When to Seek Drug and Alcohol Treatment

There’s a big difference between someone who drinks a beer every now and again, such as at major holiday parties or even every other weekend or once a month, and someone who drinks everyday. There is an even bigger difference between someone who has a glass of wine nightly with dinner and someone who drinks until they are throwing up and maybe even black out. You cannot define someone who needs drug and alcohol treatment by how many drinks they drink, how often, or even how many drugs they take. It’s different for everyone. However, you should seek drug and alcohol treatment any time you feel as though drugs and alcohol have a hold on your life and you don’t like the way things are going. If you feel as though may lose everything if you don’t stop, and if you feel as though you may die if you don’t stop, then you need to take yourself to a residential drug and alcohol treatment center immediately.

Interventions

Some families will get together to stage an intervention. This is usually after the person has become a real problem to live with or even be around. The drugs and/or alcohol have seriously buried the person who that person used to be. What’s left now is an embittered addict who cares little for the feelings of those who surround him or her, and can only think about that next hit or drink. This is when the family comes together and tells that person that this is enough, they’re not going to take it anymore and that the person must enter a drug and alcohol treatment program or else they will give an ultimatum, usually to either kick the person out of the house or leave them alone completely.

Entering Treatment

Whether you had an intervention, or you have hit absolutely rock bottom, taking yourself to a drug and alcohol treatment center is a very big step. Once you arrive, you’ll have to decide if it’s going to be inpatient or outpatient care. Inpatient care will keep you inside the facility where you will undergo constant supervision and treatment. The outpatient care allows you to live your life normally and even work, while undergoing treatment simultaneously. Choose the one that’s right for you. Don’t choose one or the other because you’re trying to stay inside your comfort zone. For instance, don’t choose outpatient care because you don’t feel comfortable bunking with other addicts. But you should choose outpatient if you have to work in order to support your family.

Drug and alcohol treatment requires you to first accept that you have a problem, then commit to the treatment itself, and it even requires you to carry on with the positive changes even after treatment is completed. This is a permanent lifestyle change for the better so you should treat it that way. But if you have a problem, and you think you may lose everything, you may die, or even if you just hate the way your life has turned out up until this point, enter a drug and alcohol treatment program and take your life back for yourself.