Category: Drug Rehab

Can You Force Someone to Go to Rehab?

If your loved one is struggling with drugs or alcohol, watching them do so can be the hardest thing. Not only are you aware of what they are doing to themselves, you’re aware of treatment and options to help. Rehab clinics or substance use disorder treatment centers are designed to help people overcome physical addiction and then build the life skills they need to build a life where they don’t need drugs or alcohol. But, getting them there can be extremely difficult. That’s especially true considering many people are in denial of their substance abuse problems, think they can quit whenever they want, and may not be ready to get help.

The bad news is that no, you can’t force someone to go to rehab unless they are under the age of 18. If your loved one is a minor, you can make them get treatment providing you’re their parent or guardian. However, in every other case, your loved one will have to choose help for themselves. That’s hard, but it also means they are going to be ready for treatment when they go to look for it.

In this article, we’ll expand on that and some of the steps you can take to make sure your loved one gets into treatment. In addition, we’ll go over the legalities of forcing an adult into treatment by taking them to court.

What is Involuntary Commitment?

Today, an estimated 48.6 million Americans struggle with a substance use disorder. This means that almost one in five Americans has a substance use disorder and needs some form of rehab or treatment. In extreme cases, where the individual in question is deemed to be a danger to themselves or others, you can get the law to step in and force that person into care. In addition, that will be easiest if your loved one breaks the law. For example, if your loved one has a history of driving under the influence, especially if they’ve been arrested in the past.

Civil Commitment or involuntary commitment is not available in every state. Otherwise, you can take your loved one to court with proof of their addiction, proof that they are posing a danger to themselves or others (neglect of themselves, driving under the influence, suicidal ideation, violent ideation) and then hand the decision over to a court. This will involve:

A mental assessment where a medical professional will determine if your loved one is able to make informed decisions about their mental health
The family or family doctor (depending on state) has to make a petition to the court requesting involuntary/civil commitment
The court will evaluate the decision
A hearing will be held where the court will decide if it is valid to force the individual to go to rehab or not.

This type of involuntary commitment is legal in about 30% of states. In many, you’ll need a petition filed by at least two people and the family doctor. Here, Colorado is the easiest place to file for involuntary rehab, as the state makes allowances for up to 180 days of involuntary commitment into rehab.

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What Happens if Involuntary Commitment Works?

If you successfully take your loved one to court and have them involuntarily committed to rehab, what next? In most cases, your loved one will be mandated to 30-180 days of mandatory inpatient or outpatient treatment. Here, most forced rehab is “inpatient” meaning that your loved one stays at a facility chosen by the court for that period. In other cases, your loved one may be asked to attend an outpatient program with a probation officer to ensure they keep going. If they don’t, they could end up in jail.

Motivation is a Crucial Part of Treatment

It’s important that people go to treatment when they are ready. For millions of Americans, getting treatment means acknowledging that they have a problem, that they can’t stop on their own, and that they are out of control. That can require a significant mental shift and is a step that can be extremely painful for many people. We’re all used to people who deny that they have a problem. “I don’t drink that much”, “at least I’m not as bad as X”, “I’m not THAT bad”, “I can quit tomorrow if I want,”. All of these phrases come from people who aren’t yet ready to face that they need help. And, that means they won’t benefit from help without significant motivational therapy upfront.

This is known as “resistance to treatment” and results in non-compliance, non-engagement, and high rates of relapse after treatment ends.

Once you understand that, you can take the approach of building motivation to get help. Helping people realize that their substance use disorder is crippling them, getting in the way of their ability to live and enjoy life, and their ability to reach goals. Many people will painfully feel those impacts, especially if they are still at a point where they are living a normal life, working a job, and taking care of family.

Alternatives to Forcing Treatment

“If only I could just make them get help”, is a tempting thought. At the same time, it can be extremely harmful to your loved one and may not have the results you want. Most states will not allow forced rehab unless the situation is truly dire. For example, if your loved one has lost their house, are homeless, and are not taking care of themselves. If your loved one is still functioning normally, you’re generally better off taking other steps first. For example:

Offering Support – Offering support over the long-term, reinforcing that you’re worried about your loved one, and trying to get your loved one into treatment may have an effect over time. However, progress will be slow.
Interventions – Interventions can be a powerful way to force someone to acknowledge that they are struggling and that they need help. If you’re not sure how to hold an intervention, there are generally professional counselors who can help you plan and hold the intervention to maximum effect.
Harm Reduction – Harm reduction strategies work to reduce the harm of substance abuse without forcing your loved one into treatment. That can mean working to ensure clean needles and safe drugs, ensuring naloxone or other anti-overdose medication is available, and ensuring that your loved one drinks or uses under supervision such as a medication-assisted treatment site. The idea is that they are using anyway, you want them to do so in as safe of a manner as possible before they come to the conclusion that they need help.
Going to Therapy – If you can’t get your loved one into rehab, you might still be able to get them into counseling or therapy. That will, in turn, push them into rehab. Here, you generally want to push getting help with things that they are struggling with like mental health, feeling good, side-effects of substance abuse, work, etc., because you are worried about them.

