Addiction problems are on the rise in the United States. There are many reasons for this, including an increased availability of narcotics on the streets and the fact that doctors are willingly prescribing addictive drugs without thinking about the consequences and without giving any thought to the patient’s potential for addiction.
Addiction is a disease. It is a vicious, unrelenting disorder that strikes at the very heart of your life, making everything from your mental and physical health, to your family, your career and everything else you hold dear. However, we shouldn’t punish or exclude addicts. We have all suffered from some form of addiction, distress or disorder in our lives and we all deserve respect as we deal with these issues.
The most important thing is to remain informed. The more we know about addiction, recovery, treatments and withdrawals, the better we can handle them. That is the goal of Addictive Addiction.
What we Do
We are not psychiatrists or counsellors. We are not experts in helping those with mental illnesses and drug abuse problems. But we don’t claim to be any of those things. What we are, however, is a team of writers who have had their own problems with addiction and illness; a team of writers who have written for countless rehab clinics and specialists around the world.
In fact, Addictive Addiction began following a job that the owner of this site had with an online rehab clinic. The clinic were creating a number of pop-up sites to direct customers to a single clinic in the state of California. The process required the writer to create endless articles on addiction, illness and co-occurring disorders.
They were chosen because of their skills as a writer, but also because of their experience in this area. Over time, they realized that they really enjoyed writing on this subject and so they used their expertise gathered from working with this rehab clinic and they began creating articles for Addictive Addiction.
Over time they were joined by several other skilled writers who had the experience and the desire to cover these topics.
On this site you can learn about all of the following:
- Drug Addiction (opiates, stimulants, prescription drugs, solvents, cigarettes, cannabis)
- Alcohol Addiction
- Mood Disorders (bipolar disorder, borderline personality disorder, antisocial personality disorder)
- Depressive Disorders (major depressive disorder, seasonal affective disorder)
- Anxiety Disorders (generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder)
- Codependency
- Marriage Counseling
- Sleeping Problems
- Eating Disorders
We also discuss dual diagnosis and co-occurring disorders. For instance, it is very common for mood disorders and depressive disorders to present with drug addiction and alcohol addiction; it is very common for eating disorders and sleeping problems to present in broken marriages, drug addiction and codependency.
Most importantly, we can discuss treatments to help you get the help that you need.
Why Do Mental Illness And Substance Abuse Occur Together?
The need that some sufferers feel to self-medicate is so often what triggers substance abuse problems in those with mental illnesses. So many patients have struggled to find the help they need, whether through support groups or prescription medication, and this is what has turned them toward illicit substances.
It is very easy for drug use to get out of hand when you’re going through a difficult time. If you’re feeling terrible and you find something that makes you feel great, you’re going to want to continue taking it. When you do, you’ll eventually become addicted. And because withdrawal will make you feel even worse than you did before, you may choose instead to just keep using. It’s a vicious circle of use.
The fact that they so often occur together also makes it difficult to diagnose and treat. The main problem that a specialist faces is that the symptoms of many mental illnesses (including Major Depressive Disorder an Bipolar Disorder) can often mimic those of depressive drugs and they are also common in most drug withdrawals.
For instance, if we focus on Major Depression, irritability, severe depression and sleep problems are all hallmarks of the withdrawal and even the aftereffects of cocaine, methamphetamine and amphetamines. While digestive distress, weight changes, low moods and oversleeping present in heavy users of opiates, cannabis and alcohol.
Our Goal at Addictive Addiction
There are more mental illnesses being diagnosed now than ever before. That’s because we now understand more about how to spot them, how to diagnose them and how to treat them. Online medical sites also help, as patients are now doing their own research, discovering what their symptoms mean and then seeking the help they need to get rid of them.
That is our goal. We don’t want to provide you with help directly, because we’re not qualified to do that and we make no clams to the contrary. We just want to contribute to the information that is out there and to make sure that everything we provide is accurate.
Far too much information about there is not reliable because it is not accurate. It has been written by expert writers, or by scientists and medical experts. This is all fair and well as research can help you a lot. However, these things often lack the personal and the experienced touch, and that’s where we come in.
How to Use Addictive Addiction
we welcome all patients to explore our website and to see the information that we have on countless mental illnesses and drug addictions. You can learn about eating disorders, drug addiction, alcohol addiction, marriage counseling, bipolar disorder, major depressive, anxiety disorders and more. And once you find the information you need, then you can also learn about treatments.
At the time of writing, this site is new and we’re only just beginning to piece everything together. In time we would like to work with rehab clinics in order to refer people to places that can help them. However, this is not easy to do as we would want to make sure that those clinics really were helpful and professional, and that’s not always easy to do.
However, we may link to places every now and then, so if you find a link then you know we have done our research and believe that the clinic is perfectly capable of helping you with your issue.
Help out Addictive Addiction
Our team is small. We have trialled many writers and have talked with many more, but it’s difficult to find people who have the talent and experience as a writer, as well as someone who understands mental illness and drug abuse/addiction. If you think that you fit the bill and would like to write for this health information site, then simply click onto our Write for Us page.
Here you will find our guidelines, as well as a contact form that you can use to submit your details and a sample of your work. Just remember that we want skilled writers, but we also want people who understand this topic and preferably people with direct experience of it.