The Importance of Aftercare in Addiction Recovery

Because of how frustrating, demanding, and complex the condition of addiction is, it’s important to not only have a decent addiction rehabilitation program available to you but also aftercare services as well. Effective addiction treatment can assist in improving the lives of addicts who struggle with their so-called demons. Better results and outlook is possible for those with treatment options that are tailored to their individual needs and extensively available, even once the initial months-long treatment is over.

Statistics from the SAMHSA

It’s unfortunate but most of the centers out there don’t offer specialized substance abuse treatment for patients or the majority of people aren’t able to receive it for one reason or another.  According to SAMHSA or the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, only 11 percent of addicts in need of treatment of their condition actually get the substance abuse treatment they require.

Furthermore, it’s reported that 7.7 million American adults tend to struggle with co-occurring substance use disorder that requires dual diagnosis in order to get treated, like addiction in tandem with a mental illness. Both conditions should be treated with the rehab proper and the follow-up aftercare because there’s the risk for the unaddressed co-occurring issue to worse, leading to relapse or other dire consequences in the long run.

 The Addiction Recovery Process and Its Link to Aftercare

Detoxification or detox is not where addiction treatment ends. There’s still the initial treatment of the addiction withdrawal symptoms or the main rehab program. The rehab center then takes measures to ensure that the addict gets to live a drug-free lifestyle for the long-term instead of the short-term. Such a process involves a wide variety of psychological and physical treatments so that a patient can come back to their original state before the addiction manifested. To wit:

• What Is Aftercare Anyway? Aftercare is a term that describes the continuation or follow-up treatment for an addict’s substance abuse that happens after the initial rehab program is over. Regardless of the methods used, the treatment provider, or the setting, the goals of addiction after program remain the same. Keep on reading this article to specifically find out what those goals are.

• Continuum of Treatment: The idea of aftercare should come within the framework that treatment should be in a continuum. Sure, each treatment should always have a designated timeframe and phase, but they should also be interconnected with each other. Therefore, the most effective of addiction aftercare services come from rehab centers that closely connect the main treatment with the aftercare treatment, as though the latter is just a continuation of the former.

• Initial Thoughts on Aftercare and Overall Recovery: Aftercare is an important part of overall recovery. In some rehab centers, it’s an optional part as well. However, in others, it works best as part of the main treatment to ensure that the months of rehab won’t be wasted with a rehab. Still others consider aftercare as only something that should be availed of in case of relapse. Then again, there are facilities that offer an extra month of treatment once relapse occurs as part of a promo.

• It All Starts with Detoxification: The first step in any addiction and substance abuse treatment is medical detox that’s supervised by actual doctors and nurses. Depending on the recommendations of the healthcare professional and the substance being abused, detoxification might be called for. Some cases involve treatment of withdrawal symptoms or emotional distress straightaway. There may be medications involved to help alleviate these withdrawal symptoms as you’re safely and comfortably cleared of toxicity inside your body.

• Long-Term Abstinence Requires Holistic Rehab: Detox is just the first step. You still have to deal with the aftermath of addiction, particularly when it comes to undoing your bad habits and dependence that’s hardwired into your brain. This should allow you to start practicing and sticking with your alcohol or drug abstinence. It’s during this period that you’ll undergo a structured addiction treatment that’s either in an outpatient 12-step recovery type of setting or an inpatient/residential environment.

• Timeline for Rehab or Formal Treatment: The timeline for your treatment will naturally vary depending on the severity of your case. The recommended time for addicts is three months. There are rehabilitation programs available that offer one to three months while others can go for as long as six to nine months. Still others offer an extra month in case of relapse at no further charge. Speaking of which, ongoing recovery efforts are encouraged to continue, even if involves a shift from hospice or residential care to outpatient or clinical care.

• Outlining the Importance of Aftercare Planning: It’s important to outline and realize your aftercare planning as far as your post-rehab life is concerned. In order to ensure substance abuse recovery, full abstinence, and sobriety, you or your support system should keep tabs with your rehab center whenever you’re on the verge of relapse. The best rehab services offer programs that ensure land prioritize lasting recovery. They won’t send you on your way without a solid discharge plan, in particular.

• What’s Entailed in a Solid Discharge Plan: A solid discharge plan involves quality aftercare programs to follow-up the main rehab treatment and to ensure recovery. This is all for the sake of achieving a life filled with a sense of purpose and rewarding relationships on top of finding ways to prevent relapse while at the same time maintaining recovery from substance abuse. It’s easier said than done but it helps that the rehab proper serves as your aftercare’s foundation.

