Eating Disorders and Drug Addiction
Friday, December 5th, 2008Bulemia, anorexia, drug addiction, and alcoholism. All of these problems are about compulsion and a quick emotional fix. They devistate lives and create years of emotional pain. Many people seek eating disorder treatment or drug rehab more than once. You might be surprised to learn how similar these problems really are.
Addiction Is Empty Shortcut To Happiness
True happiness and content is from doing healthy things. People are rewarded by their body in the form of positive emotions, pleasant physical sensations, and good thoughts. Exercise, eating in a healthy way, having fun, being passionate, finding love, they all trigger the body’s reward system. These actions are perpetuated because of the reward and because they are good for human beings in general.
Addiction shortcuts around the positive healthy reactions, directly stimulating the reward center of the brain. Of course, when a person is rewarded, they tend to want to keep doing the thing that produced the reward. Enjoy a good meals every day, enjoy time with friends, spend time doing things you are passionate about. Or, for a drug addict, keep taking more and more drugs to get the emotional and physical rewards.
Quick Fix Approach Linked With Addictive Behaviors and Neurochemicals
Eating disorders are similar to addictions in that they also use artificial quick-fixes to get rewards. Their personality and patterns rely on lots of rewards and instant gratification. Eating disorders and addictions are compulsions, meaning a person loses control and centers their entire life around their dysfunctional activities. People with eating disorders and addictions also report a great deal of anxiety. They also report that their nerves are calmed by drinking, drug use, or misuse of food.
Both eating disorders and addictions have been linked with changes in neurochemicals in the brain. Of course, if a person is at risk for one problem they may be at a risk for the other. People can even have co-occuring eating disorders and addiction. The neurochemical changes can go both ways - addicted person developing an eating disorder, or a person with an eating disorder developing an addiction.
A person with either a drug addiction or an eating disorder often go to great lengths to maintain their compulsion. They can and often do develop increasingly severe behaviors and consequences as a result. Sadly, addictions and eating disorders are tremendously difficult to give up. They sometimes damage their body so badly that they put their very life at risk. Sometimes even this does not keep them from continuing.
Eating Disorder Treatment Has Similarities To Addiction Treatment
From recent research, it appears that eating disorders can be successfully treated if they are approached as an addiction. Many of the mental and emotional components are similar. Drug treatment and eating disorder treatments can be done on an outpatient or residential basis. Relapse happens with both disorders, and management is generally lifelong for both.
As you can see, both eating disorders and drug addictions are serious health problems. Both drug rehab and residential eating disorder treatment can turn someone’s life around, maybe save their life. Specialized treatment for co-occuring issues like an eating disorder and an addiction can be found at The Canyon. No need to go to a separate eating disorder facility and drug rehab center.
Drug Rehab and Eating Disorder Treatment In One Place
Your ideal treatment option is the Canyon where co-occuring disorders are treated simultaneously. Dual disorders are nothing to mess with on your own. If you know you are at rock bottom and need eating disorder and drug rehab together, contact the Canyon today.








