This is the third entry in our series of blog posts about recovery misinformation. (You can find the previous entries here and here. Our ongoing goal with this series is to separate fact from fiction when it comes to substance use disorders and the recovery journey.
As you might recall, we started this series by pointing out how frequently fact and fiction get all tangled up—and how sometimes fiction seems to replace fact altogether. For a person in recovery from a substance use disorder, misinformation can be more than an inconvenience. It can lead to serious consequences—including an unwillingness to get help in the first place or a greater likelihood of relapse.
To help you avoid the kinds of problems that can arise from misinformation, we will explore three more fictions and provide you with the facts in this blog post.
FICTION: You don’t need treatment! You can quit ‘cold turkey’ easily enough.
The idea of being able just to stop taking drugs or drinking alcohol because you have decided to do so is appealing. But this bit of misinformation fails to grapple with the reality—and the very real danger—of withdrawal symptoms.
When you take drugs or drink alcohol over a period of time, your brain and body get used to them—and come to expect them. This process of getting used to having the substances is why it can take more and more of a drug to achieve the same result as time goes by. If you attempt to deprive your body and brain of drugs or alcohol quickly—by going “cold turkey”—you are almost certainly going to experience a wide range of extremely challenging withdrawal symptoms. Among those symptoms will be fierce cravings for the substance or substances you are trying to give up.
Some of the symptoms that arise during withdrawal can be truly life-threatening. And it is also true that continuing to ingest these substances can also be life-threatening. The way out of the conundrum is to seek out medically supervised detoxification that provides a safe space for you to clear the substances from your system.
FICTION: You have to really want treatment to get any benefit from it.
We admit that throughout the blog posts you can find here on our website, we make plenty of arguments to help a person who might be on the fence about getting treatment make the decision to do so. Making the choice to get the help you need is a brave and admirable act.
But for many, many individuals, that choice proves very hard to make. For a good portion of those people, it is the loving insistence of someone who cares for them or even a court order that finally gets them into treatment for their substance use disorder. And it turns out that whether a person made the choice to pursue treatment themselves or got a serious nudge from another source, the effectiveness of the process is positive for everyone. Regardless of the reason a person seeks out treatment, the process works to help them get sober and gives them the tools to work toward maintaining that sobriety over time.
FICTION: Once you are sober, you will never have fun again.
It is undeniably the case that a lot of substance use disorders are kickstarted by someone’s desire to have a little fun or to fit in better with the crowd. And many people use drugs or alcohol in social situations—and those situations can come to seem like the definition of “fun.” When you think of using drugs or drinking alcohol as the best (or even only) way to have fun, it can be hard to imagine ongoing sobriety as anything but dull.
But it is simply not the case that fun is only available to those who drink or use drugs. The world offers a wide array of experiences that are thrilling, intriguing, challenging, and, yes, fun. Once you have reclaimed your sobriety, you have the opportunity to discover what you find to be fun—free from the influence of drugs or alcohol.
This is a True Story: We Can Help You Get Sober
Each staff member of Wooded Glen Recovery Center—located in Henryville, Indiana—knows an important truth about substance use disorders: They are treatable.
At Wooded Glen, we provide medically supervised detoxification, a rehabilitation program that also addresses co-occurring mental health disorders, and a continuum of care designed to offer ongoing support as your recovery journey gets underway.
It is undoubtedly true that a substance use disorder can upend your life. It is equally true that Wooded Glen Recovery Center—recognized as one of the best recovery centers in America—can help you get on your feet again.