Drug Addiction, Holistic Health, Mental Health, Women's Health

High Functioning Addicts In Stress

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Thousands of students graduate from college and begin full time careers each year in the professional workforce. Most are excited and unaware about the levels of extremely high stress workers can go through to manage performance expectations and pressing deadlines in their industry. After months to years of difficult work and anxiety from life wearing on their mental health, many people become vulnerable to alcohol dependency as a method of stress management.  One recent health study found that almost 8.7 percent of professional workers from the ages of 16 to 64 consumed alcohol in extreme amounts during a one month period. It also found that at least 8.6 percent used illegal drugs as well to cope with their mountains of stressful work. A high percentage of the wealthy and student population also turn to drugs to fit in a desired social group or to seek a thrill from an otherwise mundane lifestyle they feel stuck in. Over time, harsh consequences come with self-medicating for stress using alcohol and illicit drugs.

Wine glass and Bottle on a wooden background

Wealth, College, and Addiction

Not all substance addicts are obvious, as they can come from all walks from life. Often, living in constant stress to finish heavy workloads, having disposable income, and consistently making impulsive choices leads to alcohol dependence and drug abuse over time. On a college campus, I’ve witnessed many students start their taste of alcohol with a few mild drinks here and there for stress management. Drinking alcohol is considered socially acceptable and doesn’t have the same stigma attached to it as addiction to harsher drugs like marijuana or cocaine. Since many wealthy individuals also have a lot of spending money and unwarranted financial freedom, they easily fall into a vicious cycle of purchasing drugs out of spontaneity and seeking social support. When money is a given freely from a family name, it becomes difficult to find one’s personal passions and discover genuine friends who don’t just value their wealth. Combined with stressful assignments and social pressure, these factors lead to low self-esteem and boredom which spark the fire of alcohol dependence and harmful self-medicating with drugs. Substance abuse is a long term problem and no one is completely safe to preventing it seeking trained help.

Stressful Careers and Addiction

No matter their age, many workers unexpectedly turn to alcohol dependency to manage their stress and anxiety. People in professions like advertising, music, general labor, cooking, and especially bartenders are all up to two times more likely to die to substance abuse. An estimated 10 percent of all healthcare professionals are also prone to abuse drugs with sectors ranging from pediatricians to anesthesiologists. That’s a scary statistic to think about, as these are the professionals the mainstream population turns to for aid with their own health related issues. With the rising acceptance and romanticizing of alcohol dependency in the media, there is no room for wondering why the number of alcohol and drug related fatalities are climbing on an annual basis.

High Cost of Healthcare

High Functioning Addicts

If you or someone you know is experiencing difficulty with a drug or alcohol addiction, first make sure to recognize that it is a significant problem. Almost a fifth of all young adults who frequently consume alcohol as a form of self-medicating are considered a highly functional addict. High functioning alcoholics are hard to identify since they can mask it easily. Some tell-tale signs of one, especially if they’re a student, is if that they imbibe alcoholic drinks on a daily basis, become more confident at larger social gatherings, drink alone for no reason, desire to black out, run into legal consequences for their behavior, or often joke about having an addiction to others. Chronic drinking can lead to a negative change in how they look physically, think mentally, or interact with people who may not agree with their destructive lifestyle. Although some lucky high-functioning alcoholics might never experience severe problems with their repeatedly harmful choices, they need to be exposed to some form of an addiction recovery program to know how they could be sabotaging their future.

The Next Steps

If you feel that you have an alcohol dependency problem to deal with stressful work, explore the resources that are out there to learn more about how to implement positive habits. While making changes are hard, healthy choices and a better lifestyle can reinforced after enough consistency, dedication, and faith is applied over time. Just as the saying goes, “We miss 100% of the shots we don’t take”, one will never improve and see results if they don’t put in the effort to reevaluate their life themselves. Start being proactive and pursue holistic, group, or exercise based recovery through a program that fits your lifestyle. The best part is that by joining a rehab program that fits your needs, you won’t have to sacrifice any of the activities that you love. Make the leap and you’ll never want to turn back!

Drug Addiction, Holistic Health, Mental Health

Benefits of Yoga For Men and Sobriety

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Drug addiction may be difficult to get through, as the decision to stop using drugs once addiction has developed is unnerving to make. Successfully overcoming any dependency on an addictive substance takes time, energy, and enough patience. The risk of relapse can be high if a person doesn’t gain enough education about staying sober after detox, relapse prevention coping skills, and helpful sober mentoring programs. While many individuals report having less intense cravings as sobriety continues, there will be times when the body remembers the drugs it once received and will carve more.  These cravings can cause a disturbing relapse if there is not a proper plan set in place to handle them at any notice. While this doesn’t mean that the person is a failure or that their long time participating in rehab was a waste.  It simply means that the symptoms of their disease have reappeared at the time and tweaks need to be made to their treatment model.

