Addiction Treatment and Your Health Coverage

If you are interested in knowing more about how the Affordable Care Act has changed here is a resource that tells the Insurance side of Addiction. This quote is direct from the publisher:

Our resource provides information on your healthcare rights when it comes to addiction treatment and how changes with the Affordable Care Act have changed insurance coverage. 

We believed that this was an important topic to cover because while addiction affects nearly 24 million people over the age of 12, only 11.2% of those individuals receive treatment from a private facility (SAMHSA, 2009). A likely reason attributed to that low percentage is that it's not uncommon for private recovery facilities to cost in the tens of thousands of dollars.

The resource can be found here:

http://www.insurancequotes.org/health-insurance/health-resources/addiction-treatment-coverage/.

*Addiction Resources from InsuranceQuote.com

NOTE FROM ADDICTSHUNS:
Please be wise when selecting Insurance programs in regards to your health and well being. Most of all there are free programs, such as A.A., that have proven methods in the area of overcoming addiction of any type, and can supplement and complete any facility treatment programs. Just use your head!

bjb

ADDICTSHUN | addictions  
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My Own Prison

Hows your thought life?

prisons often exist in our own minds. limiting thoughts, self deprecating voices keep us locked up inside unable to move at times. funny thing about these 'mind prisons' is that there are no bars or walls. Even if you were in a prison or locked into circumstances you don't like, this can be changed.

the key out is to change your thought. if you just accept and believe everything you think, hear or say, it keeps you in prison. It is the way you handle the negative thoughts and temptations that makes a huge difference in your life. just because you think something doesn't always make it real. it is time for honest and true critical thinking. a mind prison can be solved with changing the way you think, rather than caving into "I can't...'" or feelings of despair and being overwhelmed. 

is it time to clean out and up those influences in your life?
freeing yourself from a mind prison is dependent on what you allow into your thinking through TV, books, music and the friends you keep. if what you hear on a daily basis doesn't give you peace of mind, then it's time to have some deep thought cleaning. 

try a radical thought turnaround. for one whole day write down everything you think. just write it down, no matter. even the tv, music and friends you listen to. record the constant thoughts, themes and ideas.

for day two: take that list of thoughts and compile them into negative (or positive). write those into a new list on the left column. then on the right column, write the exact opposite if it's a pattern of negativity. 

lastly, find a quote or scripture verse or something that is different than the negative thought and memorize it, write it out on your mirror, on papers and think on that instead of the negative ones. "I can't stop this madness" becomes "I have self control, peace of mind, and am calm." or whatever feels natural to you. 

Make your thought garden one of flowers and vegetables that nourish your mind and soul. Pull the weeds of bad thoughts out the moment you hear it break ground in your mind. 



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Support Addiction Recovery

 

Support Addiction Recovery with Good Nutrition and Exercise

by Lisa Felding 

According to the most recent large-scale study, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration’s National Survey on Drug Use and Health, in 2009, 23.5 million people needed treatment for drug or alcohol abuse. That’s 9.3% of people over the age of 12. Of those people, only 2.6 million received treatment at an addiction recovery facility. Nearly 90%, therefore, aren’t getting this specialized help. Any person who is recovering from an addiction needs as much support as possible, and this is especially true for someone who is trying to beat the addiction without help from a recovery facility.

One way to support efforts towards recovering from an addiction is by focusing not just on breaking the addiction cycle, but also on replacing the unhealthy behavior patterns with new healthy ones, such as nutrition and exercise. This helps the addict start to focus on positive reasons for pursuing recovery, provides a framework for promoting a return to healthier habits, and gives the recovering addict something tangible they can do to improve their health on their own.

Addiction and Nutrition

The added benefit of such a goal is that many addicts have nutritionally poor diets to begin with. Coupled with the physical impact of addiction itself, poor health is a common feature of addiction. Even if the diet is reasonably healthy, the physical toll of addiction, which can include tissue inflammation and organ dysfunction, means that nutrients are not adequately absorbed from food, or properly stored in the body. Whether or not the diet is healthy, a person with an addiction is therefore likely to suffer from nutrient deficiencies that, in conjunction with the physical consequences of addiction, can ultimately lead to muscle wasting, high blood pressure and cholesterol, gastrointestinal and digestion problems, cardiovascular stress, and central nervous system dysfunction. For these reasons, it is extremely beneficial to make nutritional goals part of a treatment plan for alcoholism or any other addiction. Adding regular exercise into the mix is also highly beneficial.

Good Nutrition Helps the Addicted Body Heal

A person who is just beginning to recover from addiction might suffer from any or all of the following nutrition-related problems: 

• Low blood sugar, leading to fatigue, anxiety, depression, panic attacks, and poor adrenal gland function
• Inability to properly absorb nutrients
• Depletion of neurotransmitters in the brain
• Sensitivity to certain foods, such as wheat, sugar, corn, or dairy products
• Deficiency in protein, vitamins, and minerals

Avoiding processed foods, and replacing these with several servings a day of fresh fruit and vegetables, allows the body to start getting all the nutrients it needs to recover from these issues. For example, hypoglycemia—low blood sugar—is a common problem for recovering addicts, and alcoholics in particular, since many alcohols are rich in sugar. This can contribute to mood disorders that in turn can increase the likelihood that a recovering addict will relapse. Eating regular nutritionally-rich meals with small amounts of whole, unrefined carbohydrates, along with protein and healthy fats, helps to control blood sugar levels and improve mood stability—which might help stave off a relapse.

