Cognitive Behavioural Therapy For Addictions therapies-related

What Is Cognitive Behavioural Therapy

Over Dependency on drugs and other ailments can be treated by changing the thinking mentality and emotions of a person and this is the core of cognitive behavioural therapy.

In the 1960s Dr. AAron T. Beck founded a type of mental health counselling known as Cognitive Behavioural Therapy.

Get Necessary Resources To Overcome Addiction

Overcoming addiction calls for many resources and people. You can recover successfully with the help of either residential or non-residential treatment. Mental health therapists are available to educate you on the essential life techniques to sustain recovery.

Make adjustments now by getting a suitable medical facility.

Today, cognitive behavioural therapy is widely used to treat addictions. Patients undergoing CBT treatment are taught to recognize the triggers in their minds, emotions, and behaviour that lead to them taking the drugs. This makes it easy to work on recovery.

Other mental health problems that can be addressed using this method include

• Nervousness
• Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD)
• Bipolar disorder
• Various forms of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
• Eating disorders
• Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)

Locate a centre for substance abuse treatment that specializes in CBT now.

How Does Cbt Work

CBT clearly shows that a good deal of destructive emotions and actions are neither reasonable nor logical. Our environment and experiences in the past may be the cause of these actions and behaviours.

A recovering user may have certain negative thoughts that automatically come to mind and Cognitive Behavioural Therapy can help to identify them. A person's feelings play a very big part in the life of a person and their addiction. People often drink or abuse drugs in an attempt to mitigate these afflictive thoughts and feelings.

Being able to isolate these feelings and emotions and recognize what brings them on empowers the addicted person to fight the addiction.

Recovering addicts can soothe the pain caused by distressful memories by repeatedly revisiting them. Once they can cope with the issues without freaking out, they are then taught how to cultivate healthy habits in place of the substances they were addicted to.

Dependency Treatment And Cognitive Behavioural Therapy

Most users are found to be suffering from deep despair and hopelessness which in the first place were caused by bad or distrustful thoughts.

Someone is bound to start using drugs or be addicted to alcohol if they constantly have negative thoughts and feelings of depression.

Triggers - certain situations that provoke, i.e. "trigger", cravings for substance during the day - prevent many addicts from living a sober life. There are three ways in which CBT can help recovering users deal with triggers according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

Cbt Aids People In Overcoming Their Drug Addiction And Alcoholism By

• Helping them dismiss misconceived notions and insecurities that have possibly led to substance abuse.
• Strengthen the patient with better ways of self-motivation.
• Carrying out training on effective communication skills.

How To Manage Triggers

• Recognise
• You need to recognise the things that make you start using the drugs.
• Evade
• Abstract oneself from trigger situations whenever it's possible.
• Manage
• The techniques of getting rid of these feeling you have learnt from CBT will come in handy in this place.

The techniques provided by the cognitive-behavioural therapists can be practiced beyond the office of the therapist. Patients can do a lot of CBT exercises all by themselves - at a group meeting and at home.

SMART and other such like Addiction Support groups employ the CBT techniques to help their members remain sober.

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy Methods

There are different practices that are used to overcome an addiction using CBT.

CBT methods that are important in treating addiction include

• Though Records
• This involves dispelling automatic negative thoughts by finding proof that shows these thoughts to be false.
• They are required to list the evidence in favour of or against the automatic thoughts and indulge in a comparison and a contrast to the thoughts.
• The idea is that by critically evaluating your thoughts, you will be able to have thoughts that are less harsh and are more rational.

Example "My manager thinks I'm useless." I need to have a drink to feel better" turns into "It's ok to make mistakes, and I will learn from them. I will have a chance to prove my worth to my supervisor by rectifying my mistake. I don't need any alcohol to bolster my self-esteem."

• Behavioural Experiments
• Here the exercises involve comparing negative thoughts and positive thoughts to see which influence good behaviour more.
• One person may react better when they self-criticize while another will do great when they self-motivated.
• Behavioural experiments are just about understanding what works best for a particular individual to a situation.

Example " "If I talk kindly to myself after binge drinking, I'll binge drink less." vs "If I'm hard on myself after binge drinking, I'll binge drink less."

• Imagery Based Exposure
• The people can overcome their feelings by thinking of a past experience that was unpleasant.
• They capture their every emotion, sight, sound, impulse and thought they felt at that moment.
• Frequently by visiting the painful memories a recovering addict can reduce the anxiety caused by the memories over a period of time.

Example A person revisits a traumatic event from their childhood. He reproduces every feeling and emotion which he experienced at that moment. Eventually, repeatedly remembering this episode gives him less pain, and he doesn't feel the need to take drugs or drink alcohol to ease this pain.

• Pleasant Activity Program
• This is a method used to reduce the monotony of routines by planning activities that are enjoyable and healthy at certain times.
• The key is to have activities that are uncomplicated and easy to execute while bringing out positive feelings.
• Preparing these lovely exercises assists to low negative involuntary feelings and the ensuing desire to drink or abuse drugs.

Example A financial advisor working in a high stress environment can take 15 minutes off the job to do something relaxing instead of turning to alcohol or drugs when overwhelmed. He or she can begin to use the extra time at their desk to enjoy some new music from a melodious artist.

How Cognitive-Behavioural Therapies Differ From Other Psychotherapies

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy provides a perfect alternative to less effective and engaging treatment techniques.

At CBT sessions, recovering addicts do not just talk, and their therapists do not just listen passively to patients. Instead of this, therapists and addicts carry out joint activities aimed at overcoming the addiction.

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy applies fruitful, action-focused techniques aimed at quick result. Lots of mid length rehabilitation programs that last from 60 to 90 days include CBT techniques to give patients more opportunities to cop? with their problems.

Other psychotherapy approaches could take up to a number of years to produce results. More often than not, CBT needs 16 meetings to deliver significant results.

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy can be adapted to make it effective during inpatient and outpatient sessions, along with individual and group counselling environments. A lot of rehabilitation facilities and addiction therapists use CBT as a part of their treatment programs.