Florida Drug Relapse Prevention
One of the sizable hurdles to long-term recovery is the risk of relapsing. At Celadon Recovery, our Fort Myers relapse prevention therapy program can help you stay committed to long-term recovery. In fact, our recovery programs are designed so you can learn to recognize and manage potential triggers to use.
Our intensive relapse prevention plans focus on both your physical and mental health. The prevention plan will include tactics for reducing stress levels, developing healthy coping tools, and avoiding (obvious) triggers. We’ll also provide you with the actionable resources needed to build a strong social support network.
Our addiction recovery programs in SWFL will assist you to build a foundation for continuing recovery. Call us at 239.266.2141 today to get started.
How Alcohol and Drug Abuse Change the Brain
If you’ve ever felt like a physical relapse seems inevitable, you aren’t being dramatic. Research shows that chronic addiction literally affects the wiring of your brain.
Drug use interferes with how your neurons send and receive communication signals. Some drugs, like opioids or stimulants, continuously activate the brain’s reward system.
Even though you might experience an initial euphoria when you’re under the influence, chronic exposure eventually causes your brain to adapt and habituate to the drug’s presence. Over time, you become dependent on it to function- it can be hard to feel pleasure from anything else.
Furthermore, drug use impacts how the brain plans, prepares, and solves problems. As a result, some people struggle with “brain fog” or general themes of indecisiveness or poor impulse control in early recovery.
The Dangers of Relapse
Why is relapse prevention so important? Relapse is a frequent part of the addiction recovery process. Reverting to drug use after a period of abstinence is downright hazardous for a number of reasons. First, using again without a build-up tolerance makes your body susceptible to overdose. At the same time, relapse can also lead to abandoning treatment altogether.
Physical and mental cravings are the most pronounced factors affecting relapse. Other relapse risk factors include increased anxiety, poor coping strategies, and a withdrawal from 12-step support. Part of our prevention program is also showing you how to spot risk factors while developing personal strategies for controlling them.
What Are the Stages of Addiction Relapse?
Drug relapse is not usually a quick, isolated event, it is actually a protracted process that appears in 3 phases: emotional, mental, and physical. Being self-aware of these three stages can help prevent relapse before it arises.
After completing drug rehab, one of the most intense fears many patients face is relapse. It is somewhat expected for individuals who are struggling to overcome drug or alcohol addiction. Many people experience multiple relapse episodes prior to successfully achieving lasting recovery. Relapse is a process, NOT an event. It starts in delicate ways and progressively worsens. In order to understand relapse prevention, one must first know the stages of relapse.
Stage 1: Emotional Relapse
Emotional relapse is the first phase of drug relapse. During this stage, the individual is not actively thinking about using drugs or alcohol. However, their reactions and behaviors may be setting them up for a relapse somewhere in the future.
Stage 2: Mental Relapse
When we decided not work on any signs in the emotional stage, there is an incremental risk of moving to the second phase of relapse. In the mental relapse, people grow at odds with themselves as they don’t want to pick up drug but feel compelled. As individuals go deeper into the second relapse stage, thoughts of using grow while commitment to relapse prevention tools dwindle.
Stage 3: Physical Relapse
When a person doesn’t take the time to admit and address the symptoms from emotional and mental relapse, it’s a short distance to physical relapse. This includes drinking alcohol or using drugs. The key (at this point) is to reach out for help and get back into residential treatment.
Medication Assisted Treatment is Relapse Prevention
Addiction has finally been recognized as a disease and no longer seen as a moral collapse. While medication assisted treatment for relapse prevention is not new, it has only been used inadequately in last number of decades. One of the biggest reasons medicines like Suboxone / Subutex / Naltrexone are being used to treat opioids is that they meaningfully reduce relapse rates by controlling withdrawals and cravings. Most notably, MAT patients have far better outcomes than patients in abstinence-only treatment center programs. At the same time, the use of Buprenorphine has given opioid addiction sufferers a more successful relapse prevention medicine that can used independent of treatment.
Take the First Step Today
At Celadon Recovery, our relapse prevention therapy program in Fort Myers can help you develop the tools and strategies needed to remain sober. We provide an evidence-based approach to relapse prevention and offer both individual and group therapy programs that are rooted in cognitive discovery.
If you’d like to learn more about our relapse prevention therapy program, contact us today at 239.266.2141.