• Altered Brain Chemistry: It’s essential to do aftercare in all addiction recovery situations because longstanding substance abuse can lead to the malfunctioning or altered function of the brain. You need to change the hardwired bad habits in your brain so that you can psychologically and mentally remove yourself from being overly dependent on whichever substance led you to become an addict in the first place. You’re in a slippery slope right after you’re done with rehab, after all.

• The Difficulty of Going Back to Normal: It’s fair to say that the changes in your brain don’t instantly reverse even after your usage of drugs or consumption of alcohol has ceased. It at least takes as much time to get back to normal as it did to get addicted, although certain complications and faulty support systems back at home can lengthen your “suffering”. Just follow doctor’s orders, be faithful with your aftercare work, and stay focused. Presence of mind or self-awareness can play a huge part in sticking with our recovery.

Measuring Aftercare Efficacy

Just like in the case of other serious chronic conditions, addiction has no easy cure. You can’t just pop several pills then call your doctor in the morning. The danger you want to avoid is relapse, which is always a possibility. The longer you’ve been addicted, the stronger your chances of relapse even after going through intense inpatient rehab treatment. Relapse also makes it hard to measure the aftercare program’s effectiveness.

• Effective Rehab Treatment 101: Effective rehab treatment reduces withdrawal symptoms and takes care of other complications both mental and physical resulting from being an addict. In contrast, lack of a treatment or poor rehab is linked to increased symptom frequency or a higher risk of relapse. This is the case with addiction as well as other chronic physical health maladies such as asthma, hypertension, and Type 1 diabetes.

• The Physical and Psychological Impact of Addiction: The physical impact of addiction can be felt in the withdrawal systems that you can treat with medication (and it’s ironic for those who are drug-addicted to need to take drugs to get over their addiction) and recovery time (they pass within a few weeks to months). However, psychological changes that affect your behaviors, feelings, and thoughts should also be addressed with individual therapy with a psychiatrist or psychologist as well as group therapy.

• Percentages of Relapse: Even with treatment involved, there’s a 40 to 60 percent chance of relapse among the addicts. This is especially the case for those with fewer support systems at home and more severe addictions as well as enablers from a bad environment. What’s more, if you do undergo relapse, this doesn’t mean that your months of rehab was unsuccessful. It instead indicates that the individual can benefit from alternative, modified, or restarted aftercare that build upon your previous recovery.

• Certain Symptoms Will Persist: Aftercare is also essential because certain physical and psychological symptoms will persist long after the addictive substance has been detoxified from your system. The months of rehab will take care of the brunt of these complications, but these physiological changes take a much longer period of time beyond three to nine months to fix. What’s dangerous about these persistent complications is that they all can lead straight to relapse, thus reaffirming the need for long-term treatment.

• Length of Treatment: The longer the treatment the higher the chances of successful recovery. Treatment length is indeed a greater contributor to success with fewer relapses because the extra months of rehab make the difference in addressing your longer-term withdrawal symptoms and addiction complications. According to NIDA or the National Institute of Abuse, most addicts require a minimum of 90 days of treatment or three months to put an end to their drug use, followed by decent aftercare in case your home life is the root of your addiction.

Defining Quality Aftercare and Its Different Variations

Addiction aftercare programs vary as much as the main addiction rehab programs themselves. However, they should also share the common philosophy that the best treatment services take into account for the whole person and his every need in a holistic manner. That’s the earmark of aftercare effectiveness. It doesn’t only focus on localized treatment or just one aspect of your addiction. It instead offers systemic change that covers every attribute of your body health affected by the addiction, which includes physical, mental, and emotional sides of healthiness. It should specifically address the addict’s:

• Vocation
• Finances
• Child care
• Education
• Relationships
• Mental health
• Legal involvement
• Housing and transportation
• Medical status including HIV/AIDS testing and treatment

Aftercare that only focuses on one area will not address the root of a greater issue. This is also true with the main rehab program. A good aftercare system should be based on the understanding that the imbalance of any of these components can lead to greater chances of relapse due to distress or plain old stress.

