The use of Drugs (prescription and illegal drugs) and Alcohol is widespread in our society. Issues arise when your  use of alcohol and/or drug has a negative impact on your life, and the lives of those close to you.

What action you take concerning your use of drugs and – or alcohol will depend on your own view of the impact that your use has on you, and through you, those close to you.

Read the next part and see if you can identify your own attitudes to your alcohol and/or drugs usage.

Stage 1

Do I have a problem?

If you do not believe that your usage of alcohol /drugs is causing you a problem then you will not take any action on this matter regardless of what your friends, partner or family think.  You might like to approach this issue by asking yourself. Why is it that other people say I have a problem? Do they have a point?

Stage 2

I have a problem but am not sure what to do about it.

Acknowledging to yourself that your use of drugs / alcohol is causing you a problem is a really big step. In fact it is the first step to your recovery! The questions surfaces about what you want to do about this issue.

Small steps could include the following !

-          Really thinking about the advantages and the disadvantages of your usage. Get a piece of paper, divide it in to two columns, and write down all the advantages and disadvantages from your own perspective.

-          Here is an example for someone who Binge drinks.

Advantages                                                     Disadvantages /issue

It is highly unlikely that you will be able to give up your alcohol –drug usage just like that. In fact it may be dangerous just to stop!

The next  step is therefore to explore ways of reducing or minimising the harm that your alcohol and /or drug usage is doing to yourself and others.

For example, if you are on Heroin, then you may wish to talk to your doctor about methadone substitute and/or needle exchange/and or smoking heroin rather than injecting it. If you are buying heroin on the streets then this can be spiked with other chemicals, (even rat poison) that can cause serious illness and even death.

If you are binge drinking, then you may wish to take steps to reduce the risks to yourself and others.

Write down on a piece of paper what you do now, the risk, and what steps you can take to reduce the risk. Here is an example  for someone who binge drinks.

What I do now                          The Risk                                 Reducing the risk

Stage 3 Taking further Action

The action that you take, will depend on the what your drink /drugs usage is, what combination of drugs you are taking. Here are a number of suggestions that may be of use.

-          Do a drink / drugs diary, so that you can really get a handle on what your usage is

-          Consult your GP, on your drink /drugs usage.

-          Your GP may be able to refer you for free alcohol /drugs services at the  surgery, or at a local drugs centre, including specialist detox treatment on the NHS.

-          If you do not want to go via the NHS, or the waiting list is too long, then private counsellors and detox centres can also offer drugs and alcohol treatment .

-          Work with your counsellor on harm minimisation, and reducing  your drug – alcohol usage

-          Work on underlying emotional issues, that fuel your use of drink or drugs addiction

-          Work to develop strategies for coping with times when you are tempted to relapse

-          Join an organisation for additional support. For example alcoholics anonymous, or narcotics anonymous. Social support to come off drugs is really important and should not be overlooked

Stage 4 sustaining the gains

Once you are working on your drugs-alcohol usage, and the underlying issues, it is important to develop relapse prevention strategies, and a recovery strategy if you do relapse.

Relapse prevention, means developing ways of ensuring that you do not revert back to your old patterns of drug-alcohol usage. You need to find out what works for you.

Examples could include

-          Continuing to work on the deeper issues, that fuel your addictive  patterns

-          developing a network of friends, who can support you, when you are struggling with the temptation to relapse,

-          relaxations and mindfulness techniques, that can help you say NO !,

-          regular AA or other meetings.

-          developing a range of alternative interests that do not involve alcohol or drugs, can also be very important.

Relapse recovery is also very important. The road to changing your drug-alcohol use, can involve times when you do relapse. How you react to that relapse is crucial. For example:

-          Beating yourself up or being hyper critical of yourself, is unlikely to help you not to relapse again –  in fact the more you beat yourself up – the more likely you are to relapse again

-          Treating the relapse with curiosity and honestly exploring the factors leading to your relapse can be very valuable in helping you not to relapse again.

-         Examples of this exploration, could be exploring the circumstances or triggers to that relapse, what happened just before you relapsed, how you were feeling before this happened , and what action you can take to reduce the risk of this happening again.

For more information about drugs – alcohol counselling you can contact the following:

-          Your local GP should have information about drugs and alcohol services that may be available on the NHS

-          Alcoholics Anonymous

-          Narcotics Anonymous

-          NHS direct.

-          Local Counsellor

Latest research shows that the use of Mindfulness based techniques, such as body awareness exercise, and also Focusing, can help people on the road to recovery. I hope this article helps you on your road to recovery! Best wishes

John Threadgold

John Threadgold is  recognised as a Focusing oriented Psychotherapist by the Focusing Institute, and private counselling practise called New Focus Therapy. He is also a drugs counsellor at the Merton Adult Crack Service ( MACS) . For more information visist his web site at www.newfocustherapy.co.uk

How do I define ‘success’ ? Well one way of defining it, is that when  therapy is  successful you begin to feel better about yourself,also feel empowered to make constructive changes to your life.  