People who aren’t ready to go to rehab are often facing significant stigma and shame. Therefore, one of the most important things you can do for your loved one is to offer support, to destigmatize addiction, and to treat their problem just like you would depression or a broken leg. It’s a problem that needs treatment and then you can recover and be healthy again.

Getting your loved one into treatment can be extremely difficult. If they’re not ready to go, many states don’t even offer a legal alternative. Instead, you’ll be forced into working to motivate your loved one to get help, staging an intervention, and working to reduce harm until they get into treatment. Good luck getting your loved one into rehab.

Does Insurance Pay for Pet Friendly Drug Rehab?

a female client sitting on a grass with her pet

Does Insurance Pay for Pet Friendly Drug Rehab?

If you’re struggling with a substance abuse disorder, worries like who’s going to take care of your pet can actually stop you from going. Today, an estimated 66% of American households have a pet, and if you’re alone, making sure your pet is taken care of is critical. Still, the vast majority of rehab centers don’t accept pets, citing distraction, extra care, and safety concerns like allergies and accidents. As a result, “pet friendly” rehabs or those that do take pets are often specialty institutions with kennels and pet daycare options that you have to pay for as part of treatment.

The big question is, will your insurance provider pay for it? And, if so, how much will they cover? The answer depends on your insurance plan, the rehab center, and what they are charging for, so figuring out the answer will require a bit more research on your part.

Your Insurance Covers Drug Rehab

Your insurance provider is required, by law, to cover drug rehab. The Affordable Care Act classifies substance use disorders as a temporary disability, meaning you are legally entitled to coverage. Your actual coverage amount will range from about 10% for some inpatient treatment to 90% for most outpatient treatment depending on your plan level. However, no matter your plan, your insurance provider is required by law to cover treatment.

Still, most place significant restrictions on care:

The provider has to be in-network/approved
You’ll need a recommendation into treatment
You may have to go through preliminary treatment such as an outpatient treatment program first
You may pay higher deductibles or copays for outpatient treatment
There may be caps on the coverage provided (E.g., some insurance providers cap coverage at about $25,000)

So, your insurance provider will always cover rehab but how much they cover and what specific institutions are covered can vary a great deal.

What Kind of Treatment Are You Going To?

If you’re going to outpatient treatment it’s almost always going to be easy to get coverage for your pets. If you’re going to inpatient treatment, you’re probably going to have a harder time getting coverage to begin with. For example, most insurance providers will cover outpatient treatment to the extent of regular mental healthcare. You might have a deductible per day/per visit or a deductible for the first visit. However, you’ll always get coverage and usually the standard provided by your plan with 40-90% depending on the level of Bronze-Platinum. That means that for outpatient treatment, coverage is normally relatively predictable.

If you’re opting for inpatient treatment, coverage is less clear. For example, some insurance providers will cover 40-90% of treatment costs minus significant deductibles and co-pays. For example, you might have a $200 per day copay. You might also have a 50% copay. These plans will typically all cover plans with pet care or pet friendly arrangements – but it does mean that the more your treatment costs, the more you’ll pay for it.

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What Pet Services Are Provided?

“Pet friendly” drug rehab can translate into a wider range of services. For example, your pet friendly rehab can include:

Pet daycare facilities like kennels and people to watch pets
Pets allowed in rooms
Pets incorporated into treatment and therapy
A mix of the above

So, pets allowed in rooms will normally come with a deposit or surcharge, much like hotels. This means you’ll pay a fee to cover any damage your pet might do in the space and can then bring your pet. Your insurance will almost never cover this fee as it’s not related to mental healthcare at all.

If you’re paying for pet care facilities that aren’t included as part of the base service, you’ll also expect to pay for that out of pocket. However, pet care will typically cost about the same as you would pay for having your pet in a kennel at home – which means you’ll pay about the same while having access to your pet during treatment.