The best way to stop relapses from happening is practicing holistic medicine by diving into activities that positively strengthen the relationship between the body and mind. Instead of just conforming to what traditional rehab programs offer, holistic medicine considers what you specifically need to get better. One method of ensuring that you can learn how to control the gray area in sobriety and regain your control is by training in programs like yoga and meditation.

Learning about the many benefits of yoga for men may help those experiencing symptoms of relapse and need help to stay sober. Many professional sports teams, pro athletes, and other prominent male figures are incorporating yoga into their daily routines and have found success!

The Physical Improvement

When you learn about yoga, you are learning a lot about connecting mentally to your body, your mood, and your overall spirit at the same time. This treatment is an incredibly positive and calming technique to alleviate or discourage the risk of relapsing, and provide addiction and depression help. Some of the most important benefits of doing yoga include an improved ability to breathe, lowered blood pressure throughout the day, deeper feelings of relaxation, and boosted athleticism in muscles. For men, they can especially benefit from the improved flexibility that yoga provides along with more consistent sleep patterns each night. Yoga movements stretch the muscles and other soft tissues in the body, releasing any types of lactic acids that can build up in the joints and normally cause stiffness and fatigue.

The Mental Benefit

Strong relapse prevention coping skills are best practiced with a strong mind to match. Along with helping the body improve, yoga relaxes your racing mind and levels of stress throughout the day that can come from staying sober. Any headaches or migraines that you may have once experienced can be eased as you learn to master different yoga movements over time. Doing yoga helps to keep anxiety hormones down to a minimum and boost mood improving chemicals instead. Since yoga primarily focuses on clearing the mind, men who often have struggled with attention problems can easily see an improvement on caging their monkey thoughts throughout the day as well. Most importantly, yoga helps a person rebuild their intrinsic sense of self confidence as they attain a new level of fitness. This builds an unshakable foundation for a person to stay sober after detox and shy away from people in their lives who may not approve of their new and improved lifestyle.

An Aid to Healing

Men practicing yoga often report feeling strong and empowered after each yoga session. No matter what someone’s religious or spiritual beliefs are, they can easily intertwine the yoga philosophy into their lives for a better mindset on life. The philosophy is focused on emptying the mind of intrusive thoughts and finding a true balance within the nervous system. Even if you’re not the most experienced, don’t be afraid to try out a couple of yoga poses yourself to see how you feel. Remember to start the process slowly and safely, accept your limits, and think positive thoughts as you begin to strengthen your body. When combined with a sober mentoring program, healing is done effectively and in an organic manner so results are developed in the long term.

The Bottom Line

Often men who have become addicted to drugs or alcohol are escaping their own kind of pain, whether it is physical or emotional. However, having healthy alternatives like yoga and meditationhelp to ease the discomfort of the initial pain or trauma that led them to abuse substances in the first place, and create a real and lasting impact for a successful rehabilitation.

Men who actively participate in the exercise as an alternative medicine find that it helps reconnects them with their body, reintroduces them to a more healthy and natural mindset, lowers their anxiety levels, and provides them a strong sensation of inner peace and satisfaction. Although addictions can have a way of stealing everything you have in life, you can take action by not allowing yourself to go to ruin. Take the time to learn how to regain control of your present and move towards a stronger, positive, and motivated future!

 

 

 

Drug Addiction, Holistic Health, Mental Health

How To Deal With An Alcoholic

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When you watch a person you love go through addiction, it’s natural to want to help them in any way you can. Parents especially will want to offer their support, no matter the circumstance. However, whether their child is a teenager or older, that desire to help may have a negative impact on their recovery. They will want to empower the addict to succeed in life, but doing this by enabling their behavior is only contributing to their vicious cycle of dependency. The more enablement the addict has to help them continue their unhealthy behavior, the longer they will wait to change their life. They will also become used to always relying on their parent to pick up the fallen pieces. It’s important to watch out for the signs of enabling behavior and make changes to prevent worse consequences, ultimately resulting in prolonging someone’s addiction.

Signs of an Enabler

When it comes to helping an addict, there’s a fine line between providing them enough support and encouraging their behavior. Supporting them means helping them do things they can’t do alone. On the hand, if you’re enabling, you are regularly doing things that the other person could and should be doing by themselves to be self-sufficient.

