Psychotherapy for Addiction

Addiction is a chronic and reoccurring brain disease that causes individuals to abuse psychoactive substances (substances that directly affect the brain). Addiction is classified as a brain disease because chronic drug use physically alters the brain and impacts how it functions. Sometimes the damage that drugs cause can be reversed, and in some cases, permanent damage results. The treatment of addiction is complex, often involving several activities, including social support, lifestyle changes, and psychotherapy.

What is Addiction?

Individuals who start using drugs don’t usually plan on becoming addicts, and once they become addicted, their drug use behaviors become involuntary – that is, initial drug use is voluntary, but as drugs alter important brain chemicals and processes, continued drug seeking is no longer voluntary. Addiction is that point in the drug user’s history when he or she could no longer choose to use or not use the drug.

How does this happen? Drugs stimulate the release of certain important brain chemicals (called neurotransmitters), mostly targeting those neurotransmitters associated with pleasurable sensations. Because the drug user’s brain is being exposed to more of the drug on a more continual basis, the brain starts to produce new receptor cells to “receive” these drugs. Certain areas of the brain are particularly affected. At the same time that new cells are being created, cells in certain areas – especially areas that are responsible for self-control and decision making – become under-stimulated, less active, or damaged.

Once an individual becomes chemically-dependent – meaning they cannot function without the drug, then they are likely to experience cravings at an increasing frequency, but will find that using the same amount of the drug they have previously used, is no longer effective. In response, they increase the amount of drug or alcohol. This cycle of increased cravings and increased use continues to escalate. Cravings are one of the main reasons that addicts tend to relapse, and research has demonstrated that at least one third of drug users who have stopped their drug use, will relapse within one year. Withdrawal from a drug is at minimum, extremely unpleasant, and in some cases, must be medically-monitored. Part of what makes withdrawal so unpleasant is that it involves cell death in the brain. Because the brain overproduced certain receptors to accommodate the drug, when that drug is withdrawn, these cells begin to die off.

Research has established some key risk factors for addiction. Poverty is an important environmental risk. Drugs are more likely to be available in poor neighborhoods. Young people who demonstrate early aggressive behavior patterns and poor social skills are at higher risk for addiction. Parenting also plays a role. Children who are not closely monitored and supervised by their parents are also more at risk. Scientists also believe that the predisposition for addiction is hereditary – potentially 40% to 60% of vulnerability to addiction may be due to genetic factors.