Psychoanalysis and the Treatment of Drug Addiction Essay Example for Free

Psychoanalysis and the Treatment of Drug Addiction EssayDrug dependency persists to present major challenge to serving psycho analysts. There are different techniques determinationd to treat medicine habituation however this paper mainly discusses depth psychology as a mode of interference for dose addiction. Even though media hype regarding the force of dose addiction has attached in the last hardly a(prenominal) years, there has not been sufficient stress on different methods pulmonary tuberculosisd to deal with it. Therapists, educationist, and the common in the public eye(predicate) require information on the subject of handling methods and means that are accessible to them. Gradually to a greater extent, experient psychoanalysts are getting employed in dose addiction programs (Hosie, West, Mackey, 1997). In order to be successful, they should be aware of different methods subprogramd in dose addiction treatment and try to incorporate them into their day- to-day practice and job. People who are in the written report of do do mediciness addiction treatment, stock-still, must try to corroborate clear idea about utilise different methods of treatment (Schonfeld Morosko, 1997).Among the various modalities physical exertiond to treat dose addiction are the twelve-step program of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA), professional steering and psychiatric care, family systems therapy, and therapeutic community treatment. In the past, these approaches accept a great deal been at odds with one an different (Minkoff, 1995). Some of the debates have involved whether medicine addiction is a disease in and of itself or is reflective of some underlying psychopathology.The proponents of the disease prototype have included AA (1995) supporters, who have tended to focus on abstinence as a way of unequivocal the disease. Adherents to the psychopathology model have mainly been mental health professionals who have advocated psychiatric and profession al counselling treatment. Yeager, DiGiuseppe, Olsen, Lewis, and Alberti (1997) noted that therapeutic community treatment has become increasingly popular because traditional and more distributively oriented psychiatric modalities have not been very effective.They echoed the argument made by Vaillant (1975) that clients suffering from medicate addiction need milieu and group involvement with their peers. External control, containment, and structure from milieu-oriented treatment are unavoidable before meaningful psych other(a)apy can begin. Stanton and Todd (2000) agreed that peer influence can play a role in less serious drug addiction problems however that long-term drug addiction generally has its origins in adolescence and that serious drug abuse is predominantly a family phenomenon (p. 8).They argued that family therapy is therefore the logical treatment of choice. Psychoanalysis And Drug Addiction To be exact, frightening drug addiction is considered as being move by contr adictory and un pointtled relative kinematicsthat drawn from the premature systematizing relations in a individuals lives. As far as drug addiction is concerned, the terms of this disagreement interrupt solid look in distinguishing exploits of using drugs that provide to spread it with the help of the mutual results of reinforcement and disguise.The objective of treatment is for diligent and psychoanalyst to uncover the constituents of the comparative ties that are embedded in the drug use, to reformulate these forces in figurative give tongue toions, and tore-check them in the kinematics of the change, next to prospects for latest exchange. Seen this way, the treatment requirements of drug users can finely be convened by analysis, improved by other methods essential for dealing with addiction.In the past drug addiction has been shut out from psychoanalysis and this method of treatment, clearly in its insinuation, top executive appear merely to validate that rest. Doing ps ychoanalysis treatment of drug users, comparing with other treatment methods, educates awareness on these hope states and uses replacement as a remedial instrument. No matter what the stress of the theory or character of the foundation, each analysis of addictive incommode that represent on entity associations tacitly contribute to a common principle that the action of drug use comes into cyclorama as a result of desire.Whilst created by a lot of dependent variables, an operation of severe drug use, if intra-psychically inspected, at all times corresponds to an attempt to bring about inner alteration, or exterior reaction, in a exacting, approved method. Almond (1997) has described desire as a personal mark offa feeling of total control or powerthat the person endeavours to bring about with his action and/or fantasy (p. 3). By these stipulations, an action of excessive drug use signifies a fundamental, desire correct and is a means to implement it, whether with regard to eff ects desired in the self or others in the outside ground.Rik Loose discussed in his book The Subject of Addiction that psychoanalysis and addiction are counterparts of the world of science and techniques. Therefore, since, the logical dialogue centers on the issue and the drug users relationship to his power of desire. In an intelligent approach, Rik Loose depicts the reason of globalization that requires our times and counters to it as a organization governed by desire and ideals. (Loose, 2002)Psychoanalysts who work with drug users know that the act of drug use is an indicative result of a procedure of previous changes. The language of diversity, acknowledged as a modern construction for intellect, allows us to secern the drug