Addiction Programs
Addiction is a chronic, relapsing disease characterized by compulsive drug-seeking and abuse and by long-lasting chemical changes in the brain. Addiction is a habit that has ‘progressed beyond voluntary control’. This why it is important that family and friends of the addict be supportive rather than aggressive or condemning as being surrounded by supportive people can help gently push the addict towards recognizing he has a drug addiction problem and seeking some kind of addiction recovery program. The APH community supports a re-framing of the recovery process into a dynamic yet simple two-stage holistic process. Our inner self-protective system will update old compulsions and defenses with other primary or secondary addictions.
Medications, such as antidepressants, mood stabilizers, or neuroleptics, may be critical for treatment success when patients have co-occurring mental disorders, such as depression, anxiety disorder, bipolar disorder, or psychosis. Drug and alcohol addiction is a private disease that affects many. The best programs provide a combination of therapies and other services to meet the needs of the individual patient, which are shaped by such issues as age, race, culture, gender, pregnancy, parenting, housing, and employment, as well as physical and sexual abuse.