Other signs of being an enabler include putting the person’s needs ahead of your own time, sanity, and schedule. This could range from going out of your way to miss important responsibilities or taking the blame when the addict gets into trouble. Other red flags are feeling resentful towards the addict since you’re taking on more responsibilities than you can handle, lying to yourself about how acceptable the addict’s behavior is, spending excessive energy focusing on solely their personal needs, and bailing them out when legal consequences eventually happen. Doing any of these behaviors only is contributing to the harmful environment that addict is living in every day. Over time, they will only start to believe that no matter how bad things get, you will always be there to mend the stitches and bring them back on their feet.

Breaking the Cycle

Since addiction affects everyone in the addict’s network, breaking your habit of enabling can make a huge impact on how well they can break their cycle of substance abuse. Any untreated or undiagnosed addict can wreak long term havoc on their families or spouse who is suffering as well. When a person is suffering from an addiction disorder, oftentimes they are in denial of their alcohlism and are unaware that the disorder exists. Rehab centers focusing on dual diagnosis have found that the link between dependency and alcohol addiction can be less weakened when the root cause is identified. In these types of situations, a person must be continually evaluated with a professional specialist to find which factors are contributing the most to their addiction specific symptoms. For example, when a person initially begins treatment, they may be experiencing a strong sense of paranoia which can recur even after staying sober for a few weeks. However, if the paranoid feeling do seem to lessen after a period of sobriety, then alcoholism can be determined as the cause. This process can make it easier to identify the true underlying disorder when any physical or psychological symptoms resulting from alcohol abuse are eliminated.

The Final Straw

Many people battling addiction find that turning to the aid of therapy and support groups provided by rehab centers can make a huge difference. Interventions especially provide unique benefits and challenges to addicts if the person is very resistant to getting help. During this process, friends, family members, and spouses need to unite as a unified force to confront the person and urge them into getting enough treatment. Interventions are often successful with the help of a professional counselor who can provide them enough advice to find the right treatment for their lifestyle, explain different alternative medicines, and other specialized rehab therapists in their area. Choose the right time and place to have this important conversation with your loved one where you can have enough alone time to process your thoughts and conversation. Make sure the person you’re having an intervention with is also sober, not busy, and focused enough to fully absorb the words that you are trying to communicate with them.

The bottom line is that helping your loved one doesn’t have to be as hard as it seems. As a family member, it’s much easier to turn a cheek towards your family, friends, or spouse who is using alcohol and other addictive substances to counteract the pressures from their life. However, make the choice to bravely stand up for their health. Don’t be afraid to call for help and be proactive when it comes to saving their lifestyle!

 

 

 

 

Drug Addiction, Holistic Health, Mental Health, Women's Health

Alcohol Dangers as a Drug

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In our world today, partying and binge drinking in college a lot are often considered milestones we will experience at some point in their lives. There’s a recent trend of campuses who have had more students experiencing alcohol related problems and critical injuries thanks to easily accessible bars and the pressure to some exerted by the Greek system. Bars that offer tempting drink specials, sometimes mandatory hazing, and wine binging focused exchanges to get tipsy when work gets too tough are considered a social standard to live up to for fitting in. Studies show that almost sixty percent of college students drank alcohol in the past month, and almost two thirds of those students engaged in binge drinking during that same time. Many of us know someone who talked about their drunk night out meeting up with someone not safe at all. It’s disturbing to hear some those stories while wondering if your friend really remembered everything that happened. Especially in an open campus, seeing crimes regularly happen close to home isn’t much help either. Aside from risking your safety, actively living a binge drinking lifestyle is extremely negative and brings your body’s health down the drain. The truth is that we can still get tempted and maintaining self-discipline is almost impossible when everyone else is following along. Ultimately, we must be educated about alcohol’s effects and seek treatment if addiction is present.

Being High Functioning

Almost twenty percent of adults, especially college students who often consume alcohol, can be considered a highly functional addict in our country today. High-functioning alcoholics are hard to recognize sometimes since they have learned with trial and error how to mask it easily. Chronic drinking leads to a negative change in how they look on the outside, act with others, and feel throughout their day. Some signs of one, especially if they’re a college student, is if they use alcoholic drinks to wind down after stressful tests or become more outgoing at social gatherings, drink by themselves, black out often, run into problems with the campus police, often joke about having an addiction or get rather upset and defensive when confronted about their habits.

