Anger Management as a Tool to Maintain Sobriety

man with anger management during treatment

Anger Management as a Tool to Maintain Sobriety

man with anger management during treatmentAnger is a normal and healthy emotion experienced by basically everyone. However, for many people, it can lead to stress, poor responses to input, and out of control emotional flare-ups that lead to drinking in order to control those emotions. Most of us are familiar with the urge to have a drink to cool down from anger – and that feeling can be an extremely difficult trigger when you’re in recovery.

Learning how to manage anger, usually through therapy and anger management classes, is therefore a very common part of addiction treatment. In fact, more and more treatment centers now offer tools like anger management, stress management, mindfulness-based stress reduction, and emotional regulation as normal elements of addiction recovery. Here’s how and why anger management plays a role in maintaining your sobriety.

Uncontrolled Anger can Trigger Relapse

Anger is a very normal emotion. However, if you’re not in control, it can be overwhelming and destructive. For many of us, anger results in poor emotional regulation, extreme stress response, and learned behavior patterns. Each of these can result in triggering an episode of drinking. For example:

  • Out-of-control anger is often learned from parents or results from not being taught emotional regulation. This means that people with anger management problems often have poor emotional regulation, so any emotion can be overwhelming. Without mechanisms to regulate emotions like anger, it’s easy to resort to substance abuse to manage your anger and other feelings.
  • Anger can be a symptom of post-traumatic stress disorder and complex PTSD, both of which require additional treatment. Both also greatly increase your risk of substance abuse as you look for means of coping with things that are out of your control.
  • Anger greatly elevates your stress response which increases cravings for substances that release dopamine and serotonin in the brain. As a result, high stress can result in a relapse and is, in fact, one of the number one causes of relapse. If you can’t resolve your anger, you will experience stress and it will increase your risk of relapse.
  • Behavior patterns, often known as habits, can be extremely powerful predictors of behavior. You’ll know this if you’ve ever driven the same way to work for years and then tried to take a different route – or found yourself autopiloting past the liquor store on your way home. If you have a habit, you’re more likely to do something automatically, and that means turning to unhealthy coping mechanisms like alcohol. If you’re used to responding to anger by drinking, you’re more likely to continue to do so, even if you have already had substance abuse treatment.

Essentially, there are a lot of ways that anger can contribute to relapse.

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How Does Anger Management Help?

a female client trying to Manage mental health ChallengesYou know how anger is detrimental to sobriety, but how does anger management help? Unfortunately, there’s no quick fix to anger problems or behaviors related to drinking around anger. Instead, you’ll have to work towards slow improvements that help you in the long-term. Let’s take a look:

  • Identifying triggers for anger – You’ll want to know what causes anger and why. In some cases, anger is a justified response to being treated unfairly. In other cases, anger is a response to stress, like traffic. For many people, you’ll want to spend time writing down when you get angry and what caused it for a few weeks before you can honestly say what triggers anger. Taking time to write that out will almost always be a part of anger management treatment as well.
  • Identifying what anger triggers – Once you know what triggers your anger, you’ll work to identify what anger triggers in you. For example, how do you behave? Do you lose control? Do you use drugs or alcohol to come down from anger? Do you come out of anger only to experience stress and anxiety? Identifying this will allow you to identify what you’re trying to improve on so it’s also a normal part of anger management.
  • Developing coping strategies – You’ll work with a counselor or therapist to specifically work on coping strategies that help you with your triggers and behaviors. For example, you can learn to take time-outs, to practice relaxation techniques, to respond in different ways, or to do other things first before responding to anger. For example, if you experience problems with anger while driving, you might be asked to take 30 seconds to concentrate on breathing, to sing a song, or to play a song and listen to it before you’re allowed to redirect attention back to anger. The idea is usually “acknowledge” “Okay I am angry”, “redirect” “Let me do something else for a few minutes” and “check in” “How do I feel now”?
  • Developing behaviors – It’s sometimes going to be important to develop a list of behaviors you are okay with and those you are not okay with. It’s important to be able to say to yourself “I am not comfortable responding in this way, so I am going to try to do something else”. Setting boundaries for yourself means you’ll have tools to help yourself realize when you’re going out of control, and that will help you to work towards being in control.
  • Setting goals – Finally, you’re always going to want to set specific and measurable goals for anger management. That can look like “I will practice breathing exercises every day”, “I will do a calming sport every day”, “I will take 30 seconds before I respond to anger”, “I will learn to stop responding to anger by shouting”, etc. If you can establish steps, you can work towards them, measure your progress, and see how it contributes to your goals.

