Abstaining from drugs is the logical first step toward addiction recovery. However, if you have a substance abuse problem, you know this is easier said than done.
Seeking the help of a detox facility like Mayflower Recovery can improve your chances of success. Detox centers help provide a safe and supportive environment where you can safely undergo withdrawal.
To understand the role of detox centers in addiction treatment, let’s learn why you need to undergo detox in the first place. We’ll also explore why detox facilities are better placed to help you during this stage of the recovery journey.
Understanding Substance Use Disorder
Drug use impacts how your brain receives and responds to messages from other parts of your body. Most drugs trick your brain into releasing high levels of the hormone dopamine, which creates feelings of pleasure or euphoria associated with alcohol, weed, heroin, cocaine and amphetamines.
The pleasurable effects caused by enhanced dopamine levels compel you to keep using drugs, creating a habit that’s hard to break. Continued use makes your brain tolerate the effects of the drugs, forcing you to take higher amounts to achieve the euphoric feeling. Substance abuse also affects your brain’s ability to produce dopamine naturally, making it difficult to feel alive and happy without using.
Continued drug abuse leads to a mental illness called substance use disorder (SUD), characterized by an inability to control or stop drug use despite the effect on your personal, relationship, social and professional life. The most severe form of SUD is addiction, a stage in which you can barely function without using drugs.
Substance use can cause or intensify symptoms of other mental conditions. According to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), around 50% of people with SUD have a co-occurring mental illness condition such as anxiety, depression, bipolar disorder or schizophrenia.
Physical conditions such as heart disease, diabetes, hepatitis and HIV can also co-occur alongside SUD.
The Multidimensional Approach of Drug and Alcohol Detox Facilities
Since substance abuse can have a range of causes and effects, a multidimensional approach to treatment is necessary to address all causes and effects of your addiction issues.
Traditional substance use treatment methods often focused on helping people achieve sobriety before addressing co-occurring mental illnesses. Another common treatment method involved treating co-occurring disorders at the same time as SUD but at different facilities and by different providers.
However, a 2020 study on substance abuse treatment found that a multidimensional approach that covers SUD’s biological, psychological, environmental and social factors has a higher success rate in preventing drug-related harm, including relapse. Such treatment should be provided in a safe and nurturing environment by a team of professionals who coordinate to maintain high standards of care.
Detox centers don’t just help rid your body of drugs before you move on to other forms of treatment. Facilities like Mayflower use an integrated approach that addresses the physical, mental, social and environmental spheres of your substance use issues.
How Detox Facilities Provide More Than Just Physical Healing
Detox is often the first stage in addiction recovery, since it gives your body and brain space to start operating without the influence of drugs. However, you may experience mild or severe withdrawal symptoms a few hours or days after your last use. Depending on the drug you’re withdrawing from, symptoms can include:
- Headaches
- Nausea and vomiting
- Tremors
- Sweatiness
- Mood changes
- Increased heart rate
- Restlessness and irritability
- Insomnia and exhaustion
- Confusion
- Anxiety or depression
- Paranoia
- Hallucinations and delusions
- Seizures
- Death
Detox centers offer physical support to help you through withdrawal. During your stay, you’ll have access to a medical team and receive medication to control the severity of the symptoms. These facilities also have qualified, caring staff monitoring you 24-7. Their presence is comforting and reassuring, and will keep you from sabotaging your progress by using drugs to stop the symptoms.
Detox facilities also have psychologists, psychiatrists and addiction counselors to help you withstand psychological and emotional withdrawal. These professionals may offer medication and therapy to control symptoms caused by anxiety, depression and paranoia.
Receiving such support strengthens your resolve to go through the worst of the withdrawal stage and successfully come out on the other end.
Navigating Recovery: The Integral Role of Detox Facilities
Detox is a step-by-step process that starts with a physical assessment to uncover the drugs you use, the length of use and health issues that existed before or cropped up during your addiction.
You’ll also undergo a psychological assessment to establish your psychological state and needs. This assessment includes diagnosing co-occurring disorders that need to be managed as you go through withdrawal.
Professionals at the detox center who are part of your care team use these assessments to create an individual treatment plan, outlining the type of care you’ll receive throughout your stay. These professionals often include:
- Case managers
- Doctors
- Nurses
- Nutritionists
- Addiction counselors
- Social workers
- Psychiatrists
- Traditional and alternative therapists
The individual treatment plan outlines your nutritional needs, exercise requirements and beneficial therapies for addiction and other mental health conditions. During your stay at the detox center, you’ll engage in various exercises, eat healthily, learn how to meditate and find fulfilling hobbies.
You’ll also undergo various therapies to learn how to handle cravings and environmental triggers without relapsing. Individual, group and family therapy reinforce your coping skills, help you build a supportive network of friends and lay a foundation for familial support and accountability when you leave the detox center.
We are here for you 24/7
If you’re worried about your sobriety journey and how to navigate your vacation well, we have people who are available to talk with you.
The Path to Reintegration: The Holistic Care of Detox Centers
The focus of detox is to show you how to live a fun, healthy life that promotes dopamine production without alcohol and other drugs. A typical stay at facilities like Mayflower Recovery lasts two weeks, during which you’ll be prepared for sober living in the real world.
Your care team will assess your progress during detox and create strategies to help you reintegrate into society and maintain long-term sobriety. If you have serious addiction issues or co-occurring problems, the team may recommend a few weeks or months of intensive treatment at a residential rehab facility. Your team may also recommend receiving outpatient treatment after leaving the detox facility so you can benefit from different forms of therapy while continuing with other aspects of your regular life.
After your stay at a detox center, case managers follow up on your progress to see how well you’re adjusting to regular life. They’ll provide tools to support you through rough patches, including access to sponsors and further addiction treatment options.
The Turning Point: How Detox Facilities Help Regain Control of Life
Detox is essential to taking back the reins over your life, rebuilding relationships broken by addiction and regaining professional trust and respect.
Dozens of people who’ve undertaken detox at Mayflower Recovery laud the effectiveness of the process. One says, “[Detox] is more than just groups and meetings. They teach you how to live and have fun in sobriety. Mayflower does so much to accomplish this with group activities such as outside barbecues and outdoor games such as basketball and corn-hole, meditation, outside guest speakers and Tibetan singing bowls.”
Another successful client reports, “Mayflower Recovery helped me and my family at a time where we didn’t know where else to turn. … I walked out the doors filled with hope, armed with strength and tools to support my recovery.”
Get Your Life Back Through Detox
Substance use disorder is a mental condition that affects millions of people. It can be caused by and result in an array of issues, all of which can be addressed through effective treatment.
Detox centers that use a multidimensional approach to treatment give you a new outlook on life and the confidence to start down the path to recovery. Finding a good detox facility with compassionate staff provides a suitable launchpad to regain control over your life.
The Mayflower Recovery detox and residential rehab facility near Boston, Massachusetts, has helped people from all over New England start their recovery journey. Our team of caring specialists can help you manage difficult withdrawal symptoms and experience life-changing behavioral therapies and alternative therapies such as art, sport and equine therapy.
Contact us today to learn about our streamlined admission process and start your recovery journey.