I’ve witnessed many of my peers start their taste of alcohol with a few drinks here and there. There’s nothing bad about having fun and enjoying a drink in moderation if you’re of age and know your limit when you go out. The point is that binge drinking to manage stress or self-medicate is what causes negative changes to occur in the body that are sometimes permanent. Drinking a lot of alcohol is socially acceptable in college and doesn’t have the same stigma attached to it as other popular vices like marijuana, cocaine, or Adderall. What seemed like a moderate activity can grow into a weekly wine night, tons of beers at happy hour, and endless vodka shots on weekends to celebrate just getting through to Friday. Rarely are such nights filled with truly wholesome memories, since drinking so much can cause it to end short or scary from a black out. The media and social norms around us are also constantly showing a glamorized version of drinking after work or at lunch breaks as a figure of humor. It seems like battling the side effects of alchohol is a piece of cake when done right. However, this notion is incredibly false and is misleading thousands of people who believe the lie.

Long-term Health Problems

It’s no joke that alcohol abuse can lead to serious acute and long term effects on a person’s mind and body. Besides severe withdrawal symptoms that develop, addicts may also develop a bad habit of experiencing memory loss and lose concentration on important tasks throughout the day. They could also develop anxiety and depression, increase risk of cancer in the colon, liver, throat, breast, etc., high blood pressure, and a damaged digestive system. A study about alcohol’s long term consequences also showed a link to a heightened risk in heart disease because of the heart not being able to effectively pump blood through the circulatory system and arteries. It depicts a striking statistic that the number of people in three years who developed heart failure, heart attack, or a condition of irregular heartbeat called atrial fibrillation, were three times more likely in their risk if they drank a lot of alcohol in the past.

Overcoming Your Addiction 

While forming a plan to recover by yourself may seem more convenient, it’s more helpful to get professional assistance; for example, getting treatment from an established alcohol rehab in Florida. They can provide you with more education on the dangers of alcohol, health consequences, and recommend the best programs for alcohol addiction recovery so you’re in the best place possible!

Wine glass and Bottle on a wooden background

 

Search Engine Optimization, Social Media Marketing

Black Hat SEO and Buying Followers

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In the social media world today, having a large user following and engagement is what makes or breaks the success of an account. Popular influencers and businesses across several industries are partnering up to create niche products, campaigns, and advertising videos to elevate both players. Several retail brands and Internet personalities have found success within the past few years by tapping into this method like Saboskirt, Gymshark, Puma, and Pacsun to name a few. This is due in part by brands being willing to pay or sponsor highly popular “faces” to the world to share their products with their loyal community of social media users. Creating awareness with big celebrities like Kylie and Kendall Jenner, models like Gigi Hadid, musicians like Kanye West, and fitness gurus like Nikki Blackletter has drastically improved their marketing effectiveness. From having special collaboration lines to seasonal promotions, each brand is now extremely recognizable across Instagram and are growing exponentially.

While this digital marketing plan is ingenuous for growing organically, some businesses take the alternative route to find the short cut of gaining views, likes, and followers to seem more promoted on the app. To seek short cuts, some social media managers have been using “black-hat SEO” tactics, or online ways to boost their accounts without doing the work. This consists of purchasing fake engagement from mostly idle accounts to look more popular on the surface level in the platform. To take a stand against this tactic, Instagram is taking drastic measures on their software to temporarily and permanently block users who do this, so be sure to do your job as a marketer to avoid it.

How Does Buying Followers Work?

Several black hat SEO services exist on the web and the app store to allow someone to increase their likes, views, and followers on Instagram. These can be referred to as “bots” ask for a specific payment in advance to gain hundreds to tens of thousands of followers at a single time. They also repeatedly follow and unfollow the same accounts in hopes of getting the reciprocated follow in return. While it sounds effective in the short term, doing this repeatedly throughout time is against terms of service of Instagram and can cause turmoil with organic followers on your account. Another major way to get a large following is to connect to zombie social media accounts by paying a third party business to get 10, 100, or even as much as 10,000 likes on a single picture post. These zombie accounts are usually inactive, have very few followers, and contain either zero personal posts or solely spam content. A few Instagram influencers, Hollywood celebrities, and musicians out there have been caught with this tactic and have struggled with covering up the negative headlines it caused.

The Black Hat Impact

The reality with black hat SEO is that many social media users don’t realize that they are tarnishing their online reputation for the future. A more effective and realistic way to assess if your Instagram marketing campaign is actually working is by measuring the amount of people you’re engaging with, the amount of site visits and sales conversions trailed from your posts and the growth in organic comments you receive. By simply buying thousands of fake followers from an app, you will inevitably cause a growing number of uninterested customers, spread a highly negative and unprofessional name for your business, and anger your competitors and followers who are being more mindful to post only genuine content for true growth. Though online, the reality of social media still places honesty on a pedestal, and your integrity can take a hit as your real followers discover the scam like methods being used for your marketing.