Finally, if your pet is incorporated into treatment, you might get coverage from your insurance provider. Pet therapy and animal-assisted therapy are increasingly common – although this might require trained animals, it more often incorporates taking care of and bonding with an animal as part of the treatment. There’s no reason why that can’t be your own pet.

Here, it’s also important to pay attention to what’s offered as part of a pet friendly rehab. For example, if your rehab is only offering a kennel service, you might want to check if you’re allowed to see your pet at all. After all, some people might have allergies, your pet will have to be checked to ensure they can safely socialize with other patients, etc. Those create risks for other patients and for your pet.

What is Your Doctor’s Recommendation?

It’s important to start out your search for a pet friendly drug rehab by talking to your doctor. Here, you’ll want to discuss your reasons for wanting to take your pet with you, lack of pet care as an obstacle to getting treatment, and any emotional or support benefits you get from having a pet. The more strongly your doctor recommends you to a treatment center offering pet care, the more your insurance provider is going to be obligated to offer some coverage for the pet care as well. In addition, you’ll always need the recommendation to treatment to get care at all.

Here, it’s often a good idea to look at your provider’s network and figure out which treatment centers (if any) are in-network, so you have specific options to bring to your doctor before you start the discussion. And, of course, that discussion will almost always start with whether you need treatment at all – but chances are at this point you’ve already had that discussion.

Talking to Your Insurance Provider

The final say on whether your insurance provider covers pet friendly drug rehab is always going to come down to the provider. For example, most providers require that rehab institutions be:

Part of their network. Many plans simply do not offer coverage for out of network facilities. However, many do, so check your plan construction to be sure
A doctor’s recommendation to the facility. Most insurance providers want your doctor to send them a request for treatment and to refer you to that facility. You’ll always have to talk to your doctor.

You’ll also want to call your insurance provider to ask what coverage options are, what extra services are covered, and what the specific rules are. You might find your provider has a whole list of extra services like pet care that are partially covered. You might also find they don’t much care what’s included – so long as you stay within caps and pay everything over that. However, calling and understanding the rates and what the rules are will help you a great deal.

Eventually, finding a pet friendly drug treatment center can make it more accessible for you to get the treatment you need. Not having to worry about a pet means you’ll be better able to focus on treatment. Having the company of a pet can offer a lot of support as well. And, treatment centers are increasingly offering pet care and facilities, so you have more options than ever before.

Supporting a Loved One Coming Home from Addiction Treatment

If your loved one is in treatment, they’re taking the steps to change their life for the better. Whether that’s after a long and hard battle to get them there or a sudden decision on their part doesn’t matter. Chances are, you want to support them and to provide the kind of help and support they need to continue to get better at home. That can mean taking steps to get therapy yourself, to change how you talk about and see substance use disorder, and to provide the kind of support they need.

It’s natural that you want to help. Chances are, offering support will also make a lot of difference to your loved one and how they feel coming out of addiction treatment. At the same time, they need to be in charge of their recovery and that means they set the pace. You can’t decide things for anyone, instead, you can only provide the emotional support they need to keep moving forward. Sometimes that will be difficult, especially if your loved one is struggling, appears to be backsliding, or is too caught up in dealing with their own problems to notice the help.

Addiction Treatment Doesn’t Mean Complete Recovery

In an ideal world, your loved one would go to treatment and come back completely recovered, with no more substance use disorder. Unfortunately, nothing ever works that way. Even if you were to send your loved one off for surgery for a broken bone, they’d still have months of recovery to follow – and you’d have to support them as they struggle through healing. Addiction treatment is the same, as you’ll have someone who’s been handed tools and a means of changing their life, but who still has to figure out how to apply that and if that application fits their life or if they need further support.

They will still experience cravings, they will have mood swings, they will revert to behaviors from addiction, they may even relapse a few times. The important thing is that they always stop and recognize negative things and get back on track, because healing is very rarely linear. If you need extra help with that, going to support groups like Al-Anon can actually help a great deal.

It’s also important to keep in mind that nothing is bringing the “old” them back. Most of us send our loved ones off to treatment expecting to get the “them” they were before addiction happened back. That’s never going to happen, and setting expectations for it will only lead to disappointment. You’re going to have to get to know your loved one as they are now, with the impact of everything that’s happened since they started using, with the impact of substances on their brain, and with the impacts of therapy and treatment. They won’t be the same as before – but chances are, you’ll like the new version of them just as much as you did the old one.