Eventually, anger management means understanding yourself, what causes reactions, and what your reactions are. From there, you can more easily get therapy and counseling to help you modulate those behaviors. Having those emotional regulation tools will help you to stay in control, will reduce the stress you feel about anger, and may even help you to experience anger less. For example, if you experience anger about small things like someone cutting you off while driving, redirection and doing something else for a bit might save you anger for the rest of the day. That will pay off in improving your mood and decreasing your need to relax – because you’ll be less worked up. Of course, what you need to work on will depend on your situation, how you’re managing anger currently, and what’s causing problems. In some cases, you need better anger management skills and in others you need to step out of situations that are causing problems with anger. Your counselor will help you with that.

Anger management can help you maintain sobriety, especially if you have a habit of drinking after episodes of anger. The more stressed you feel after getting angry, the more that’s likely to be true. The good news is that anger and emotional management is more and more often a standard part of substance abuse treatment, so you’ll have more options to get anger management worked into your normal treatment and aftercare. Of course, you can also go to a program that’s completely separate from substance abuse, just keep in mind that it will touch less on specific overlaps with addiction and relapse. Good luck getting help.

Does Insurance Pay for Couples Drug Rehab?

a lovely couple in treatment at a drug and alcohol rehab center in riverside california

Does Insurance Pay for Couples Drug Rehab?

a lovely couple in treatment at a drug and alcohol rehab center in riverside californiaIf you and your partner are struggling with substance abuse, rehab is an important step in recovery. Rehabilitation or substance abuse treatment services use therapy, counseling, and complementary skills like emotional management, building coping skills, stress management, and building healthy routines to help people overcome not just their substance abuse but also the underlying problems that resulted in it in the first place. If you’re with a partner who also has problems, getting couples drug rehab means you go together and often receive relationship and family therapy alongside drug addiction treatment to ensure you can rebuild your relationship on a healthy basis.

At the same time, drug addiction treatment is expensive. You want your insurance to pay for as much of it as-is possible. The question is, does your insurance pay for couple’s drug rehab? The answer is; that depends. We’ll go over the factors involved and how you can work to ensure you’re getting coverage for your program of choice – and what you need to do to ensure you get that coverage to begin with.

Your Insurance Covers Rehab

Your insurance plan is required to cover drug and alcohol abuse treatment. That’s the law under the Affordable Care Act (better known as Obamacare). You are legally entitled to rehabilitation or substance abuse treatment care under Federal law. This means that your insurance plan covers rehab. However, coverage offered can vary significantly per plan.

The good news is that, no matter what, you’ll get some coverage for your drug rehab. If you take a quick look at your plan, you’ll also see roughly what is covered. Usually you can expect 40-90% coverage depending on plan, although many providers have caps and custom options for inpatient treatment. Increasingly, insurance plans are rolling rehab under general clinic visits or specialty care, which means it might not always be straightforward to find rehab or substance abuse treatment on your plan. If you’re not sure, you can always call your provider for straightforward answers. That will also help you figure out if you have to go through a provider-sponsored treatment plan or assessment before you can get help – as some plans do require this.

What Your Insurance Plan(s) Cover

Insurance plans cover different things depending on the plan. Often, that’s equitable to the physical health coverage you have. For example, with a bronze plan you can normally expect to cover about 60% of total costs yourself and with a platinum plan that drops down to about 10% of total costs. That should remain roughly equivalent no matter what kind of treatment you’re looking for. Therefore, many insurance plans won’t care too much what kind of treatment you start, providing you pay the associated costs.

marriage counselling at a drug rehab center in southern californiaYou’ll want to look at:

  • What type of treatment is covered. E.g., inpatient or outpatient? Some plans require you complete an outpatient program before it will pay for an inpatient program
  • Some plans have deductibles per day some plans have deductibles per treatment type
  • Maximum coverage
  • Maximum covered
  • If deductibles change for inpatient vs outpatient care

For example, if you have a bronze plan, chances are very high that your insurance plan will attempt to cover the bare minimum. This means you might not get coverage for extras like couples’ rehab, unless that’s explicitly incorporated into mental health treatment and coverage.

