Can Mindfulness Therapy Help Treat Addiction?
Beating addiction is one of the most difficult things someone can face. Anyone that’s suffered (or suffers from) addiction knows that kicking the habit is daunting.
The issue with addiction is that it often attacks twofold. Meaning, it hurts us both physically and mentally.
Physical cravings can give way to mental desires, and vice versa. There’s no one true definition that decides when you’re addicted.
Those looking to beat their addiction will find plenty of options from conventional medical science. Take this pill for your detox. Try anti-depression medication.
It’s not that prescribing those treatments is inherently bad, in fact, they can often help. The issue arises from the various spectrums of addiction.
Sometimes modern medicine should step back and let the body heal itself. The phrase “mind over matter” rings true in this situation.
Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) is a strategy in holistic addiction treatment that embraces “mind over matter.”
If every feeling is a construct of your mind, then, theoretically, you can suppress any feeling.
Holistic Addiction Treatment: What Is Mindfulness?
Mindfulness treatment is the idea that becoming self-aware can help control addictive impulses.
“Living in the moment,” as some describe it, involves paying attention to the body’s cravings and discerning what emotions, sensations, and thoughts trigger addiction.
Sometimes people choose to focus on their “moment” with meditation, but day-to-day awareness works just as well.
For example, if you’re addicted to cigarettes, pay attention to what triggers your cravings to smoke.
Maybe it’s driving in the car that causes your urge to smoke. Maybe you only smoke when you’re stressed out.
Mindfulness pushes acceptance of these situations and emotions as “triggers.” Patients should strive towards acknowledging these triggers instead of reacting to them.
The Mindfulness Outcome
The end goal of mindfulness therapy is tolerating uncomfortable cravings by acknowledging them.
It’s sort of like facing problems head on, and then engaging in a form of impulse control.
Yes, you’re craving that drink because you just got home from work. However, you know the feeling is normal (for you) and is controllable.
Addicts that can separate addiction from their own psyche are able to recognize trigger stimuli, and eventually suppress their impulses.
As with any holistic addiction treatment, there are always skeptics. Though it’s becoming harder and harder to deny mindfulness therapy works.
Have you even seen people walk on hot coals, or sleep on a bed of nails? While not exactly mindfulness therapy, the underlying methodology is the same.
Those individuals are recognizing their reaction to stimuli, and then suppressing their urges (get off the coals and nails).
Western literature review has also found that mindfulness meditation positively correlates to successful substance abuse treatment.
If you’re an addiction treatment specialist, or know someone with an addiction, we urge you to research mindfulness therapy.
Yes, some holistic addiction treatment is pseudoscience, and we understand you are skeptical.
However, we’ve had great success using mindfulness therapy in conjunction with other treatments.
Simple “mind over matter” could save a life.
Reviewed and Assessed by
Taylor Brown, B.A.Com., MAADC II
Tim Coleman, M. of Ed.
Staffed 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
Medical
Midwest Recovery Centers believes strongly in a client-centered approach. Substance Use Disorder is not what it was 5 or even 2 years ago. The substances on the street are constantly changing and so are the number of contraindications and fatal threats that substance use imposes on the person suffering. Our Medical team continues to stay up to speed with new advances of evidence-based approaches in treating those with both substance use disorder as well as their co-occurring mental health diagnosis. There are many varying pieces to each client’s situation when it comes to tackling the puzzle of a medical detox, and each step in the treatment planning is carefully selected, reviewed, and communicated for the best possible outcome of each client. We understand that consideration of the medical history, family history, past trauma, past and current substance use are all key indicators to most effectively give each client the best chance at developing a recovery process. Each client may present with a different scope of medical needs whether it’s their blood work or the most effective medications for them. Midwest Recovery Centers is proud to have the finest medical team to meet these individual and specific needs of each client that walks through our doors.
Clinical
When it comes to the therapeutic treatment of patients with substance use disorder, Midwest Recovery Centers believes in a client-centered approach guided by evidence-based practices. Substance use disorder has been identified by the American Medical Association as a disease, but because addiction is a disease that impacts behavior, treatment of this disease is often heavily focused on modifying behaviors and thoughts as well as establishing a new way of life. We place a strong emphasis on educating patients about this chronic illness and empowering them to practice treating it as such. Our clinical team is composed of leading experts in the field. We believe in having a staff as diverse as the clients we serve; from Licensed Professional Counselors to Licensed Clinical Social Workers, our staff is highly trained and educated in not only addiction but the mental health issues and life circumstances that often accompany it. Many of our clinicians have their own personal experience in long term recovery which lends them to an even better understanding of what our patients are experiencing. Our staff is highly skilled in choosing the most effective therapeutic modality for each client’s needs, to give them the best chance of securing the recovery process that will change their lives. Our clinical team understands that this is a family disease. This is why clinicians will offer weekly updates to families as well as concrete tools for families to utilize as they journey through this illness with their loved one. Those tools will be offered by the patient’s individual clinician as well as at our free Family Night on the first Wednesday of each month, offered to anyone in the community.
Our Origin Story
I began Midwest Recovery in honor of my mother, Betty Lou Wallace, who taught me responsibility in life and sobriety.
Mom was born, raised, and lived most of her life in Missouri, a state I'm still proud to call home. She had five children. The youngest were my older brother Don and me.
We knew that the disease of addiction ran in the family, but it wasn't until Don and I grew older that we realized we were falling into addictive patterns. Through it all, Mom was supportive of her children but firm about one principle: whether the disease was inherited or developed through your environment, you were responsible for your recovery from addiction.
"I will be supportive of your recovery but I will not enable your addiction," she was fond of saying.
Ultimately, I stayed sober from 1990 to 1997, when I relapsed. With Mom's support, I was able to get sober again in 2002. Tragically, Don was not so lucky. He passed away in 2005 from complications of an injury and continued addiction.
Mom wanted no parent to suffer from the sorrow and anguish of losing a child, so in 2002, she helped me establish my first treatment center business.
As Mom grew older, she shared with me some lessons she had learned through her affiliation with Al-Anon, a support group for family members of loved ones struggling with addiction. She asked me to stay clean and sober one day at a time and to use the lessons I learned in my own recovery to help others who were suffering.
In 2008, Mom passed away from throat cancer, one day after my six year sober anniversary. I still remember that one of the last times we spoke, she told me she was proud of my recovery.
Mom would be so happy to know that myself, our partners, and our team are carrying on her legacy in her home state. I don't know if my own recovery process would be intact without her and the lessons she shared. So much of what we share with our clients at Midwest began with Betty Lou.
Above all, Mom imparted several teachings that I carry with me every day: that people are inherently good, and if they fall into addiction, this makes them sick, not bad. She taught me to be patient, tolerant, loving, and kind to myself and to others.
Most of all, she taught me that recovery works if we are able to be honest with ourselves about our own behavior. That’s what she helped me accomplish and that’s what we strive to accomplish with every Midwest client.
On behalf of Betty Lou, I thank you for your interest in Midwest Recovery.
Jeff Howard