Another reason that a healthy diet helps the body recover from addiction is that some minerals—in particular, calcium and magnesium—can reduce the severity of cravings and addiction-related stress. Nervousness and irritability are heightened in people who are deficient in calcium or magnesium, because these minerals are essential for healthy central nervous system function. When the body is deficient in these minerals, it reduces a person’s ability to cope with stress, and in a recovering addict this ability is often already stretched to the limit.

The Benefits of Exercise

Starting an exercise program is another good way to reinforce the positive reasons for giving up an addiction. The benefits of regular exercise are well-documented, and when it comes to addiction recovery, are even more important. Cardiovascular exercise is, for example, a great way to reduce stress, by burning off excess adrenaline and other anxiety-inducing chemicals that the body produces. As well as this, it can help promote restful sleep, therefore helping to combat the insomnia that is a common feature of addiction recovery. Insomnia is completely normal for a recovering addict, but it can be very distressing, and stressful, for a newly-sober individual. Exercise can also help rebuild muscle mass and improve cardiovascular health, both of which are often impaired in addicts.

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Someone You Know is an Addict

Someone You Know is an Addict

It’s estimated that approximately one in five people are born with an addictive personality - meaning they are vulnerable to becoming addicted to a substance or behavior.  This means that there is an excellent chance that someone you know - a friend or family member - is suffering, perhaps secretly, with an addiction problem.

The most serious cases end with the death or suicide or the victim.

This article is part of a campaign by Addictions UK to help addicts, all around the world. Read on to find out how you can offer your support. 

Understanding Addiction

The rapid growth of the Internet in recent years has seen the rise of new addiction problems, including Facebook addiction, online pornography addiction, online gambling addiction, and even Internet addiction.  

Although the word “addiction” is used to mean many different things, what we’re talking about here is more accurately described as “pathological dependence” - a flaw in the brain chemistry that creates an overwhelming and escalating urge to engage in a certain kind of behavior, even if the person knows that their actions are hurting them and they’re desperate to stop.

The condition of addiction can be easier to understand when compared to Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD).  An OCD sufferer may be aware that, logically, there is no need to repeatedly wash their hands until they’re raw and bleeding, but the compulsion is so strong that they’re powerless to stop.  

Similarly, an online gambling addict may be racked with guilt because, once again, they’ve spent the grocery money on online poker, but no matter what they try, they cannot gain control of their behavior.

Worse still, when an addict’s compulsive behavior is of a type that is considered socially unacceptable, it’s common to hide the problem and try to tackle it privately.  This usually only results in the problem becoming more deeply entrenched.

Treatment is Available

The first step to successfully tacking addiction is education.  The addict may have come to the conclusion that they are a wicked person who is beyond redemption, but learning that their troubling actions are symptoms of an illness that afflicts millions of other people, many of whom have been successfully treated, can rekindle their hope and create a burning desire to obtain treatment.

Talking to a doctor can help; they may be able to recommend a local addiction treatment program.  Alternatively, private treatment can be obtained (see below). The most important thing is for the addict to recognize that they have a dependency problem and that they cannot enter recovery without professional help.

How You Can Help

At the beginning of this article, we said that there is a strong chance that a friend of family member is suffering, maybe in silence, but that there is a way you can help.

There’s little point in trying to guess who may or not be affected. Addiction afflicts all different kinds of people, and often the person you least expect.

What you can do is help to put this article in front of as many different people as possible.  The more people that see this message, the more likely it is that it will reach someone who really needs it.

To show your support for this campaign, please do one or more of the following:

Share this article on Twitter and Facebook.

Go to  AddictonSuk and “Like” this page.

Place a link to  AddictionSuk:
"http://www.addictionsuk.com" 

www.addictionsuk.com or  

"http://www.facebook.com/addictionsuk" 

www.facebook.com/addictionsuk on your website.

Post a comment below this blog post.

"The Four Pillars of Recovery"

Does Addiction Rehab and Therapy Work?

From what I see with the friends and celebrities going in and out of it on a regular basis, apparently not. My close friend has seen it all and nothing has helped until now. She found a Dr with a program that actually works. Dr. John Vigil is caring for my friend now, and there are great strides of recovery for her like I've seen never before.

He has written the best explanation about Alcohol and Drug addiction I've ever read. His honesty and totally frank story about a lifetime struggle with addiction doesn't sugar coat any of the disasters that out of control addiction has in one's life including those closest to him. What turned my thinking around is  medical description about what happens with alcohol and substance abuse. He explained with great compassion and easy to understand medical terms, why people don't get better with conventional treatment. Reading his book, gave my search for answers answers to that question from someone who has seen both sides. 

I learned a greater compassion for addicts after reading his book. The clear cut path of "FOUR PILLARS OF RECOVERY" just might hold the key to anyone with an substance addiction gaining freedom from this disease. I am sharing his website, his information with you the readers, so you have a link to someone who knows what he's doing and lays a clear path for recovery.

Dr John Vigil of Albuquerque, NM authored a book on addiction and recovery titled "The Four Pillars of Recovery." It explains his comprehensive state-of-the art and evidence based care for drug and alcohol addiction and substance abuse disorders, including buprenorphine (Suboxone) office-based treatment for opiate addiction. Doctor on Call is an Albuquerque mental health clinic is run by a medical doctor specializing in addiction medicine.Dr. Vigil is a member of the American Society of Addiction Medicine.

CONTACT INFORMATION:Main WEBSITE: Doctor on Call Dr Vigil's Blog: HEALTH CARE REFORM BLOGDownload free brochure: Counseling Services and Behavioral Health