Addiction is like cancer– it doesn’t discriminate. Rich or poor, male or female, any race in the world. Addiction affects everyone. Thanks to the Affordable Care Act (ACA), addiction is also covered by most insurance providers, with the same coverage as you would expect for cancer or heart disease. The long-standing stigma of addiction is beginning to see serious policy changes, which means more people will have access to a wider ranger of treatment options. New Directions is a drug and alcohol rehab for pregnant women that specializes in recovery during pregnancy, or with children. More women with access to our care means a deeper intergenerational impact on addiction, and many more methods of treatment that cater to individual women.
Many providers will have a continuum of care. Addiction can fall anywhere on a scale. It could be that you have a hard time falling asleep without taking a pill or using some other substance, or it could be having a serious impact on your daily life such as making you miss days of work, or neglect other important responsibilities. It could be that you see a problem growing within yourself, or that others have encouraged you to seek care. Whatever the circumstances are, it’s important that you have options available to make recovery as simple, safe, and reliable as possible for you.
Whenever possible, we recommend monitored, in-house care, where we can provide constant help and supervision, such as withdrawal symptom management, and fresh, organic cooking. However, for some women this can type of treatment plan can be too inhibitive, or costly. Many programs will ask that patients stay at least 4-5 days a week, at 6 hours a day.
Other programs, such as our outpatient care program, offers career-oriented women or women with light, manageable symptoms of addiction a chance to recover at a more manageable pace for their lifestyle. For these women, addiction might be affecting a specific aspect of their life—their romantic relationships, their health, finances, or social life—but it isn’t overwhelming them or consuming their entire quality of life. In these circumstances, a simple outpatient program at 3-4 hours, 3-4 times a week, might be an effective way to cope with their addiction.
When selecting an outpatient program, it’s important to understand that the time requirements are less important than the treatment options. Many programs reel in patients who are looking for light treatment without serious commitment, but in such a short time they can offer little more than education and informational lectures, whereas the patient might need therapy, counseling, or training in coping mechanisms. In these cases, a little time saved is a lot of time lost.
Though outpatient care may be an effective solution for some, the illusion of time saved can be a long-term distractor for those who need more intensive care. More often than not, it’s an alluring proposition for women who are in high-level positions as CEO’s, schoolteachers who have excessive work hours, nurses, and a million other professions that seem to call upon higher performance and longer, more sporadic work hours. As we said before, addiction doesn’t discriminate. The difficulty or expertise of the job doesn’t make these populations any less susceptible to addiction. In fact, the stress could encourage it.
What we’ve found in our outpatient programs is that many of the women who join it as a swift and approachable form of recovery will see small improvement in their lives that will encourage them to try the in-house program for faster, more effective results. Spending more time in more intensive recovery, they find, saves them hundreds of hours in the long run.
In the end, your time and health are the two most expensive investments you can ever make—because you can’t ever get them back. It’s important to find a program that not only works for your schedule but works for your benefit. If you feel that light treatment options can give you the edge you need to manage your addiction, then an outpatient program might be the best option. Coupled with a program like Alcoholics Anonymous or Narcotics Anonymous, you might even develop the community you need to keep you on track. Likewise, if you want to test the waters and see what treatment can do for you, this is a great way to start. If you’re looking to drastically change your health or your life, however, a more intensive and monitored program would be the fastest way, despite an initially heavier time investment.