Understanding what Support Looks Like

It’s also important to consider what supporting your loved one actually looks like. That means stepping back and looking at which factor. In most cases, that means:

Having the ability to make informed decisions to support physical and emotional well-being
Having a stable and safe place to live
Having a meaningful and independent life with resources to participate in society
Having support, love, friendship, and family through relationships and social networks

You can often help with that in several ways. For example, you can help by listening, by providing a stable place to live, by offering respect, and by continuing to engage with them even when they are struggling. Support can look different depending on your relationship and for example, will take dramatically different forms depending on whether your loved one is living with you or not after treatment.

Committing to Healing Relationships

It’s important to keep in mind that substance use disorders often very significantly damage relationships. Often, you will build patterns of negative behavior and responses that can carry over, even after your loved one is in recovery. This means you may have to deal with your own negative emotions and being bitter, angry, or disappointed. Your loved one is not going to tackle those right away and may not even realize it has to be done. Putting the focus on their recovery first and working to build a relationship so you have the grounds to talk about the past is an important part of commitment.

It’s not about you, their focus on their recovery should be the most important thing for the first months out of recovery
It’s critical to set healthy boundaries and to say no when you cannot or do not want to do something or be involved with it
Setting guidelines on stepping out of situations where either of you is behaving or responding in a negative fashion is important.
Deciding to actively acknowledge and work around past behavior and patterns will be important, especially if you find yourself easily fighting, dismissing each other, etc.

Setting good boundaries can also help you to ensure that you behave in a healthy manner around your loved one. E.g., by ensuring that you aren’t enabling them or pushing them back into a pattern of substance abuse.

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Create a Safe and Welcoming Environment

It’s important that you take steps to create a safe and welcoming environment for your loved one. That means:

Practicing acceptance of who they are now, with all faults and problems
Accepting that they aren’t recovered and are instead in recovery
Making space for mental health problems
Accepting that they will not be fixing your relationship right away
Accepting that substance use disorders are a behavioral disorder or an illness and not a personal choice

It also means taking steps to make your loved one feel like they are accepted, welcome, and wanted. That means:

Treating your loved one like a member of the family even when they can’t contribute to the family
Involve them in plans, events, etc.
Plan around their obligations and needs. E.g., having parties that are alcohol-free, taking their therapy or 12-step obligations into account when making plans, etc. Simple things like going “We can’t go out to dinner at Thursday at 5 PM because X has their 12-step meeting then, why don’t we do it Wednesday instead?” can make a lot of difference to people feeling like their needs are being taken into account.

A history of substance use disorder can mean there’s a history of avoidance, negative emotions, and not including people in plans. Changing that is one of the easiest ways to show that you accept they are trying and that they are part of the family.

Talk and Listen

Going into recovery and treatment often means that you’re basing your entire life around treatment. At the same time, your loved one is changing as a person. They’re learning new things, picking up new skills, picking up new hobbies, and making new friends. They’re in a state of enforced change and that can be difficult and traumatic. Making space to talk about that, about what they are learning, about what they are doing, about life goals, etc., is more important than talking about addiction, cravings, and getting better. Why? It makes your loved one feel supported, like you see that they are trying, and that you acknowledge they are a person beyond their substance use disorder and recovery from it.

Seek Out Family Therapy

In many cases, it’s going to be important to go to therapy and treatment yourself. That’s either by yourself or with your loved one. Family therapy can help you to improve your relationships, to undo old patterns, and to build new behavioral patterns with your loved one. It can also allow you to get support in figuring out how to be there for your loved one. That also often means having third-party insight into what your loved one is saying and what that means for you and for your family.

Family therapy can help you to work on healing relationships, to understand how your negative behavior patterns impact each other, and to see your relationship from their perspective as well as your own.

Building a Relationship

Moving forward from addiction means putting in a lot of work. It means accepting your loved one for who they are and as imperfect. It also means giving them autonomy, freedom, and privacy to make their own decisions. That means building trust and rebuilding a relationship based on who they are now. That can be difficult, especially if the past hasn’t given you the grounds to do so, but will give you a baseline to have a healthy and positive relationship with your loved one moving forward.

Rehab or addiction treatment gives your loved one the tools to move forward and to fix their life. It’s what they do with it as they leave rehab that counts. The most important thing you can do to support that is to make them feel loved, like part of the family, and like they are being seen for the effort they are putting in.

7 Characteristics of a Good Drug and Alcohol Rehab

mental health expert at a drug and alcohol rehab

7 Characteristics of a Good Drug and Alcohol Rehab

If you or a loved one is struggling with a substance use disorder, getting help and going to rehab is the best way to get started turning your life around. Unfortunately, even choosing a rehab center can be a challenge. In 2022, there were 17,353 registered substance use disorder treatment facilities in the United States. This means you’ll have to navigate a large number of options, look at different treatment methods, and put in work to find the treatment center that works for you.

