Addiction comes at a high price, ranging from damaged livelihoods to broken relationships. It often attacks us at our lowest point. Studies on addiction show that it frequently occurs in people with mental health difficulties, and about 20% of addicts also suffer from anxiety or depression.
Addicts pay with everything that they have. If you don’t want to put yourself or your loved ones through such an uphill battle, you must know the actual cost of addiction. Only then, perhaps, will you find the courage to seek help. So, be kind to yourself and read on. Here’s the lowdown on what you are signing up for:
Psychological Turbulences
Your mental well-being is fragile as it is; topping everyday stresses with substances can make it take a turn for the worse. Substances such as alcohol and drugs are merciless once you start taking them. Not only do you get dependent on them, but you also begin developing severe mental health conditions, including bipolar disorder and even depression. These co-occurring issues can make you sicker and push you to abuse substances even harder, forming a never-ending vicious cycle.
When addiction sinks its claw deep inside of you, the only way out is to check into rehab. These institutions have trained professionals who can support and devise the best route for your treatment, including supervised detox. Best of all – help is but a few clicks away. Take advantage of this fact and google substancerehabilitation.com to learn about the services available to you.
One of the best advantages of these centers is that they help address the psychological challenges that keep most addicts hopelessly hooked. Mental health issues resulting from substance abuse are more common than you think. According to the American Medical Association Journal, roughly 37% of alcohol abusers and 53% of drug abusers have a severe mental illness. Saving yourself a lifetime of regrets can begin today.
You don’t have to walk down this path alone. It’s a good idea to have people in your life you can share experiences with. The location also matters. Many inpatient and outpatient facilities have state-of-the-art resources with a view to boot. Addiction is a disease of isolation, so give yourself a break by allowing others to help and support you.
Financial Damages
Addiction is the fastest way to empty your wallet and devastate the financial security of your loved ones. The financial cost of addiction is far too tremendous. Substances cost money. A single dose of cocaine, depending on its purity and location, can cost as much as $200. Annually, this habit can incapacitate you financially. The more you abuse, the costlier it gets.
Financing a drug habit often leads down illicit corridors that you never thought you’d follow. Once you burn through all your savings, you may get into debt or get into crime to keep the high going. You may struggle to hold onto a job under a drug or alcohol-induced stupor and may end up unemployed. A domino effect of tragedies may occur when you cannot pay for your basic needs, and you may find yourself staring at endless bills and debt.
Substance abuse often leads to severe poverty, including homelessness, starvation, no access to healthcare, and many diseases. If you’re on the same path, turn away now, or you might find yourself in the same boat as them.
Emotional Instability
Emotions are a vital and delicate part of the human experience. Even though it is painful to navigate through joy, sadness, and anger, these emotions are necessary for your well-being. Life is full of curveballs, and a healthy set of emotions helps you cope with them. But, when substances enter the equation, it throws off your balance and sends you into an emotional frenzy or numbness.
There are chances you may become hyperactive or highly aggressive. The effects of your disheveled state negatively impact friends and family, causing them to be afraid for you. Addicts often throw extreme tantrums, vacillating between cheerfulness to extreme gloominess at the drop of a hat. This pattern of unpredicted mood swings takes over eventually and becomes unmanageable. Apathy is another heartbreaking consequence of misusing substances. It makes you cold and unapproachable, pushing those that matter away, and turning you into a social outcast.
On the other hand, if you get involved with stimulants, you may become hyperactive and violent, starting fights and insulting people for no reason. Coming down from a substance-induced high may make you anxious guilty and even fill you with intense feelings of shame. Crashing like this can further deteriorate your well-being.
Unstable emotional health is painful as it can pile on intense feelings of rejection and open gates to self-harm. Like your physical well-being, your emotional health also needs a professional hand through counseling and therapy. So, if you start showing signs of instability and get tempted to use substances as a solution, seek help immediately.
Physical Debilitation
While under the influence, you may start neglecting yourself and your hygiene. Substances make you disconnect from your surroundings and make you retreat to the dark corners of your mind. So, you may skip showering, allow trash to pile up, and let wounds fester. When you neglect your physical health, you open the door to numerous diseases and illnesses. The effects of some disorders can be short-term, while others last longer. Short-term conditions may have a massive shift in appetite, causing you to skip meals and binge substances instead.
Intense insomnia may become a permanent fixture in your life. Coupled with increased heart rate and slurred speech, hunger pangs, a lack of sleep can be essentially fatal. It is also possible to become unbalanced and frequently trip while walking, leading to surface-level wounds that may become infected. The use of drugs has more severe long-term consequences. You may lose the essence of who you are, get paranoid, and become totally unrecognizable, even to yourself.
Eventually, no amount of drugs will be enough, and this chemical gluttony can spell disaster for you. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), in 2018, drug overdose caused nearly 70,000 deaths in the US alone. Continued substance abuse may put you at risk by impairing your memory and concentration and causing organ failure.
Final Thoughts
You must understand that the cost of addiction is too high to bear. Unless you find help in rehab, counseling, and therapy, you end up signing away your psychological, financial, emotional, and physical well-being.
Dealing with collapsing mental health, drained finances, broken emotions, and poor physical health is enough to push anyone into a corner. No matter when and why you started taking substances, stop now. Seek help to live your life to the fullest and enjoy simple pleasures with no regrets holding you back.