user as careworn into specific states of mind comprising of special(prenominal) influence, feelings regarding the person himself and others, feelings concerning the worldthat augment the desires and cravings that are confined and apparently recognized in typical action of drug use.One might also say that, for a given drug consumer, the action of using the drug provides to intrepidly set the limits of a basic state of oneself. In fact, the preliminary investigative mission with the drug user comprises of extricating the user from attraction with the drug in order to divert the user in its place in the self-state that portends it. Astonishingly, the standing of desire in the addiction is for the most part uncared for in drug treatment.Drug users in this kind-hearted of situations are frequently encouraged to talk to other recuperating fellows when they believe themselves to be caught up in desire to fill in drug. (Loose, 2002) This suggestion regularly wielded by twelve-step companionship also, in the shape of a precondition offer to talk to ones supporter every time sensing the urge to take drugis evidently well planned (and, no doubt, useful at times).On the other playscript this type of counselling is sightless to the internal truth of the state of desire that not just impels nerve users presumptuous in their use of drugs, nevertheless in addition throw international apprehension of other individuals in their lives to the periphery of their brain. Moreover, still as conventional treatment programs dedicate significant consideration to the issue of reversion enlightening drug users in relation to surroundings stimuli and inner feelings (e. g. depression, loneliness) that could encourage desires to use drugsthey fee no attention to the desire aver that the course of reversion usually serve to perform.Due to this rationale, psychoanalysis has a lot to proffer the severe drug user whilst the majority of drug treatments look previous to putting an end to drug addicting behaviour, the psychoanalytic attempt would take in this objective and stretch gain ground to investigate the desire state that uncovers end result in drug use and in other prototypes of actions in his or her life.In effect, the methodica l approach would be to treat the persons drug use nevertheless look for to disengage much(prenominal) a symptomatic outburst from the original self-state, which has call for to be conserved for its background and significance to the person and, for that basis, deserve consideration (Bromberg, 1998). transformation come in an analysis, Winnicott (1960) wrote, when the traumatic factors enter the psycho-analytic material in the affected roles own way, and within the patients desire (p. 37).This regulatory statement can also be functional to remedial work with drug users, whose desire intend, usually set free out there, requirement to be completely greeted into the methodical exchange. In fact, it is from the point of view of the functioning coalition nevertheless effectively realizes with a drug userthat the analyst may sense another exchange transpiring in the transportation. In it, the analyst is excluded from all events eventuating in the patients drug use and is left to feel incapacitated.Not only is the patients move to a state of emotional cut-off a marker of desire, so is the analysts helpless state. (Loose, 2002) For it is these feelings of helplessness in the analyst that point to the history of pain or trauma in the patient that may have showed the way to the users need for desire to start with, and to such severity. Nonetheless, veritable new trends in investigative way and the significance of a relational viewpoint in taking into custody drug use, the ability of psychoanalysts, amplified by understanding of addiction, can be of utmost advantage to them.That is why a relational model of psychoanalytically based treatment has significance for severe drugs users. This statement may seem affect on two accounts psychoanalysis has often been considered useless for active drug users, and drug users have often been judged unsuitable for psychoanalysis. (Loose, 2002) Both assumptions are false, though accepted as truths in the mental health and drug addiction treatment worlds. Recent changes that have taken place in the understanding of the psychoanalytic work on make relationally informed psychoanalysis an ideal therapeutic venue for drug users.These shifts in psychoanalysis have reversed its previous lack of fit for drug addiction. Any Psychoanalyst who has spent time workings with drug users has heard, first-hand, accounts of the disrepute of psychoanalysis from the standpoint of addicted patients. (Loose, 2002) The traditional analytic stance that emphasized comment smacked of passivity to drug users, and the priority given to aetiology over symptoms often left patients drinking and drug use unattended to.However contemporary psychoanalysis has shifted its style of investigation as Mitchell (1997) stated, it has moved away from reliance on interpretation and insight as the primary tools for achieving therapeutic change. Rather, psychoanalysis today places furiousness on an analysts ability to enter into a patients dynam ics, mobilized in transferencecounter transference form together with the patient to arrive at an understanding of these regards and, in the process, to go steady new forms of relating for the patient to trust, in the place of old, constraining patterns (Mitchell, 1997 Bromberg, 1998).In short, todays psychoanalyst is every bit an engaged participant. How does this development serve the substance-using patient? The drug user tends to be a do-er and act-er, and, on technical grounds alone, needfully an active approach to feel meaningfully engaged, even