When you the client succeed in therapy, the counsellor or psychotherapists will often privately believe that it was their own skills that did it, or perhaps their model of counselling. But therapists are less willing to talk about people who do not succeed in therapy;

Back in the 1950’s, Kirtner and Cartwright, two researchers at the University of Chicago counselling centre, tried to find out answer as to what makes successful counselling. They listened to hundreds of tape recordings of therapy sessions.

The started out with the assumption that therapists who could offer a therapeutic relationship based on empathy, unconditional acceptance, and being genuine, would  have  more successful clients, than therapists who did not offer these qualities. There was some evidence consistent with that view, but something did not fit. Such therapists still had clients who did not benefit from therapy, while other therapists, who did not embody these qualities, nevertheless had successful clients.

Kirtner and Cartwright, decided to explore how  the clients used therapy. They made a startling discovery. They could predict the successful ( and unsuccessful) clients within the first two sessions.  The question surfaces, what is the difference between how successful and unsuccessful clients used therapy?

Unsuccessful clients often talked about their issues in any or all of the following ways.

-       Some people had a very clear intellectual understanding of their issues, They could pinpoint with some accuracy how their problems arose in their life history, for example a childhood experience, but nothing ever felt different or shifted for them

-       Other people told stories without any emotional depth. They could talk about traumatic incidents in the same way as they might describe going to the shops or what they had for dinner. Again nothing shifted for them

-       Some people by contrast experienced their emotions with full force. They could experience their anger depression and hurt again and again, but these feelings never changed.

How did successful people work on their issues ? Successful people would at times talk in the same as  the people described above.. But they also had a special way of talking, that could be spotted in the first two sessions, once it had been identified.

Successful clients:

-       Talked about their issues, but frequently slowed down their talking ., became less fluent,

-       They paused what they were saying, and checked out whether their words accurately reflected what they were experiencing.

-       They would sense into their issues, and change their language to fit their experience.

-       The issue would unfold, change and feel different in their body, and such clients would  often feel a release of tension in their bodies

The following is a fictionalised example of this process and the  ellipses show the client pausing,

Client   ‘well I was really angry with her ( pause hesitates) well ( sensing in to issue, sensing a murky edge to this) – no – not quite angry – ( pause) well sort of — maybe

Yeah – when she walked off with my best mate, I felt betrayed, ( now sensing, does the word betrayed really symbolise that felt sense ) yeah there is more —– ( sensing in) oh yeah that’s it, I just felt so alone. Oh thats funny, that tension has gone, like it feels better somehow !

Now although the content of what happens is horrible, nevertheless the clients would often feel a release of tension in their body at the end of the process, as if the issue had somehow changed or been processed. By being aware of their issue, and sensing into the issue, without being overwhelmed by it, somehow the issue had changed, felt better in their body.

Clients who characteristically had these ‘moments’ in their therapy, also began to feel better about themselves, and also tended to make constrictive changes to their lives.

The question surfaced, can unsuccessful therapy clients learn to do what the successful clients were doing naturally?  Dr Eugene Gendlin carried forward this research.

Dr Gendlin closely observed what successful clients were doing, and then broke this down into a series of teachable steps that potentially unsuccessful clients could learn. He called this process ‘focusing’.

Those steps have changed over the years, but commonly include:

-       Sensing into the body, getting a felt sense of the issue

-       Slowing down language, just sensing , ‘ is this anger or is there something else there’? just checking the language accurately symbolises and carries forward the bodily experience of the issue

-       Sensing something that starts intellectually vague, but concretely experienced, and seems to be at the edge of awareness

-       The edge of awareness feeling, then comes into focus. And becomes clearer as the process continues.

-       Often the issue infolds and changes as the client checks language against the felt sense, and there is often a release of tension in the body.

Dr Gendlin set up the Focusing Institute, to promote focusing, and  developed courses for people to learn focusing outside of therapy. He also developed focusing courses for therapists.

Dr Gendlin discovered that people could use the focusing tool for all sorts of purposes, and not just therapy. For example

-       People could use focusing for finding out how they really felt at any given time

-       Could use it to help them make better and more informed decisions

-       Could be used to interpret dreams

-       Help with therapy when it has become stuck

-       Remove writers block

-       Help with artwork, creative projects,

-       and there is even a group of focusers who use focusing to help with buying and selling shares.

More about focusing Oriented Therapy

In Denmark focusing oriented therapists will often ask potential counselling and psychotherapy clients to learn some focusing from a fellow practitioner, before they commence therapy.

In the UK there are less focusing oriented therapists, and such therapists will often incorporate focusing suggestions into their standard therapy. Examples may include:’ you talked about being angry, can you just slow down and sense into that,’ or ‘can you sense where you feel that in your body’. Some people will immediately know what the therapist is talking about although not all. Some focusing therapists, will also offer ‘guided focusing sessions’ as part of the therapy. I have seen people literally transform after learning focusing in this way.

Focusing outside of therapy.

You can learn focusing outside of therapy. I offer a 6 hour individual focusing course that you can learn focusing skills without being in therapy, or along side your own therapy if you are in therapy with a different therapist.

You can find out more about focusing oriented therapy  and focusing courses that are run in the UK from the Focusing Institute Website. See my links page for further information.