Recently we published an infographic called “Your Baby on Drugs” to illustrate the harmful effects that drug and substance abuse while pregnant can have on the welfare of both the mother and the child to be born.

Addiction Treatment and Rehabilitation

Parents don’t know how to parent a young adult who is an alcoholic and/or drug addict. Period! What they do know, is that there comes a point when they reach outside of themselves, their family unit and ask for help. Usually, when everything they have tried to do to save their child from alcohol and drug addiction hasn’t worked. And, when they get to this point, we the addiction professionals can hear their emotional exhaustion and psychological desperation. But most importantly, we can hear the unconditional love that they have for their children. We can only hear it, if we are actually listening. And if we are listening; it is that love, that bond that we the professionals should be nurturing.

We should be utilizing every clinical skill we have attained to strengthen the individual and secure the foundation of their relationships, which are based on unconditional love.

For any addiction treatment plan to be truly effective, it’s of vital importance for each alcoholic and addict to continue on the path toward long-term sobriety in the days, months and years after they have completed inpatient rehab treatment.

While many qualified addiction treatment centers offer sound after rehab programs, 12 Palms Recovery Center believes in implementing an after rehab treatment plan for its clients, for it’s clients that also in many ways maps out how family members can assist their loved ones in their recovery as well.

Family counseling is an important part of the comprehensive addiction treatment programs offered at 12 Palms, and the dedicated staff of counselors and therapists are certified and trained in family counseling. Family-involved therapy can be very useful in helping clients with their after rehab planning. Family-involved therapy helps educate family members about their own actions and behaviors that may have been factors in the continuation of their loved one’s substance abuse.

Oftentimes, drug addicts are completely unaware of the devastation they are causing in the lives of those around them, especially within their own families. Family members themselves will yell, scream, withdraw, cajole, rant, criticize, understand, negotiate, get fed up and try any other number of ways to manage their loved ones’ addiction, to no avail.

As a result, the family becomes so intensely focused on trying to fix their loved one’s addiction that they have lost the ability to be themselves and to communicate honestly, while the addict just continues on, either not knowing or not caring how their family is dealing with their actions and behavior.

Many drug addiction rehabs focus on the addict and their recovery, with treatment modalities designed to serve only the addict. However, at 12 Palms Recovery Center, family counseling is a major component of their comprehensive drug treatment plan.