Those facilities also vary considerably in treatment options, luxury, treatment type, and treatment delivery. For example, you can go to a simple outpatient program where you visit the clinic daily. You can also go to a high-end luxury resort that looks and feels like a vacation with therapy on top. There’s also a large range of options in between, which is the best fit for most people. Whatever you go to, the following 7 characteristics of a good drug and alcohol rehab are crucial for your treatment.

1. They Accept Your Insurance

Substance abuse treatment can be extremely expensive, especially if you’re going to an inpatient treatment facility. Having the surety that your program is covered by your insurance allows you to get the help you need without adding on extra financial stress. In addition, if your treatment facility accepts insurance, that means it’s offering medically recognized treatment, has gone through the process of being locally licensed and certified, and meets the standards for quality set by whatever region it is in.

Of course, that’s not always the case. Some insurance programs simply won’t cover inpatient care. Others require that you go to outpatient care first and only cover inpatient care if you relapse after an outpatient program. So, your rehab center not being covered by your insurance provider may be about policy rather than about the rehab facility being part of an established medical network. However, in general, it’s best to work with rehab centers that work with medical providers, that are part of your network, and that can share data and medical files to your doctor and vice-versa, so you get the best possible care.

2. The Facility and Staff are Licensed

It’s important to check who you are working with and who is providing treatment as part of your rehab program. For example, are you working with registered nurses for your detox program? Are counselors licensed? Is there a psychologist or psychiatrist on the team? How much interaction will you have with those people?

Depending on the drug and alcohol rehab team, you’re likely to work with a mix of counselor, nurses, and doctors. You’ll want to see what staff are like and how qualified they. The best programs largely rely on skilled specialist counselors with therapists and doctors to back up those programs, so you get a mix of treatment.

3. The Facility Offers Personalized Treatment

Whether it’s called personalization, trauma-informed care, or a program that’s adjusted to your needs as you move through it, you want to look for personalization. This means that the facility adapts your treatment to you and your needs. This is important because many people going into addiction treatment struggle with unique problems like trauma, co-occurring mental health disorders, and behavioral problems. If you’re having trouble motivating yourself to believe in therapy, therapy should adapt to offer you a motivational program. If you’re struggling to commit to treatment because you’re feeling suicidal, therapy should adapt to address that first.

Personalized treatment means you get the care you need, when you need it, instead of being forced through a cookie-cutter program. That will improve your outcome and will ensure you get the support you need as you need it. However, it can also mean programs last much longer, as you might have to delay treatment to address other symptoms or slow down treatment to your pace.

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4. Low Patient to Staff Ratios

The more one-on-one time you get with staff and counselors, the more value you’ll get from the treatment center. Of course, you also benefit a great deal from interacting with your peers and from group therapy. That’s why basically every treatment option incorporates group therapy as a baseline. It’s good for you to see and experience how others are going through and have gone through addiction, it’s good for you to understand your peers, and it’s good for you to be able to see which aspects of your personality and behavior are you and which are “just” addiction. At the same time, the best drug and alcohol rehab centers maintain a low staff to patient ratio.

In general, ratings are:

14+ patients per staff member – High
4-14 patients per staff member – Average
4 or less patients per staff member – Low

It’s also important to keep in mind that the lower staff to patient ratios are, the more you’ll pay for treatment. However, you’ll also get more direct attention, more personalization, and more insight into your own personal needs. And, that can be extremely valuable, whether you’re going to an inpatient or an outpatient program.

5. Diverse Treatment Options

Most people are aware that there are dozens of ways to treat substance use disorders. Here, you want to look for a program that uses multiple treatment options so that they can adapt your treatment and your program to your needs. For example, if your treatment center is only offering counseling, it might not be a great resource for you.

A good mix of treatment options looks like:

Diverse behavioral therapies like CBT, DBT, and EMDR
Counseling
Group Therapy
Motivational Therapies like ACT
Complementary therapies like music therapy, nutritional therapy
Exercise and fitness programs

Essentially, you want a program that uses a mix of resources, so it can offer you what you need, when you need it.

6. Aftercare Programs

The dream is that you go through rehab and you walk out the other side, a new person, ready to recover. Unfortunately, that’s rarely the case. Most people end up needing aftercare including ongoing therapy and counseling. Sometimes that’s to give you the support you need to stay clean and sober. In other cases, it’s to give you the support you need to go back to recovery after a relapse. However, any good rehab program will realize that you need this aftercare. Aftercare can mean sober homes, ongoing support and counseling, telehealth support, fast-track readmission in case of a relapse, an outpatient program, checkups and key dates, etc. The important thing is that it’s there, that you discuss with your rehab center what you need and why, and that you have the tools to get that ongoing support.

