What Happens First at an Addiction Treatment Center?
When you take your first very brave steps into an addiction treatment
center, the process will begin with the staff (in some addiction treatment
centers there may be nurses and/or medical professionals as well), will
evaluate and assess each incoming patient, their needs, and their status
of addiction (timeline of using, what drug, how often, etc.). Before an
individual can be admitted into an addiction treatment center, a complete
physical examination will be performed in order to determine whether there
are any medical problems present, and do decide if a person may be at
higher risk for experiencing more severe withdrawal symptoms during the
detoxification period. If such risks are present during this examination,
then a different method of detox for that individual will be administered
in order to minimize the withdrawal symptoms and lower the risk of
complications with the detoxing. Most addiction treatment centers are
designed around the idea of making their patients as comfortable as
possible in an attempt to make their recovery process as easy as they
possibly can. Not only will the addiction treatment center focus of the
rehabilitation of the addiction itself, but they will also address any
other mental disorders through an initial psychiatric evaluation followed
by additional counseling. Underlying medical conditions, in some cases,
can contribute to the addiction and therefore those conditions need to be
treated as well.
The Rehab in Addiction Treatment Centers
After the initial intake process is completed, and the process of
detoxification is over, then the addiction treatment continues with the
counseling and therapy parts of rehab. There are several types of
counseling that patients will undergo during their time at an addiction
treatment center. Of those, the may include, but are not limited to: group
counseling or therapy, individual counseling, family counseling and
therapy, and educational counseling. The very first goal of counseling for
addiction treatment centers is to help the person explore him or herself
and identify why they began to use drugs in the first place. Another is to
have the person compare their life and their behaviors to who they are
now, a person who was using drugs, to who they were before they started
using drugs, which was a person clean and sober. Another important aspect
of counseling while in an addiction treatment center is to identify the
“triggers” the person has that make using drugs or drinking more likely.
Triggers can be anything from people, places, events, and so on. By
identifying the individual’s personal triggers, the counselors can help
them to construct a plan of attack in order to assist the individual in
avoiding those triggers and ultimately making the choice to stay sober
much easier once they leave the addiction treatment center.
By evaluating themselves and really looking into who they are as
individuals, the willingness to change will become much more prominent. By
knowing, and acknowledging, what it is about themselves that patient wants
to change, and understanding the reasoning behind these changes, the time
spent at the addiction treatment center will be much more beneficial.
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