Biology of Addiction: Adults and Adolescents
While you are enrolled in the eight-week Outpatient Program at The Right Step, you will experience the proven clinical treatment methods that are used to make positive changes in your life.
In Session Two, you will have learned about the disease concept of addiction, as well as the phases experienced and the effect of substance abuse on your brain neurotransmitters.
Continuing on, you will learn more regarding the number of years involved in developing the disease of addiction and how this differs between adults and adolescents.
Also covered in this session:
Disease Concept of Addiction - Part 1
Addiction Therapy: Disease Traits - Part 2
Disease of Addiction: Initial Stages - Part 3
Disease of Addiction: Losing Control - Part 4
Disease of Addiction: Substance Abuse Withdrawal and Pain - Part 5
Brain Neurotransmitters: Phases of Addiction - Part 6
Disease of Addiction: The Effect of Substance Abuse on Adults
In group addiction therapy discussions, you will learn that if an adult has never used alcohol before and decides to begin drinking, in most cases it would take a very long time for addiction to occur.
This would depend on a few factors including whether or not there is a family history of alcoholism or addiction, as well as the reasons why the individual began to drink.
If a healthy adult without a family history of abuse or addiction begins drinking as merely a social lubricant and not due to depression or grief, then it would most likely take many years before the disease of addiction would occur, if at all.
Disease of Addiction: The Experience for Adolescents
When you learn about substance abuse effect upon adolescents, you will discover that it varies from the effect on adults. The adolescent brain is still forming. The neuronets or pathways are still being created. Introducing alcohol or drugs can therefore change the way the brain develops.
The way that most adolescents use alcohol is also different from typical adult substance use. Teenagers more commonly start drinking for the purpose of getting drunk. This speeds up the process of substance abuse addiction and enables a faster development of tolerance to alcohol or drugs.
This is especially true when an adolescent is already predisposed toward addiction genetically due to a family history of alcoholism or drug addiction.
Some studies show that the addiction develops over a span of one year; however, it typically takes one to three years for adolescent substance abuse to become an addiction disease.
Addiction Treatment
Residents of local Texas and New Mexico cities including Port Isabel, Richmond-Rosenberg, South Padre, Spring, Tomball and Albuquerque often receive treatment for their addiction to drugs or alcohol through the Outpatient Programs at one of 20 convenient Right Step locations.
Out patient Alcohol Treatment and Outpatient Drug Treatment programs are offered in Austin TX, Baytown TX, Beaumont TX, Conroe TX, Dallas TX, Euless TX, Plano TX, Houston TX, Clear Lake TX, Ft. Bend TX, Pasadena TX, The Woodlands TX, San Antonio TX, Wimberley TX, Albuquerque NM.
Residential Treatment centers in DFW, Houston and Austin are also provided for recovery from addiction disease, attracting individuals from Oklahoma, Louisiana, Arkansas, Arizona and other areas of the United States to participate in recovery programs at The Right Step.
Addiction Treatment - Additional Information:
Addiction Therapy: Disease Traits
Disease of Addiction: Initial Stages
