Relapse Prevention in Pasadena, TX

Relapse prevention is an important component of any high quality addiction treatment program. Relapse prevention in Pasadena occurs across many domains in rehab, and it's essential for helping you stay sober during the early weeks and months of recovery.

Addiction relapse may occur when you use again, or lapse, once you're in recovery. A lapse can cause a relapse, or recurrence, of the addiction, once again characterized by compulsive drug or alcohol use despite the negative consequences.

Drug and alcohol addiction in Pasadena is the result of shifts in brain function that occur when you chronically use drugs or alcohol. As your brain changes its chemical functions to compensate for the presence of a psychoactive substance, it makes strong connections between the drug use and the pleasure it produces. It begins to associate enjoying the drug with wanting it. The result is intense cravings driven by the same mechanisms that drive us to seek out food and sex to your brain, drugs become essential to survival. These brain changes affect your thought and behavior patterns, which become dysfunctional and contribute to the progression of the addiction.

Addiction is a chronic disease, which means that it can't be cured. However, it can be sent into remission through abstinence supported by therapy that helps you address the underlying causes of the addiction and re-learn healthy ways of thinking and behaving. But just as it takes time to develop an addiction, it takes time for brain function to return to normal, and it takes time to develop new thought and behavior patterns and make lifestyle changes that support recovery.

During early recovery, relapse prevention programs help you stay sober by offering practical tips, skills, and strategies that reduce stress, help you manage cravings, and address other potent triggers for relapse.

Relapse Prevention in Pasadena Occurs Through Many Avenues

Addiction relapse prevention isn't just one program. It occurs through a variety of programming offered in treatment.

Psychoeducational classes are part therapy and part education. They help you understand how addiction develops and how it's treated. They help you understand the mechanics of relapse and how it occurs, and they offer immediate practical strategies for maintaining sobriety in the challenging early weeks and months of recovery.

Psychotherapy, or talk therapy, helps you change your dysfunctional thought and behavior patterns, and it delves into the issues that underlie the addiction, which may include a history of trauma, chronic stress, family dysfunction, or mental illness. You'll identify your triggers and develop essential skills to help you successfully cope with them.

Pharmacotherapy, or the use of medication, helps you get a mental illness under control, and it can help reduce cravings for some substances, including alcohol and opioids like heroin and prescription painkillers.

Complementary therapies like art, music, and nature therapy, yoga and meditation, and acupuncture help you relieve stress and improve your body's stress response to reduce the risk of relapse. Complementary therapies also help you work through difficult emotions and experiences and improve your self-awareness and self-confidence, which go a long way toward promoting long-term abstinence.

Support groups are an important component of treatment, offering a high level of peer support. Support groups promote personal accountability, and they offer the opportunity to share tips and strategies for coping with stress, high-risk situations, and other important triggers for relapse. They provide access to emergency support around the clock.

Aftercare plans are developed once treatment programs in Pasadena are complete and offer ongoing addiction relapse prevention through a variety of programming based on your unique needs. The aftercare plan typically includes ongoing therapy and participation in a support group, and it may also include a sober living program, ongoing monitoring of a mental illness, educational assistance, vocational rehab, and other essential relapse prevention programs.

Relapse Doesn't Mean Treatment Failed

Relapse rates for addiction are similar to those for other chronic diseases like diabetes and heart disease. Between 40 and 60 percent of people in recovery will relapse, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse. Relapse prevention in Pasadena dramatically reduces your risk of relapse, but if you lapse or relapse anyway, it's not the end of the world, and it doesn't mean that treatment didn't work.

But while relapse was once considered to be a catastrophe, it's now regarded as a normal part of recovery, and it's considered to be an opportunity to evaluate what went wrong, determine what skills you're missing, and develop those skills to prevent a similar problem in the future. Relapse prevention programs stress that the most important thing is to seek help as soon as possible once a lapse or relapse occurs.

Approaching a lapse or relapse with a positive attitude and focusing on the progress you've made rather than on the relapse is essential for getting back on track quickly and stronger in recovery than ever. Call us now at (877) 804-1531.