loved Ones

Family and friends can provide encouragement and support when you stop drinking.

Maybe your partner, sibling, or roommate is also thinking about making a change. Changing drinking habits together allows you to support each other while also boosting your motivation and accountability.

Turner notes the importance of bringing along a trusted support person when attending events that involve alcohol. Its often easier to turn down a drink when you dont have to do it alone.

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Replace Bad Habit With The Good Habit

It is the fact that you cant quit any habit, you just can replace it with the good one.

Here, you can also replace the habit of drinking alcohol with another good habit such as playing sports, visiting a new place, reading books, or anything that you like.

If you get a strong urge to drink alcohol, drink non-alcoholic beer, juice, or something else except alcohol.

I will recommend you to become spiritual in life. It is my personal experience that spirituality literally modifies any person from the soul.

You will never find the calmness that spiritual practices can provide you.

You might have heard all these about spirituality.

But if you really want to get rid of alcohol addiction then the real-time for it has come.

Go and find a spiritual mentor, join spiritual communities, read spiritual books. These will help you very much.

In the previous article on how to get rid of masturbation habits, I talked about the benefits of spirituality in detail.

Are There Treatment Options Available

Many individuals benefit from who can help them overcome emotional difficulties and make positive changes in their lives. Usually, treatment incorporates:

• : This therapy focuses on challenging and changing unhelpful cognitive distortions and behaviors, improving emotional regulation, and developing coping strategies that target current problems.
• Individual therapy: One-on-one therapy sessions offer a unique and transparent space for those in recovery to express their challenges, emotions, and hopes.
• Couples therapy: When behavioral addictions break apart relationships, both romantic and family ones, couples counseling can help restore trust and rebuild relationships, which can be essential for support in long-term recovery.
• Group therapy: Speaking about challenges, emotions, and troubles in a group environment, can offer a sense of fellowship and support and provide a space to build sober relationships.
• Self-help groups: Usually, addiction is a lifelong journey self-help groups can offer aftercare support once someone ends treatment. Usually, these 12-step programs provide a sense of structure that can help with long-term sobriety.

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Use Your Feelings As A Feedback

Think of your painful emotions as the equivalent of physical pain.

Physical pain sends a powerful signal that something is wrong, nudging you to take action of some kind. Without physical pain, your situation would worsen, potentially leading to a premature death

Emotions work the same way. They exist as a signal that something needs attention and possibly some action. Perhaps, you need to let go of some people, or remove a disempowering story that creates suffering in your life.

E Get Treatment To Overcome An Addiction

The next step in your journey towards treatment, depending on how long youve been using and the severity of your condition, is treatment. The treatment includes both medical and psychological.

Theres no universal treatment for drug and substance addiction. What works for another may not work for you. But some of the treatment options include:

i) Psychotherapy

Psychotherapy, coupled with other behavioral therapies, can help you improve your coping skills, develop healthy habits, and change your perspective.

Examples of this kind of treatment include cognitive behavior therapy, which focuses on changing your thoughts and behaviors mindfulness therapy, which helps you fight anxiety and depression and motivational enhancement therapy, which enables you to increase your readiness for change.

Of course, family therapy is another option. This is particularly ideal for teens and young adults and is often effective in improving, supporting, and helping you overcome addiction.

ii) Medications

Medications are usually best suited for treating withdrawal symptoms. They also help you remain in treatment and prevent relapse.

The type of drugs the doctor will prescribe depends on your type of addiction and the extent of the damage. For instance, alcohol addiction, nicotine, and opioids have different prescription medications.

These medications are helpful in both the short and the long term. It is important to talk to your doctor about the available options for better outcomes.

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It Takes More Than Willpower To Stay Clean

If you started using to cope with issues in your life, youll eventually develop a physical addiction that leaves you craving the stuff even if you dont want it. If you got hooked because you were already predisposed to addiction, you may use enough to develop emotional and psychological effects that only continued use seems to manage. Either way, the addiction can become more powerful than your desire to quit.

The problem with going cold turkey is that you dont learn how to address the factors that led to addiction, or how to respond to triggers that might make you want to use again. You can quit cold turkey to get clean. To stay clean, you also need other treatments, including:

How To Beat Drug Addiction

by dmoakler | May 18, 2020 | Addiction Help

Dealing with drug addiction can make good people do things they never wanted to do. It can damage careers and relationshipsbut there is no one who is helpless or hopeless. By accepting your addiction, reaching out for help, and changing your habits, you can find sobriety and recovery. Read these eight tips to find out how to beat drug addiction and avoid relapses.

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Benefits Of Quitting Marijuana

• Quitting marijuana can help you regain your life sometimes, people who struggle with substance abuse issues end up neglecting key areas of their life that used to bring them joy and satisfaction. Some of these areas might include career, personal growth, friendships, relationships with family members, intimate relationships, and more. Quitting marijuana can help you rekindle these bonds and commitments and achieve freedom from addiction.
• Quitting marijuana can help you achieve better sleep quality. Some studies suggest that marijuana interferes with your bodys REM sleep cycles, sometimes disrupting your quality or depth of sleep. Sleep is an integral part of the body and brains health and overall recovery. Giving up weed might help you sleep better.11
• Quitting marijuana can protect your memory from worsening. Some studies suggest that THC exposure over long periods may quicken age-related loss of hippocampal neurons. In turn, this can impact your ability to process information and form memories. By giving up weed, your memory may improve and may be less likely to worsen.12

B Avoid Replacement Addictive Behaviors

Instead of finding addictive behaviors to replace your addiction, you should focus more on healthy strategies to support your long-term recovery.

The problem with those replacement behaviors is that they create rewarding feelings and sensations, just like your drug addiction. You will have achieved nothing in the end.

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How To Stop Bad Habits And Addictions

Many people think that all the addict needs is greater self-control and willpower.

If he could just try harder, surely he could stop drinking.

But nothing could be further from the truth relying on willpower alone is whats preventing an addict from recovering.

You might be able to get off an addiction for a week or month, but without a plan, youre very likely to relapse.

Some people believe that if you can show an addict how his addiction is hurting his health or throw out his mood changer, the problem will be solved.

But the truth is, neither the lack of information, not the supply is the problem.

Overcoming an addiction requires a new way of thinking about it.

In other words, the source of addiction isnt the individual substance or activity so much as our way of thinking.

• Addiction Recovery Resources

Do You Want A Life Without Addiction

We hope you have found this guide useful in your fight against addiction. The Life Process Program is a systematic, proven methodology for beating addiction. Whether you are battling an addiction to drugs, alcohol,food, , sex, or gambling, our program is a hands-on, practical guide to overcoming addiction of any kind. If you or a loved one is struggling with addiction we can offer additional help and support through our online Life Process Program.

I originally developed the Life Process Program as a residential program involving intense experiential learning, including exercises and feedback from counselors whom I personally trained. The treatment program was licensed, welcomed by insurers, and awarded the highest commendation for addiction treatment programs. Most people obviously cannot afford the time and expense of participating in a residential treatment program. My online LPP provides the same learning experience as the residential LPP program, but in an affordable, convenient package you can access on a home computer, laptop or mobile device.

So, please, explore the Life Process Program here and embark on your personal path to recovery. I believe you will never regret doing so.

Dr. Stanton Peele, Ph.D

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