7. Support for Co-occurring Disorders

More than half of all people with a substance use disorder also have a co-occurring mental health disorder. Many of those include disorders that require medication and treatment. You need to ensure that your facility has the tools to help you manage co-occurring disorders, to help you treat the symptoms of substance use disorders around mental health disorders, and that address how substance use disorders impact your vulnerability to substance abuse and to relapse.

There’s a lot that goes into choosing a drug and alcohol rehab program. Often, you should start by talking to your doctor, decide what you’re looking for, and then figure out where you’re looking for treatment. From there, it’s easier to narrow down treatment options – and you may find that there are only a few that meet the criteria you’re looking for. Hopefully, you can find a great rehab center that meets your needs and helps you take the next step towards recovery.

Why Long-Term Addiction Rehab Produces Better Outcomes

a man from a long term rehab center looking at the camera

Why Long-Term Addiction Rehab Produces Better Outcomes

For most people, rehab means a 28-30-day stint in a recovery clinic. That standard care often feels like a long time for many of us, especially when we have to take time off of work, away from childcare, and away from other life responsibilities and goals. At the same time, modern medicine and research increasingly shows that 30 days is not enough to offer the full term of support and care that most people need. For that reason, long-term addiction rehab, or rehab that extends up to 6 months, is increasingly available. Here, long-term addiction rehab facilities often adjust the treatment model to the patient. This means that you receive care for as long as your doctor and provider thinks you need it.

The 30-day treatment model still offers convenience and an alternative to those who can’t afford a longer term of care. However, continuing with outpatient treatment after an inpatient stay is still recommended. There are many reasons why long-term addiction rehab produces better outcomes than the traditional model. If you’re considering investing in longer care for you or your loved one, it’s important to understand why, and what the differences are.

Based on Biological Recovery

Most people are aware that recovering from the physical impacts of addiction can take a very long time. Few of us are aware of just how long. For example, the early impacts of addiction on the reward system typically fade within 30-90 days depending on the individual. After 30-90 days of treatment, your brain will be at a semi-permanent state of “recovery” for the next 12-24 months. From there, you’ll continue to heal, but more slowly.

For many people, it does take 1-2 years before your brain resembles a “control” subject of someone who hasn’t been addicted to drugs or alcohol. For example, it typically takes about 14 months for your brain to show levels of dopamine transporters at levels similar to those of persons who have never been addicted. Brain imaging from persons who were abstinent after alcoholism also showed that the longer individuals were abstinent, the better brain recovery was. For example, individuals who were abstinent for 10 months were significantly more likely to show normal volumes in areas of the brain related to executive control, salience, and emotional processing than individuals who were sober for 1 month.

On the other hand, your brain may never fully recover from addiction. The earlier you start using or drinking, the more permanent changes will be. For example, adolescents who heavily drink are likely to never have a brain that functions the same as a control subject who never had an addiction. Still, that just means you’ll need more ongoing support, rather than that you can’t live without drugs or alcohol.

Essentially, your body takes a long time to recover from addiction. Spending one month in rehab can help you to overcome the worst of cravings. For many others, that process takes up to 90 days. From there, you’ll still have a long uphill battle as your brain slowly returns to normal.

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Benefits of Long-Term Drug Rehab

Long-term drug rehab is typically delivered in one of several ways, depending on your resources and time. These include:

A longer stay of 90+ days in a rehab facility where you’ll receive full support and ongoing care in a facility, followed by aftercare when you leave
A 30-day stay in residential treatment followed by 6+ months of outpatient treatment
A 30-day stay in residential treatment followed by a stay in a sober home and 6+ months of outpatient treatment

Here, you’ll normally get a therapy and counseling schedule that’s very similar to what you’d get in a shorter-term rehab. However, it will extend for longer. You’ll also get additional tracks of long-term self-care, physical health, mental recovery, social recovery, etc., to help you rehabilitate back into your life, rather than just helping with the immediate pressing issue of the substance use disorder.