Genuine Growth and Engagement

If you rather decide to grow your following on social media in an honest manner, avoid using black hat bots and applications. Instead of aiming to cheat the digital marketing system, wasting your time and energy, and ultimately risking your own online image, switch to aiming for active engagement with other businesses and perhaps gaining advice from a marketing consultant. Experts knowledgeable in social media can listen to your business aspirations and forma step by step plan to boost your engagement across your various social media platforms. Don’t wait to achieve a higher level of digital marketing and reap the rewards.

 

Drug Addiction, Holistic Health, Mental Health, Website Design

Holistic Recovery and Alternative Treatment

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Holistic addition treatment is marked as an efficient method to treat substance abuse as it weaves together integrative medicines to boost a client’s physical well-being, emotional levels, and prevent relapses in the future. In many cases, depending on a prescribed medication from doctors can hide more serious addiction symptoms which hurts a person’s through recovery in the long term. The point of alternative treatment, and especially holistic recovery, is for a person to start from within and break away from using foreign chemicals in the form of medications, They focus on bettering their exercise habits, dive into meditation, improve their nutritional diet, and strengthen their spirituality. For example, starting a routine of doing aromatherapy, music therapy, and joining a local sports group would be advised as a perfect mix of holistic recovery methods. When combined, these activities energize the mind, body, and soul for true healing that will last a long time.

Wine glass and Bottle on a wooden background

How Can You Start Holistic Recovery

The first step to practicing holistic recovery is setting a consistent time throughout the day to practice the act of mindfulness. This involves reflecting on your thoughts and feelings for a few minutes every day and focus on your body right there in the present moment. Treating yourself with care and taking a short break can help lower stress levels that may be built up and strengthen the bond you have with changes occurring within your body. Another great method for mindfulness is by tapping into yoga or dance, as it combines the physical body and directions from the mind to transport strength and develop flexibility as an exercise. Yoga also helps a person to build more internal discipline and strength as well.  Each yoga session a person undertakes involves having an intense focus on inhales, exhales, and being more concentrated on various aspects of the body that are pushed throughout each position.

Practicing your breathing can also increase your levels of energy, lower stress, and develop a better sense of clarity. Introducing more exercise is also extremely beneficial to holistic recovery, whether it’s running, tennis, or even basketball. Training in sessions with others and competing together helps build rapport to keep you accountable. You will sense that you are developing a stronger sense of confidence as you are consistently improving as well.

Holistic Benefits

Putting together multiple approaches in the idea of holistic recovery is backed up by various researchers who have observed its effects in long term studies. One study published in Complementary Therapies in Medicine in 2013 found the result that participating in yoga and mindfulness-based meditation during addiction recovery for drugs and alcohol made a huge difference with patients who can become much less vunerable to relapses. Two years later, in 2015, a report published in the Australian Journal of Primary Health also supported that there is a powerful link with mental and physical health. These support the many benefits associated with holistic treatment as it plays a role on whether a client will gain long-term sobriety.

Holistic therapy is also extremely easy to plug into as it doesn’t involve uncomfortable hospital tests, countless pills, and intense therapy sessions to get negative feelings out of the mind. Relying on medication, while based in science, may provide a powerful psychological or physical dependency which is difficult to break away from over time. That is why many people opt for holistic therapies instead. People are also more comfortable where fun activites like running therapy or yoga classes are widespread and accessible in their local community. Along the lines of the holistic recovery method of treating the mind, body and soul, these programs encourage their clients to learn new skills and use them as a building block of their long-term recovery. If a patient is willing to take the time to consider their overall health, they can pay attention to more details like their breathing, hydration, and food that together build a stronger and more disciplined body. Throughout the entire process of holistic treatment, each client is the tooled with a variety of relapse-prevention skills which they can put to good use even after they complete their recovery program.

Becoming Well

If you feel that you can identify as a patient who is struggling to overcome your substance addiction, consider the holistic therapy approach for a more effective recovery. The perfect way to learn more about holistic recovery and traditional addiction treatment is to speak with experts. Find a rehabilitation center that understands the importance of catering to each person’s specific needs and are enthusiastic to discuss their various methods.

 

 

 

Uncategorized

Sobriety and New Age Alcoholics Anonymous

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If you find yourself feeling like you can’t get out of the rut starting your recovery journey, you will definitely experience some days where staying motivated alone will feel extremely difficult. Being independent in the battle for long term health is the worst way to get over an addiction to very strong substances like drugs or alcohol. Having a close knit peer support system who can guide you and keep you motivated throughout your addiction recovery is crucial to prevent any relapses from happening in the future.

