Alcohol Dependency Treatment & Rehab

Alcoholism, also known as “alcohol dependency", is a disease that may require internment in a rehabilitation treatment center for proper treatment of the four basic addictive symptoms:

• Craving - A strong need, or compulsion, to drink.
• Loss of control - The inability to limit one’s drinking on any given occasion.
• Physical dependence - Withdrawal symptoms, such as nausea, sweating, shakiness, and anxiety, occur when alcohol use is stopped after a period of heavy drinking.
• Tolerance - The need to drink greater amounts of alcohol in order to “get high".

The people who don't suffer from alcohol dependency often wonder why alcoholics can't just stop drinking whenever they want to. These people have no idea that alcoholism has little to do with willpower. Alcoholics suffer from a powerful "craving”, or uncontrollable need, for alcohol that overrides their ability to stop drinking. This need can be as strong as the need for food or water and people addicted to alcohol often times want to check themselves into an alcohol dependency treatment facility to gain control of this powerful compulsion.

It is hard for people that do not suffer from alcoholism or alcohol addiction to understand why some individuals can use alcohol without problems while other cannot control their craving or consumption. One very important factor to consider is genetics. Scientists have found that there is a positive correlation between alcoholism and having alcohol dependency problems in a person’s family history. Genes, however, are not the only explanation for this problem. In fact, scientists now believe that certain environmental and social factors as well as certain external stimuli in a person’s life can determine and even act as a catalyst in whether a person with a genetic risk or predisposition to alcoholism ever develops the disease.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Alcohol-related motor vehicle crashes kill a person every 31 minutes and injure someone every two minutes, as per a report by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).

Risk for developing alcoholism can increase based on:

• A person’s environment,
• Where a person lives
• How a person lives
• Family, friends, and culture
• Peer pressure
• Accessibility of alcohol

A few people are able to recover from alcoholism without help from an alcohol addiction treatment program or other types of addiction therapies, but the majority of alcoholics need the assistance of Alcohol Dependency Treatment and Rehab Facilities. With treatment and support, many individuals are able to stop drinking and rebuild their lives.