(Newswire.net — December 19, 2017) — Contrary to popular opinion, heroin addiction can be treated and is in fact one of the medical conditions that respond well to treatment.
Addiction can be very severe. It’s a brain relapsing disease that causes the individual to compulsively seek and use the drug despite knowing how harmful the consequences are. This has nothing to do with morals and in situations like this the victim has no control over themselves anymore.
People experience heroin addiction differently because the main causes of the addiction can be attributed to certain biological and genetic factors – which of course are individual factors.
This is not to say social factors such as trauma or injury, parent’s history of addiction, mood disorders such as depression and anxiety or even psychological trauma do not play their roles too.
Here are the 3 steps to effective treatment of heroin addiction:
1. Heroin detox
This is the first step to treating heroin addiction. Detoxification is simply chemical withdrawal from heroin.
The detox process will take place at a medical treatment center for a couple of days. Your body might start to experience withdrawal symptoms within a few hours of ending the heroin use – when there are no longer traces of heroin in your system.
You start to have symptoms like flu, goose bumps and chills, insomnia, fever, twitching legs, vomiting, etc. Methadone or Buprenorphine will be administered to you by your doctor.
Methadone is a slow-acting opioid medication. It is taken orally and reduces withdrawal symptoms in heroin addicts. It dampens the high while preventing the withdrawal symptoms. Buprenorphine is sold under the brand name Subutex, and is also an opioid used to treat heroin addiction.
It relieves the addicts of their addiction without producing the other dangerous side effects of other opioids. It has a lower potential for misuse, less physical dependence and euphoria, and helps patients stay in treatment.
However, it is important to know that not all heroin users experience the above symptoms so the treatment for heroin will vary, depending on the individual.
2. Therapy
Once the detoxification is complete, you proceed to attending classes where you have one-on-one chats with counselors, attend support meetings and some other treatments alongside. During this period, you’ll learn how to handle triggers – people and situations that encourage you to revert back to heroin use.
Some outdoor residential centers provide outdoor activities like swimming, hiking, horseback riding, etc. These will help you effectively relief stress through the use of physical activities. There are also additional coping activities like meditation and yoga, deep breathing, etc. to aid and fasten your recovery.
3. Maintenance
After going through the process above and you return home healthy, you’ll still need consistent follow-up to ensure you don’t revert to your old habits. This maintenance process will require you attending 12-step meetings like Narcotics Anonymous or various other support groups.
Family members of heroin addicts are also encouraged to engage in counseling themselves for better understanding of how to deal with the change in behavior of the heroin addict and how to better support them through the treatment process.
Being free of heroin addiction might seem impossible to heroin addicts at first because their brain is already wired to believe they cannot be fully functional without it. However, the steps above are very effective in treating heroin addiction, and in a little while, you’ll be free and fully functional with total control over yourself.