Addiction Counselling: Vancouver, BC
Alcohol, Drug, Sexual, and Other Addictions
Living with an addiction whether it is to food, gambling, alcohol, drugs, sex, pornography, the internet, or to unhealthy relationships can have numerous detrimental effects on your life and the enjoyment you experience in daily living. An addiction has a number of key components that takes an aspect of life that may be healthy and needed and turn it into a negative component of your being. An addiction can be described as an attachment, devotion, or inclination towards something that when indulged as a recurring event becomes harmful to your health, mental state, or social life. The addict is unfortunately, not the only victim. Loved ones, spouses, and children suffer greatly over the widespread effects of someone who has given into the downward spiral of an uncontrollable addiction.
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Anything in our life has the potential to be an object of compulsive or obsessive desire. In the counselling world, we think of addiction as something that is causing negative or detrimental effects, and is beyond the control of the individual. Whereas food is a necessary part of our life, when food begins to be needed to calm your nerves or to relax you it begins to take on an unhealthy role in your life and left unchecked can develop into an addiction where food may be needed every time you are upset, anxious, or feeling lonely.
Do I Have An Addiction?
Recognizing you are using something in an unhealthy way is the first step towards making a necessary change and rediscovering the true benefit of this item or activity. Using the internet to look up information is a very useful tool to provide answers however, if your internet use begins to cut into your time with your family and you feel a need to be online and a compulsion to check in with sites regularly, then this type of behavior may indicate an unhealthy addiction. Addictions begin as an abuse of something, overusing a drug for pain relief, overusing alcohol to relax after a tough day at work. What changes the abuse to an addiction is when this moves to a need the body develops and the individual being unable to stop or needing more to get the same effect. Some of the most common addictions we see that cause individuals and families problems today are sexual addictions (or addicted to pornography), the gambling addict,, individuals addicted to drugs and alcohol, and computer / gaming addictions. The good news is that help is available and the cycle can be broken.
Do I Need Counselling for My Addiction?
Behaviors develop so that you can maintain the addiction, these behaviors further limit and challenge you to live a healthy and functional life. Depression may be a result of addictions as an individual may begin to steal to afford the addiction, may be late to work due to a hangover from alcohol, may fall behind in work due to surfing the internet, or the loss of friends due to changes in mood. Whether you are dealing with the abuse of an activity in your life, or the overuse of something that once brought you happiness, or even if this has developed into an addiction, you can get help and overcome this. Freedom from these issues begins with acknowledging you are facing a challenge in your life. You do not have to have the answers, or know how to make the changes. Contacting a Theravive Vancouver Addictions Counsellor is a great first step to overcome these issues and begin to live life fully and freely.