adequately gripped by the therapeutic process. However, on another level, it is precisely the drug users recourse to action to express conflicting relational needs that is the target of treatment. (Loose, 2002)Reliance on action is a cornerstone of the drug users characterologic makeup (Wurmser, 1977, 1978). It is typically this reliance that has earned him disfavour with psychoanalysts, whose work depends so on reflection and delay . Action serves many purposes for the drug user, however it is usually its defensive function that has been highlighted by theorists. In this view, as articulated by Wurmser, action gives the drug user a powerful alternative to, or, more accurately, means of flight from, painful affects and inadequate tools of symbolic expression.Drug users are notable for limitations in their symbolic functioning Wurmser termed their difficulties hypo-symbolization, describing deficits that range from a specific inability to recognize and label feelings to a more brush failure to engage in fantasy or exploration of their inner lives at all. In such a view, again elaborated by Wurmser, action serves as a special form of externalization, go the person its magical, problem solving properties and the appearance of narcissistic control.However if, instead of emphasizing its defensive role, we view action as the vehicle drug users have for communicating un-symbolized experience, then it is to their ac tions we must look for the initial outlines of their conflicts. Drug use is then far from unwelcome in undertaking analytic treatment of a person taking drugs. It is the signature act of such a patient and, as such, contains the components of his unconscious and as yet un-symbolized life it is the starting point of treatment. The intended course of that treatment would then be for analyst and patient to begin to uncover the relational deadlock embedded in the drug use. (Loose, 2002)Their aim is to discover that deadlock anew in the kinematicsof the transference, often at first still involving instances of drug use, and eventually to deposit it within the organizing relationships of the patients early life, ultimately replayed and addressed free of reference to drugs, within the experience of the treatment relationship. In other words, the aim of therapeutic action would be to track, and deconstruct, the symptom from its extra-psychic form, concretized in drug use, to its intra-psyc hic life in the patients object relations (Boesky, 2000).It is here that the needs of the person devour drug and the current state of psychoanalytic practice converge. Enactments, whereby patients draw their analysts into jointly realizing fantasized aspects of their object relations, play a recognized role in analytic practice today. Though theorists of various schools differ in their understanding of word-paintings, view of the analysts role, and sense of their therapeutic value, there is general agreement in the field that enactments are inevitable manifestations of transferencecounter-transference forces at work in the analytic process (Ellman and Moskowitz, 1998).In relational theory, in particular, enactments are regarded not only as unavoidable, however also as the central specialty of the work. They are the means through which patient and analyst are afforded the opportunity to revive old relational patterns jointly, as well as to reopen them to observation, understanding , and possibilities for change within the analytic relationship (Mitchell, 1997 Bromberg, 1998). By placing enactment at the heart of analytic work, relational practitioners have opened the door of psychoanalysis to substance using patients.This is so for several reasons first, enactments provide drug users with a mode of communication tailor made to their needs to actualize, rather than reflect on, inner experience (Boesky, 2000). More important, enactments are a conduit for experience whose transitional properties uniquely serve the drug useroffering not only a bridge between the patients symptomatic behaviour outside the consulting room to his conduct within the treatment, however also, more generally, a bridge between action and meaning, drug and object, act of drug use and underlying relational needs.In theory and approach, then, the relational model provides the basis for the desired course of treatment for drug users. To be sure, no treatment of drug addiction could be effec tive by attending to the relational underpinnings of drug use alone. Severe drug use is a dangerous and potentially life-threatening problem however derived, it nonetheless is sustained by the powerful pharmacological effects of drugs and the operation of the laws of conditioning on peoples behaviour. (Loose, 2002)Any Psychoanalyst working with a person taking drug must have a working knowledge of a range of ancillary treatment modalities commonly needed during the course of their treatment. such(prenominal) approaches include use of cognitive-behavioural interventions, referrals to residential or intensive outpatient programs, support for participation in 12-step programs, use of toxicology tests, and use of pharmaco-therapies designed to counteract or inhibit drug effects (for example, disulfiram for alcoholics, naltrexone for opiate addicts).Purely speaking, then, any treatment of active drug user is, by force, integrative in practice, if, ultimately, psychoanalytic in design. Ho wever, if appropriately used, such supplementary therapies do not necessarily compromise the analytic task in fact, it is my argument that the particular tools summoned during the course of any one patients treatment arelike his drug useuniquely customized to fit his relational needs and are therefore best understood within a psychoanalytic framework.