Traditional methods of peer support groups like Alcoholics Anonymous have been around for many years as the go-to opportunity to talk amongst a group of people who can understand and listen to your struggles. In the past few years, we have been quickly integrating our lives with the internet and social media. Public forums, online messenger, and even video chat groups has allowed the peer support method to evolve into a powerful online community to help keep people motivated, learn more about their “triggers” to avoid sinking to temptation, and staying consistent to ensure long term success. People from a variety of lifestyles and backgrounds pursuing this accessible resource and are finishing it with success as a stronger person than ever before.

Peer Support Impact

It’s a long journey that is required to recover from addiction without any consistent support from other people around you. Although people who are within a peer support group may come from different walks of life and each have a variety of needs, everyone depends on each other as a line of support. Every person involved in the group is aware of what life is like as an addict in our current society, the difficulty of dealing daily temptations, and dealing with feelings that occur during recovery like sadness, guilt, and remorse that comes recovery. Most people try to rebuild their sense of self -confidence, their relationships with any friends and family, and their professional careers for the future. Being part of an active support group increases your likelihood to stay in recovery and finish it strong. You will gain needed emotional support with understanding mentors and informational support from educational seminars that teach important recovery skills. You will also acquire an important sense of belonging, as well as tips for interacting with other people that don’t revolve around consuming drugs or alchohol.

A Variety of Services

No matter where you start in your recovery journey, there are a variety services available for to help you gain sobriety and ensure relapse prevention. Peer support groups are great at being adaptable and could be individualized to your pre-recovery, recovery in progress, or post-recovery time line. For example, a peer support group can be initiated before a person enters their rehab treatment to help them develop an organized mindset for making lifestyle changes. If they’re already enrolled in a specific treatment program, support groups can also accompany it and provide an important link to a community of people going through the same experience. If treatment is done, a person has the option to still join to increase their chance of preventing relapse in the future. Even if you feel like pursuing a support group is expensive or do not exactly wish to open up to a room full of strangers, the support system that develops is foundational to your overall success as a patient. Throughout each stage, while participating in each meeting, members of peer support groups will be building their leadership abilities that will be vital to use in the future.

Online Support

There is definite evidence that having a peer support group provides enormous benefits to the body, mind, and spirit. If you have a very busy schedule and can’t find enough time to attend Alcoholic Anonymous type events in person, you might want to take a look at joining online programs to digitally stay on track. No matter how large the forum is, chances are you will find someone who shares similar troubles and can form a meaningful bond alongside you as you grow. New Age Alcoholics Anonymous meetings are now increasingly popular for people to bond over remote locations and global time zones. The online community provides a safe space to discuss personal failures, goals, and experiences to develop into a healthy person again. Facebook and Reddit has many forums and groups that are open to their members for free, and welcome them with open arms. A lot of colleges throughout the country also run discussion forums for their students to join on a weekly basis. You can also easily Google search for online AA groups that suit your lifestyle and personal goals to help you best succeed!

Drug Addiction, Holistic Health, Mental Health, Women's Health

The Benefits of Aromatherapy

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The Benefits of Aromatherapy

Oftentimes keeping up with all our responsibilities can be tough as we’re constantly moving from one task to the next throughout the day without rest. If you are finding trouble balancing your job, relationships, or even just getting to all your chores, there’s a big chance you are overly stressed.. Experiencing high levels of anxiety and stress can be damaging to your psyche if left untreated. With its negative effects to your mind and body, not taking enough time to relax leads to a high risk of vulnerability to perilous disease and a negative and hindering mentality overall. However, there are ways to meditate that are proven to help manage even the most extreme amounts of stress when done right. One method of meditation that is not as commonly mentioned by the mainstream media is regarded by stress management experts as aromatherapy. Involving the use of a variety of essential oils, it is a highly effective segment of therapy and is often used alongside the process of peaceful breathing meditation. Your body will reap the benefits of a more stable mood, lower anxiety, and most importantly, a jumpstarted energy level.

The Basics of Aromatherapy

As a tried and true method of practicing mental rehab and stress management, aromatherapy has been around for thousands of years and weaved into the culture of several Western and Eastern countries throughout the globe. It is frequently used each week by people who seek to improve their negative mood, change uncomfortable anxiety, and as a natural supplement to medicine. A significant part of aromatherapy is the process of creating synergy with substances that aren’t processed or man-made. Synergy is a known term for the combined use of a variety of natural essential oils that can together provide a far higher level of mental healing than each oil would have provided on their own. However, because some specific oils can lead to the body having severe allergies or other side effects that are very uncomfortable, it’s highly important to dilute the oil mixture with another carrier oil to make the concentration less strong when it comes in contact with your body. For managing stress specifically, there are aromatic compounds from different essential oils that are known by therapists as relaxants which soothe the mind after a few inhales.