At any rate, SAMHSA has also showcased the treatment characteristics you should be on the lookout for when availing of a good facility to facilitate aftercare program recovery. The components of successful aftercare include:

• Health: Health-related aftercare services should offer the addicted patient with the measures to reduce or overcome their targeted symptoms. The service can be accomplished through a number of steps, such as substance use and mental health problem assessment, testing for substances such as alcohol and drugs as well as infectious diseases, medication services for mental health and addiction therapy, and education related to substance abuse, mental health, and medical treatment.

• Home: Home services for aftercare mostly deal with the guarantee that the recovering addict receiving treatment has a supportive and stable housing during and after the program. The best aftercare programs can even offer support for transportation to appointments, connecting to available services, and even finding housing in case the addict is an impoverished and down-on-his-luck kind of individual trying to get back to his feet.

• Purpose: Aftercare can also assist in helping you build a stronger sense of purpose linked with improved recovery. By assisting the addict to find meaning through family responsibilities, school, or career, he could end up gaining motivation when it comes to remaining substance-free. He is, after all, replacing the hole left by not taking drugs or alcohol with something positive and constructive in his life.

• Community: Aftercare also has a community aspect to it. It involves instilling a sense of hope, love, and belonging within the addict that comes from him reestablishing his relationships with his loved ones. They’re the support group he needs in order to survive the normal, sober world.  Community-based aftercare programs can offer the addict the means to find community involvement, engage in healthy relationships, improve current relationships, and build new social networks.

Types of Addiction Aftercare

Here are the different types of addiction aftercare.

• Sober Residences: For those who’ve started inpatient service treatment for the duration of their rehabilitation stay, some form of sober residence can assist hugely as an aftercare option for them. It helps them transition from the rehab center to the real world, back in their home, while keeping relapse risk to a minimum. It’s the aftercare of choice for those with risky home living situations without strong support outside treatment premises or environments that led them to become dependent on substances in the first place. This can include:

• • Therapeutic Communities: These programs are intensely structured and can last for half a year to a year. Residents and rehab staff then work in order to achieve recovery and maintain it. Treatment should assist the patient in changing negative beliefs about himself as well as prevent self-destructive patterns. It offers supports of the vocational and educational kind.

• • Recovery Housing: This supervised and short-term type of housing is for patients in recovery. This sober residence aftercare type is less intense and more focused on the connection between groups and individuals to outside resources and the outside world at large. It’s a preparatory step towards becoming self-sufficient or independent.

• • Social Model: This program is also known as sober living. It’s a model that offers no formal staff in the home or professional treatment whatsoever. Instead, the patients within this residence depend on one another for guidance and support. Sober-living houses typically require the participants to attend outside treatment and work to pay bills, like a rental home for recovering addicts.

• • Residential Reentry Centers: This sober residence type is also known as halfway houses and more focused on preparing recovering patients to live in the outside world in full sobriety more so than recovery housing. These centers are also reserved for patients that are also involved in the criminal justice system. They share a lot of similarities with sober-living houses but there’s more accountability and structure involved.

• Outpatient Treatment and 12-Step Programs: Outpatient treatment or treatment that involves attending meetings at clinics or centers instead of living in such residences are available for those who wish to still live their life, continue their careers, or attend school while under rehab. Among the most popular outpatient treatment programs are the 12-step groups like Alcoholics Anonymous, Narcotics Anonymous, SMART Recovery, and Women in Sobriety that build a fellowship or sober-living network that places emphasis on a higher power to achieve sobriety and substance abstinence.

Aftercare in a Nutshell

If you belong to the 2.5 million addicts that already searched for rehab or initially completed an initial level of care, then you’ve taken the first step towards addiction treatment for drugs and alcohol. However, there’s more work to do even as you’ve taken this monumental step that most people never get to take. It’s important to keep you, the addict, from relapsing and undoing all the hard work you’ve accomplished while under therapy.

Like one single piece of the Jenga tower could lead to the collapse of the whole structure if it’s not properly placed in harmony with all the other pieces, leading to a domino effect. In essence, rehab and aftercare is all about rebuilding yourself back to normal after addiction has destroyed you.

Aftercare Treatment at Lanna Rehab

Lanna Rehab Clinic in Thailand is an affordable alternative to your usual local wellness center that you can avail of through rehab tourism. It’s cheaper to travel to Lanna Rehab Clinic and avail of its services than to check yourself in with a domestic rehab facility. Lanna also offers some of the best aftercare in addiction recovery treatment in the region or even in the world. You can acquire an extra month of rehab at no extra cost in case of relapse as well as constant follow-ups once you do complete the program. Call their 24-hour hotline daily for more info.