You’ll also want to check whether:

  • You both have the same insurance plan. If you’re both on the same plan, it will be easier to align treatment and get joint coverage. If you’re not, it may be much harder to do so.
  • If you have different plans, your providers may work with a different network, which means it will be basically impossible to both get coverage from the same organization
  • Couples rehab may be treated as “joint” therapy or as individual therapy for two people and the difference will matter a lot depending on your rehab program

Essentially, if you have to align two separate insurance plans, you may have more trouble getting insurance coverage. However, if you’re on a family plan together, it may be much easier.

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Our expert & caring staff on site are available 24/7. Call us today.

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What Your Doctor(s) Recommend

a doctor's recommendationIt’s always important to start out any visit to rehab with a trip to your doctor. This is important because you’ll need a doctor’s recommendation into treatment in order to get coverage for your rehab at all. Here, you’ll also want your doctor to specifically recommend couples rehab to you. This will greatly increase your chances that the rehab center covers the treatment without making a fuss.

In most cases, if you can present your doctor with a case as to why you want couples’ rehab, your doctor will be more than happy to recommend it. Those reasons can be as simple as:

  • We want to learn how to support each other in staying clean and sober
  • We want to undo the harm of substance abuse on our relationship and that means getting help together and getting family therapy alongside substance abuse treatment
  • It’s important that we have perspective on the treatment the other has received so that we can live with and work with that in a healthy way after treatment

Essentially, there are plenty of reasons why couples drug rehab can be beneficial over both of you going to separate programs or even both of you going to the same program with no extra support for couples. Talking to your consultant about it and then taking that discussion to your doctor can mean you very easily get a recommendation into that treatment from your doctor. That’s also important because, without that recommendation, your insurance may not offer coverage.

Will Everything Be Covered?

Almost no insurance provider will cover every part of rehab. If you’re going to an inpatient program, you can expect higher deductibles, limits on coverage, and reduced coverage. If you’re going to an outpatient program, you can expect relatively low deductibles and copays. However, in most cases, you can expect a maximum coverage of about 90% even with the best plans. Basic plans usually won’t cover more than about 40% of your treatment – although that does vary quite a bit. The best option is to look at your plan, see what it covers, and figure out what your best option is within your insurance plan and budget.

Confronting your mutual substance abuse can be difficult. Sharing the burden, learning how to be better together, and learning how to support each other in that can be a powerful part of recovery. Getting couples rehab can very much be the right choice for many of us. Hopefully, you can easily get that treatment without worrying too much about what your insurance provider covers. However, the fastest and easiest solution is always to call your insurance provider, ask what their options are, and take steps from there. Chances are very high that a significant portion of your couples therapy will be covered by your insurance. Good luck getting treatment.

Do Women React Differently Than Men to Meth?

Do Women React Differently Than Men to Meth

Do Women React Differently Than Men to Meth?

Do Women React Differently Than Men to MethMethamphetamine is one of the most popular drugs in the United States. In 2022, an estimated 176,000 Americans started using the drug. A further 1.8 million Americans, or 0.6% of the U.S. population qualified for a methamphetamine disorder. Today, that mostly means adults aged 26 or older, and almost half of these count as a severe substance use disorder. That data isn’t split by gender, but today we know that while men are more likely to abuse meth, women are just as likely to be addicted as men and are often more susceptible to cravings and addiction. That’s in part because of hormones and in part because of different societal pressures to use.

Women respond to, react to, and use methamphetamine differently than men. Yet, for many women, substance abuse treatment is the same as that designed for and delivered primarily to men. Understanding the differences and how women’s bodies and women’s lived social experiences mean different reactions to addictive substances like methamphetamine can help you to better understand treatment and what you need from it to recover.

Do Women Respond Differently to Meth than Men?

The short answer is, yes. Women respond differently to meth than men. However, the long answer is that there are a lot of factors that come into play including social upbringing, environmental factors, and hormones.

This means that treating substance use disorder has to tackle different problems.

  • Women are more vulnerable to addiction than men
  • Women are more vulnerable to relapse than men
  • Women progress to “addiction” faster than men
  • Women respond to treatment better than men
  • Women show fewer symptoms of cardiovascular and brain damage following meth usage
  • Women have different motivators to use and therefore require different treatment than men

While both men and women are negatively impacted by methamphetamine, the effects are different. Acknowledging and responding to those differences means creating treatment programs tailored around biology and lived experiences rather than handing everyone the same treatment programs.

