Self-medicating To Deal With Stress

The term self-medicating refers to attempts to bargain with depression, hurting (concrete or emotional), or intense emotions with the help of drugs (prescription or otherwise), alcohol, and other substances, and without the guidance of a doctor. Yous don't have to exist diagnosed with a medical condition to self-medicate. You might exist self-medicating just as a response to the pressures of everyday life.

At Houston Behavioral Helathcare Hospital, we've gathered some information on causes and symptoms of self-medication, including self medicating low, cocky medicating anxiety, self medicating ADHD, and self medicating with alcohol, and how to get help.

Some Gamble Factors for Self Medication

Adventure Factors for self-medication include:

Depression
Bipolar disorder
Schizophrenia
Other mental illnesses
Childhood trauma
Intense emotional experiences
Physical and emotional corruption

I affair these take chances factors have in common is stress; many are stressful experiences or memories of stressful times, and many can be stressors or tin can be the things that set off the desire to self-medicate, to notice relief.

The National Constitute on Drug Corruption (NIDA) issued a bulletin on the relationship between stress and substance abuse. Stress is role of our lives and tin can help us focus, but prolonged or intense stress can be debilitating, disrupting our ability to function from solar day to mean solar day. Traumatic stress and its aftermath (post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD) tin put people at hazard for substance abuse.

Children can also suffer from stress and even PTSD. Indeed, early-life stressors, such as kid abuse or loss of a parent, can increase the risk of problems in adulthood, including impulsive beliefs, anxiety and depression, and substance abuse.

Stress is as well a major factor in people taking upwards smoking once again, even years later quitting, and the same is true for resuming drug use after a flow of abstinence.

Signs of Self Medicating

ProjectKnow lists the following signs of cocky-medicating:

Staying away from family, friends, social events, and other activities
A sudden change in hobbies or who 1 spends time with
Secrecy about how one spends time
Neglecting concrete care, such as showering or eating
Having difficulties in piece of work, schoolhouse, or other areas
Sudden anger
New or unusual financial issues because of the cost of booze and drugs

Self Medicating Depression

Symptoms of low include:

A continual sense of sadness, emptiness, hopelessness, guilt, or worthlessness
Irritability
Having trouble concentrating or paying attention
Difficulty sleeping, such as early waking, sleeping longer than normal, or indisposition
Weight changes or increased/decreased appetite
An increase in aches and pains
Thoughts of suicide, or attempts

These symptoms can be intense, and drugs or alcohol can dull the intensity, but they can likewise deepen the depression.

Self Medicating Feet

Anxiety and depression share many of the same symptoms, and the dangers of cocky-medication are like. Depression and anxiety are often correlated with stimulation of the amygdala, a region of the brain associated with processing emotions.

Self-medicating with alcohol and drugs tin help calm the stimulation (run across The Surgeon General's Study on Booze, Drugs and Health, chapter two, p. 14), but the calming is temporary, and the drugs used take their own side furnishings. Healthline has compiled a listing of different substances people use to self-medicate, the effect each has, and the dangers of each substance.

Self Medicating ADHD

One effect of ADHD involves difficulty concentrating or focusing; another involves poor impulse control. WebMD lists the following warning signs that someone might be self-medicating for ADHD:

Alcohol: More than 7 drinks a week for a adult female, 14 for a human being, is excessive.
Marijuana, cocaine, heroin, and other illegal drugs: These have no do good in treating ADHD. Whatever use at all is a matter for concern.
Caffeine: Similar the most widely-used ADHD medications, caffeine is a stimulant, but it can affect growth and slumber of teens. In adults, drinking more than than two cups of coffee a day, or not beingness able to cutting dorsum, may be a sign of self-medicating.
Cigarettes: Nicotine can help one focus, but it can as well make symptoms of ADHD worse, more hyper. ADHD tin can too make quitting cigarettes harder, though the ADHD drug methylphenidate coupled with a nicotine patch tin help greatly.
Over-exercise: Practise sends extra blood to the brain, and the part controlling attention, and then it'south a pop response to ADHD. The danger of over-practise comes in taking time away from other normal life activities and family and friends to exercise more.
Prescription drugs: People may employ prescription drugs for other than their intended utilize, or use a higher dose than prescribed, which tin make ADHD worse, not better.

Besides Ritalin and Adderall, therapies for ADHD include cognitive behavioral therapy, yoga, counseling, and support groups.

Self Medicating with Alcohol

The Surgeon Full general's Report on Alcohol, Drugs and Health cites studies that suggest that one incentive to utilise drugs and booze may be "to suppress overactive brain stress systems that produce negative emotions or feelings" (p. xiv). In other words, alcohol may calm the brain's response to stress. However, the relief is only temporary, and withdrawing from alcohol can likewise produce negative feelings which can become stronger each time a person tries to quit alcohol. Self-medicating with alcohol is dangerous and volition only make things worse.

If you or a loved one are struggling with alcohol and drug use, bipolar disorder, low, anxiety, schizophrenia, PTSD or other disorders, nosotros invite you to learn more about Houston Behavioral. Take a look at our programs for adolescents and adults, and contact the states today.