Building Structure – The longer your stint in rehab, the more time you’ll have to build the structure and habits that allow you to live in a healthy way. For example, most people are aware of the “24 days to build a habit” maxim. Few of us are aware that in reality that scales from 14-90+ days. The longer you have to repeat habits like daily exercise, cleaning, self-care, meals, etc., the more you’ll be able to make those routines a normal part of your life, without extra effort. Therefore, spending more time in rehab means you’ll have more time to make structure a normal part of your life. You’ll also have more time to benefit from structure set up by someone else, so you don’t have to worry about or think about things like ensuring you’re eating well, that you’re getting enough exercise, etc. You’ll get the healthy lifestyle while having the headspace to focus on your recovery, managing your mental health, and working through counseling and therapy.

Ongoing Care –Traditional rehab means you get a few weeks of detox followed by a few weeks of intensive therapy and care. With long-term rehab, you get detox and then as much ongoing therapy as you need. This means that your program is completely scaled to meet your needs to help you work through pressing issues as they come up and then to continue to help you build healthy coping skills, healthy life skills, social skills, etc.

A Focus on Life Rehabilitation – Long-term drug rehab means you can shift the focus of mental healthcare away from triage and focusing on immediate issues like cravings and addiction and towards helping you build the skills for a healthy and happy life. That means skills to cope with cravings, time management, emotional regulation, learning to build healthy and fulfilling social relationships, introducing self-care, learning to manage mental health, etc. That will, eventually, mean you’re set up to be much more stable and healthy when you do go back to your life.

Support as Long as You Need It – If you’re staying in rehab as long as you need it, you can get the care you need. That means continuing each part of your track until you’re actually ready to graduate. That means you can focus on recovering from and dealing with cravings for as long as you need. When you’re ready to move on from that, you can do so. You can spend as much time as you need to learn how to manage stress, emotional regulation, and anything else that comes up during the course of your treatment. That will, eventually, give you a much better baseline to deal with and manage yourself and your life. Recovery at your own pace also means you can get treatment for years on an outpatient basis, and you don’t have to stop going to care until you’re ready to do so.

Aftercare – It doesn’t matter how long treatment is, you should always get aftercare. That means options to restart treatment and to have checkups, ongoing sessions with counselors, and meetups with your peers. Long-term addiction rehab typically provides that as a standard part of treatment, meaning you know that when you graduate from care, you’ll have follow-up sessions to ensure you’re still doing well, you’ll have opportunities to reconnect with people, and you’ll have opportunities to give back where you want to.

Long-term addiction rehab is an investment because it takes more of your time and for longer. However, it provides you with a baseline to build a healthy life, to get treatment at your own pace, and to stay in care for as long as you need it. It’s not the right solution for everyone, but for many people, it means you’re opting into long-term support and structure, so you get what you need to stay clean and sober.

If you or your loved-one struggles from alcoholism or other substance abuse please contact us today and speak with one of our experienced and professional intake advisors about our alcohol rehab, detox, partial hospitalization, and residential treatment programs. 10 Acre Ranch also has specialty tracks like our pet friendly drug rehab and couples substance abuse treatment programs. We’re here to help you recover.

How Effective is Suboxone for Fentanyl Treatment?

Suboxone is an FDA-approved prescription drug most commonly used to help people maintain abstinence from opioid drugs. As a result, suboxone is one of the most prescribed medications for Medication Assisted Treatment (MAT) programs. It’s also listed as a life-saving drug by the World Health Administration as an essential drug. At the same time, there’s a lot of controversy around Suboxone – both for use with opioids and also for extra strong opioids such as fentanyl.

Here, many people are concerned that they’re replacing one drug with another. Others are concerned that Suboxone also has a withdrawal period. And, in some cases, individuals are concerned about the potential of precipitated withdrawal, which means that you suddenly go into withdrawal from a very strong drug, which can result in hospitalization. At the same time, Suboxone is considered one of the most important drugs for helping people maintain recovery – so you don’t run the risk of overdose when you go back to fentanyl. What are the factors that impact this? And, how effective is it?

What is Suboxone?

Suboxone is an FDA-approved combination drug composed of Buprenorphine and Naloxone. It’s typically orally administrated and is primarily used in maintenance programs to help individuals stay clean during recovery from opioid use disorder. The drug has been shown to greatly improve outcomes for individuals by preventing relapse, reducing cravings, and reducing the length and severity of the detox phase. It’s also comprised of two of the most important drugs in opioid use disorder treatment:

