Finding Cocaine Addiction Help For a Loved One
Cocaine’s powerful stimulant effects can attract productive-minded individuals just as easily as it attracts the casual recreational user. The drug’s initial effects promote feelings of confidence, energy and initiative luring even the most conservative of persons into its web of addiction.
Watching a loved one sink into the hole of addiction can be hard to bear. Cocaine addictions strip away a person’s sense of self and purpose to the point where addicts can’t help but lash out at those closest to them out of frustration.
Cocaine addiction help may well be the only way out for people who use the drug on a regular basis. Detox treatment programs provide addicts with the supports needed to break the body’s physical dependency on the drug.
Cocaine addiction help also offers ongoing psychosocial treatment where recovering addicts learn new ways of coping with daily life pressures. Ultimately, the severity of your loved one’s addiction will determine what type of cocaine addiction help will best meet his or her treatment needs.
Cocaine’s Damaging Effects
A cocaine addiction takes addicts on an emotional roller coaster ride made up of unpredictable “highs” and ever-worsening withdrawal effects. With ongoing use, the brain becomes physically dependent on the drug’s effects to function normally as brain cells grow weak from overuse.
With each dose of cocaine, brain cells secrete massive amounts of neurotransmitter chemicals, according to Macalester College. Over time, weakened brain cells become desensitized to cocaine’s effects driving users to ingest even larger doses of the drug. This cycle of cravings and withdrawal will continue until a person gets needed cocaine addiction help.
Detox Needs
Overcoming a cocaine addiction is possible with the right help and support.
Most every cocaine addict’s recovery process starts with detox treatment. Granted, some people can break the body’s physical dependency on the drug on their own. It is possible. However, those who do have an ample support network of friends and family in place to get them through this most difficult of stages.
Cocaine addiction help begins with detox treatment administered by a licensed, experienced treatment facility. The type of cocaine addiction help offered through treatment facilities provides addicts with the 24-hour care, monitoring and structure needed to make it through the detox stage.
Psychological Treatment Needs
Addiction involves a psychological component that drives a person’s drug-using behaviors. This aspect of addiction mirrors the body’s physical dependency as the mind has also become dependent on the drug’s effects.
In many cases, by the time a person seeks out cocaine addiction help, additional psychological problems have developed from the damage done to brain chemical functions. The combined effects of addiction and psychological problems require professional help; otherwise, a person will soon resume drug use after detox.
Treatment Program Levels
As different people experience addiction in different ways, cocaine addiction help includes a range of treatment program levels. For addicts coming off chronic long-term addictions, inpatient programs offer the type of ongoing structure and intensive treatment needed to give a person a solid foundation in the recovery process.
For loved ones in the early stages of addiction (or those just completing inpatient treatment), outpatient programs offer a more flexible treatment schedule where recovering addicts can still meet work and family obligations while receiving needed treatment care.