What’s Essential About Oils?

Essential oils are an important asset to complete any aromatherapy regime. Although they may sound peculiar or even smell odd at first, they hold the amazing ability to provide positive sensations to our bodies. Certain natural oils derived from different herbs like chamomile, bay, basil, lavender, anise, eucalyptus, rose, and thyme in particular all provide great effects to help aid consistent stress management. From strengthening the immune system, decreasing allergen levels, or slowly releasing a sedative effect to fall asleep easier, these oils are crucial for meditation to become even more effective. Some of the best essential oils for igniting stress relief are lavender, bergamot, peppermint, vetiver, and ylang ylang. These are all very affordable and can be purchased at any local wellness or organics store like Vitamin World, Walgreens, CVS, or Whole Foods in your area. To incorporate it into your weekly regimen, it is recommended by aromatherapy experts to first procure a couple small pieces of rock salt and place them in a small glass or plastic vial. The rock salt serves as an important absorbent to avoid any spills from your vial happening in the future. Add a couple droplets of the oil of your choice to the rock salt, and store the vial in a safe, dry, and relatively cool place. Whenever you feel stressed and need some extra help to rewind, twist open the vial and slowly breathe in the scent for a few minutes.

Along with carrying a vial around for managing stress, essential oils can also be added to your lifestyle via an oil diffuser in different rooms of your home. To begin using one, fill the tank of the diffuser with warm water. Then, make sure to add about ten to fifteen drops of the essential oil of your choice, close the tank lid, and turn the diffuser on for a few minutes. Most diffusers can run for several hours with a single charge and distribute the scent of the oil almost immediately. Affordable diffusers can be found across the web at stores like Urban Outfitters, Amazon, Walmart, and Target. At the end of the day, choose which method is most convenient and effective for your personal needs. With more tips about using diffusers, Elevate Rehab explains in more detail with this infographic about different essential oils one can experiment with to aid their meditation.

The Change Starts With You

Whether you decide to practice aromatherapy or choose another mediation route, it’s easy to see that the practice offers a wide variety of mental and physical benefits that lead to a lasting improvement in stress levels, daily energy, and overall mood. Take action and seek out what types of meditation methods work best for you and your lifestyle!

 

Drug Addiction, Mental Health, Women's Health

The dangers of a refreshing beverage

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Today, alcohol is easily accessible in our world today. While many people use a drink here and there to ease their levels of stress and to relax, over the long term it can lead to a range of physical and mental problem. What’s more, a person can become dependent on a strong substance like alcohol if they drink frequently each week. There is no doubt that our culture is one that promotes social drinking, whether it’s to get “lit” for raging college parties, prepare for a music festival, have fun at happy hour, or just survive a family reunion.  Many people believe that there are no penalties or long term consequences from having a casual beer from time to time. Yet, some statistics clearly show that alcohol is in fact causing a dent in the welfare and overall health of our society.

Damaging Effects from Alcohol

Scientific research shows that as much as 86 percent of all people in the United States will drink alcohol at some point their lives. Around 70 percent will drink at least one time in any given year. This shows that alcohol is present in many Americans lives, and thus from that starting point an addiction can spawn. It only takes one time for someone to gain an addiction to a substance. Therefore, as it is a legal drug it’s very hard to recognize if someone has an addiction problem.

So, why is it exactly so important that we stay on the lookout for a loved one or friend who may be suffering from alcoholism? The haunting consequences that come with consistent alcohol consumption is enough to make a difference. We all are granted one life to live, and as the traditional saying goes, our body is a temple that must be taken care of. As a result, binge drinking alcohol on a daily, or even weekly basis would be just like treating your fragile body like a waste outlet. While drinking alcohol, a person will experience a range of damaging short term and long term impairments on their mind and body.