Buprenorphine – Buprenorphine is an opioid drug with a light side effect profile and a lower addiction profile than those used recreationally. In light doses, buprenorphine causes no euphoria or sedation, meaning that it doesn’t have a driver for individuals to abuse it recreationally. However, it does bind with the same opioid receptors in the body and brain as fentanyl, meaning that while you’re taking it, you don’t experience physical cravings and you don’t go into withdrawal. This drug is sold on its own as Subutex. Here, it’s an important and lief-saving drug. However, it still carries the potential of abuse as buprenorphine can cause euphoria in high doses and when injected.
Naloxone – Suboxone also contains Naloxone, which is known as a the opioid overdose withdrawal reversal drug. Naloxone is an opioid antagonist which causes opioids to stop binding with receptors in the brain. This can pull individuals out of an overdose. It can also cause sudden onset withdrawal which means that someone taking Naloxone suddenly will almost certainly require hospital care and treatment. However, it’s poorly digested orally. This means that while you are taking the Suboxone orally or according to prescription, it won’t have an effect. However, if you take more than the prescribed dose or attempt to inject it, the Naloxone will take effect – and you will go into withdrawal.

In short, Suboxone is buprenorphine, an opioid drug with an anti-abuse mechanism built in. That makes it safer for people to take home and use on their own, even during early stages of addiction.

When taking it, you should mostly feel normal, but without cravings or withdrawal symptoms associated with quitting opioid drugs like fentanyl.

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Is Suboxone Effective?

Suboxone is one of the most-recommended drugs for medication assisted treatment. That recommendation comes from the fact that it works, it has a very low risk of abuse, and the safety mechanism of Naloxone means that patients can more easily use it unsupervised at home. That allows more freedom to individuals to live their lives rather than going to a doctor’s office or clinic every day for a dose of buprenorphine.

Suboxone is also fully FDA approved. It’s consistently pointed to as greatly improving outcomes in opioid use disorder treatment. However, it is not a treatment on its own. Suboxone does not help you overcome behavioral addiction. Instead, it reduces cravings and withdrawal symptoms, allowing you to go about living your normal life while getting treatment for substance use disorder. Without dealing with cravings, you’re more likely to be able to get through treatment without risking relapse and potential overdose on fentanyl. This means it greatly reduces risks of accidental death while also reducing risk of relapse to begin with. At the same time, you still need behavioral therapy to recover from a behavioral substance use disorder. For this reason, any substance use disorder treatment program offering medication assistance with Suboxone will pair it with therapy and counseling.

Overall, Suboxone is a very safe and effective drug that can function as a crutch while you learn the skills to stay clean. It reduces the impact of quitting right away, reduces cravings, and lowers the threshold to staying clean. As a result, people who use it are significantly more likely to stay in recovery than those who are not in a MAT program.

What’s are the Concerns of Using Suboxone with Fentanyl?

Fentanyl is widely known as one of the strongest opioid drugs on the market. It’s also increasingly finding its way into dozens of drugs, including faux prescription pills, drugs sold as heroin, and even directly sold as fentanyl. At 10,000 times the strength of morphine, fentanyl is extremely strong and has a very high risk of overdose and accidental drug death. In fact, more than 74% of opioid drug deaths are linked to fentanyl. When you use Naloxone to treat fentanyl overdose, it causes significant and immediate withdrawal symptoms which can require medical attention. This is known as precipitated withdrawal. Persons taking suboxone run a risk of precipitated withdrawal as well. However, according to a study published in 2023, about 1% of fentanyl users taking suboxone will go through precipitated withdrawal. This means that it is important to start using suboxone in a clinic if you’re a fentanyl user. However, risks are extremely low.

In other cases, people are concerned about using one opioid to recover from another. However, buprenorphine has an extremely low addiction profile. This means it’s very unlikely that you become addicted to the drug. You will become dependent on the drug, which means you’ll have to taper off it in order to quit. However, it also means you can safely quit opioids, with low risks of strong withdrawal symptoms, and low risk of relapse. As a result, Suboxone is associated with improved recovery rates, reduced risk of death, and decreased cost of treatment.

Seeking Out Medication Assisted Treatment

If you or a loved one is struggling with substance abuse, it’s important to look into getting help. If that substance is fentanyl, withdrawal and recovery are difficult and can be dangerous. Medication assisted programs with Suboxone can greatly reduce those risks. However, it’s important to discuss your options with your doctor and your rehab facility. Both should help you to look at your options, associated risks, and how those risks come into play for your recovery, your long-term health, and your short-term treatment. Chances are very high that you’ll be recommended into a tapering program to reduce fentanyl usage or directly into a detox clinic where you can start suboxone under medical supervision and then directly into a behavioral mental health treatment program.

Eventually, the right treatment for you depends on your mental health, your addiction, and what you want for yourself. Suboxone can be life-saving, it can reduce risks, and it can help you to stay in recovery. Either way, good luck getting treatment.