Hormones and Greater Vulnerability to Addiction

Women show increased susceptibility to the effects of stimulants including cocaine and methamphetamine than men. Women are more likely to show a strong tendency towards cravings and addiction, with more vulnerability to the reward effects of stimulants.

That’s thought to be linked to estrogen, with multiple studies showing increased effects of methamphetamine and other stimulants during the estrogen producing period of the menstrual cycle. Women on progesterone-based birth control are also at increased risk, as progesterone may increase the reward or stimulating effects of methamphetamine, increasing cravings, and increasing the effect of the drug.

As a result, women are more vulnerable to addiction to begin with. Women move from the cycle of initiating methamphetamine usage to addiction faster than men. Women are also more likely to experience relapse even after getting treatment.

This also means that trans women are potentially especially vulnerable to methamphetamine reward and addiction. Anyone taking estrogen supplementation or hormonal supplementation is likely to see increased effects of methamphetamine and therefore to be more at risk of rapidly becoming addicted to the drug. That vulnerability is further exacerbated by low mental health and a strong tendency to use stimulants in the LGTBQ++ community.

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women are more resilient to Long-Term DamageMore Resilience to Long-Term Damage

Women using stimulants such as cocaine and methamphetamine are less likely to show abnormalities of blood flow, heart, and brain blood flow than men. They are also likely to show similar negative impacts to concentration, learning, and achievement – even when using methamphetamine for longer than men. The mechanism behind this resilience is poorly understood but may have something to do with hormonal changes.

However, that doesn’t mean women don’t experience damage from methamphetamine abuse. Women see significant reductions in gray matter volume when using meth. This reduces blood and oxygen levels in the brain and can reduce cognition, attention, memory, and emotional processing. Like with men, this damage is expected to heal after about 2 years of abstinence.

Different Motivators to Use

Women often report using methamphetamine and other substances for very different reasons than men. For example:

  • Women report significant rates of co-occurring depression when using methamphetamine. For some women, methamphetamine initiation is a tactic to manage depression while maintaining energy levels to continue household responsibilities. Methamphetamine is a stimulant and may be used to reduce side-effects and symptoms of low-mood and sleeplessness – or for self-medication. This means that treatment must involve treating the co-occurring disorder to prevent a relapse and a return to self-medication following treatment.
  • Women very often have roles related to caregiving and social support which they cannot easily step out of. As a result, women cite using methamphetamines to keep up with work, home care, childcare, and family responsibilities. With methamphetamine taking on an enabling role, treating methamphetamine use in women may not involve changing behaviors of avoidance but rather changing behaviors of taking on too much – which means a completely different treatment trajectory is needed.
  • Women face higher societal pressure to be thin and many women cite methamphetamine use as part of a weight loss strategy. This means that methamphetamine may reflect underlying eating disorders which must be treated as part of relapse prevention.
  • Women are significantly more likely to be dependent on a significant other because of children or lack of independence. This can mean that exposure to methamphetamine originates in a partner or spouse and that substance abuse is likely to be a shared activity in the relationship as well as a means of escaping from domestic trouble or violence. These motivators means that significant effort must be put in to provide domestic shelters, housing assistance, and childcare assistance as part of recovery efforts to ensure that women with childcare obligations are not forced to remain in situations that trigger and result in further methamphetamine abuse.

Women use drugs like methamphetamines for significantly different reasons than men. Often, that’s exacerbated by social issues, childcare, lack of independence, and roles in which they are the primary caregiver. Women need structural support including childcare, structural treatment for mental health disorders, and help finding and treating underlying problems and disorders.

Men often need this as well, but for different motivators and problems. Therefore, the approach has to be different if both are to receive a high quality of care.

Getting Help

If you or a loved one is struggling with methamphetamine, it’s important to actively look for help. That means talking to your doctor and reaching out to a rehab center for longer-term treatment and assistance. Here, choosing a treatment center with programs for women can offer significant advantages for recovery including better interventions tailored to the motivations and underlying problems faced by women. Programs made for women also take biology into account and the increased vulnerability to cravings and addiction as well as the role hormones play in both into account – meaning you’ll receive better and more targeted treatment.

At the same time, you may want to look for treatment centers offering childcare, family therapy, aftercare with housing assistance such as sober living, and outpatient care options to enable ongoing childcare. Meeting the needs of women in recovery should mean meeting lifestyle needs as well, so that you can feel safe in taking time to go to treatment because family and responsibilities are taken care of.