Long Term Consequences

If you were initially unaware, alcoholism is documented to kill five times the number of individuals annually than all other drugs known to man put together. In fact, more than 80,000 deaths are directly linked to  drinking every single year according to national health records. These deaths are often drawn out and very painful since alcohol slowly degrades the body by eroding critical health systems. For example, on alcohol can cause irreversible damage in the form of fatty liver disease. This condition is often unspoken of, but is basically caused by excessive fat in the liver, making it harder for the organ to process toxins effectively and do its job normally. Another long term illness directly linked to frequent alcohol use is alcoholic cirrhosis. With this condition, the liver becomes so damaged that it scars. These wounds inhibit the function of the liver and are the last stage of the chronic liver disease. Along with this acquiring, alcohol hepatitis is always a possibility. This refers to high swelling of the liver, which in turn causes damage. This disease affects as many as 35 percent of heavy drinkers and can be mild to severe. In the latter, it can cause life-threatening complications or death.

These are just a few of the fatal diseases that alcohol can cause. Binge drinking on a regular basis can lead to someone developing a dangerous alcohol addiction and should be taken seriously. Just because you may be young and your body seems to recover from alcohol abuse quickly, doesn’t mean it will always be this way. Before you drink, please think about how your body will react to these dangerous substances and what damage it can do.

Recognizing the Signs

If you think someone you know may be suffering from alcoholism here are some of the signs to look out for. There are many signs that someone may be struggling with an addiction. First of all, if someone is starting to go out less and less for no apparent reason, they may be staying in to drink by themselves. If these actions are coupled with irregular mood swings and eating habits, there is a strong chance some type of substance abuse addiction is present. Furthermore, if you find out they are lying to you about their activities and the amount they drink, it is likely they are ashamed of an addiction or just don’t want you to know about it. If someone is conveying these signs, getting in touch with a rehab center to help out may not be a bad idea. Trained professionals will work closely with you to make sure you are doing the right things every day. It is worth having the correct support, addictions are a tough uphill battle, and you should get the help you need today.

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Teen Mental Health

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These days, the dialogue about mental diseases like anorexia, depression, and addiction among teens has been brought up more than ever before thanks to school education programs, awareness conferences, and the movies and shows developed from the mainstream media. Television series like the new “13 Reasons Why” is a prime example of what factored into this resurgence, as it depicts a teenager who struggles with depression from her environment and being angry at her peers. While it’s based on a fake story line, the issues it shows are extremely realistic since many kids go through social pressure, stress from school, and adapting to puberty. Studies show that at least one of every eight teens in the U.S. are diagnosed with depression, which is shocking. That means that out of a normal sized class of 32 students a high school, 4 of those students will be going through depression at the time. Depression can build up to a boiling point for many reasons, but it’s a given that adequate treatment is crucial for the health and safety of someone if they have it.

Forming Depression

Depression can be caused for a great deal of reasons, from feeling extremely insecure compared to others, experiencing emotional or physical abuse from a friend or parent, feeling consistently hopeless, or not being accepted by the people around you. For a teen, being teased in school or flunking tests, feeling left out from friends, and being extremely dissatisfied with their body, social status, etc. all play a role. With these events bringing constant stress, depression can develop and spiral into an abyss of negative emotions and idleness for an individual.  

Spotting someone with depression may be difficult, but it’s generally agreed that a change in personality and behavior will be apparent. Look out for red flags like seeing someone being less interested in activities they once enjoyed, sleeping a lot more, eating a lot more or less, and not being able to focus at school or at tasks. They could also have bad memory, underperformance, or may even turn to addictive substances to get through the pain. That’s definitely a dangerous plan and could lead to much more harmful consequences in the future.

Getting through Depression

There’s a lot of professionals who can help a teen with their profession. Spending time with them to hear their fears, stress, and hopes will help you gain their trust to pursue help and hopefully start a rehab program. Make sure to let know that their emotions are okay to experience, but their idleness and reluctance to change at the moment is not. After some time, you can move on to approaching the topic of seeking therapy and telling them that it will be a positive impact to their health and future years.

Receiving Treatment

It all comes down to what their lifestyle and personality is like to choose what therapy will work best. However, helping them acknowledge the problem is the most important step so they can take action on it. If they are extremely stubborn at this stage, you may even have to resort to taking a medical test which shows concrete proof of depression being active. One example is doing a blood test to identify genetic markers associated with depression. With the test’s help, doctors can get to the cause of their problem way quicker and reach a much quicker diagnosis as well. From there, they can recommend what type of therapy to take and changes they can make to their sleeping habits, nutrition, and physical activity to aid the process.

Persistence is Key

Depression is a great mountain to climb, but with a team of help and dedication to getting better it can be tackled. Instead of taking no action or turning to unhealthy addictions to cope, asking for help will bring quicker results and better health overall. Combined with using holistic therapy that includes aromatherapy, massage therapy, meditation, better nutrition, and more exercise, awareness of the body can be increased so the person can prevent spiraling into the illness again in the future.