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Opiate addiction is a treatable illness

Understanding and admitting that you have a problem with opiates is the first big step towards seeking help, finding appropriate treatment and getting your life back. This is, in itself, an important milestone, and we understand how difficult it can be.

When considering your current behaviour patterns, relationships and lifestyle choices, do any of these issues apply to you?

See how you can start treatment at Life Works.

Behaviour patterns

• You cannot get through the day without using opiates.
• Your life revolves around opiates. Your time is spent getting high, thinking about your next chance to use opiates or planning how and where you can get your next opiate supply.
• You are suffering financial consequences because you are spending your money on buying opiates.
• You have borrowed or stolen money, or shoplifted so that you could buy opiates.
• Breaking the law is unavoidable because getting opiates is a necessity.
• Life has become incredibly hard and painful – the only thing that feels good is taking opiates.
• Parts of your day are lost to getting high.
• You cannot rely on anything except opiates. Knowing they are always there gives you something to live for.

See how you can start treatment at Life Works.

Social

• You are doing less of the things that were important to you, for example, seeing friends or family, going out or enjoying hobbies.
• You have started neglecting important relationships – for example, you are spending less and less time with your partner or spouse, your usual friends or your children.
• You are spending more and more time with others who also use opiates.
• You are increasingly preoccupied and withdrawn from those you care about.

If you can relate to any of these, it may be time for you to get help to deal with your opiate addiction.

At Life Works, we believe that opiates have become a problem when you continue to take them in spite of negative consequences – whether they are professional, relationships, health, financial, legal or other problems. 

If you’d like to read how another client felt about their addiction to opiates please click here.

See how you can start treatment at Life Works.

As a leading behavioural health facility for the treatment of opiate addiction, Life Works is able to help you.

If you need help or advice about your opiate use, please call us on 0800 081 0700 to speak to one of our counsellors in confidence or email us for more information.

We can answer any questions or concerns you may have and help you find the right treatment.

Not sure if you have a problem?

Denial is common and symptomatic of opiate dependence. You may deny that you have a problem both to yourself and to others, through:

• Minimising the effects of your opiate use.
• Criticising those around you for making too much fuss about your opiate use.
• Concealing your use of opiates from your loved ones.
• Considerably underestimating the amount of opiates you are taking.
• Placing the blame for your opiate use on other people or situations in your life, such as “I take opiates because my life is so stressful”.

It is worth considering why you feel the need to do any of these things, if you don’t have a problem with opiates. It is likely that you are relying heavily on opiates but you are not ready to admit this to yourself or to anyone else.

See how you can start treatment at Life Works.

Why admitting you have a problem can be so hard

Denial is a key characteristic of opiate addiction. It is one of the few illnesses which perpetuates itself, as one of the symptoms of opiate addiction is that it tells you that you don’t have a problem. This is one of the reasons why individuals stay trapped with opiate addiction for a lifetime – unless they get help. We advise you to stay open to the feedback from others and professionals and look at the evidence.

See how you can start treatment at Life Works.

Why it is so important to get help

At Life Works, we know that opiate addiction is an illness. This is central to our Clinical Philosophy and underpins our approach to treatment. We use the latest neuroscientific thinking to inform our understanding of how problems with opiate use affect the individual and how we can provide effective treatment of these problems.

Having an addiction to opiates means that you have an illness which affects different parts of the brain and seriously impairs your ability to make choices. This means that over time, your decision-making ability and your behaviour become more and more focused on opiates, to the detriment of everything else in your life – your partner, your job, your family, your friends. Getting opiates becomes your number one priority. You may have done things that you feel deeply ashamed about but you couldn’t avoid doing them because you had to be able to obtain opiates – one way or another.

Feeling ashamed or guilty about your behaviour can be incredibly difficult and often increases your need to take opiates, if only to get relief from these feelings. And yet, the satisfaction or relief you feel each time becomes more and more short-lived. Each time you take opiates, you are left wanting more, and often feeling dissatisfied and desperate for more relief. But over time, this will worsen the problem for you, increasingly isolate you from those who care about you and leave you with feelings of loneliness, fear and desperation. Sadly, many individuals do not ask for help when they really need it, to the extent that their opiate addiction worsens to the point of crisis - medically, physically and emotionally.

See how you can start treatment at Life Works.

Is it really a problem?

Opiate addiction is a progressive, life-threatening, psychiatric illness. If left untreated, it causes serious long term health problems – for example, drowsiness, constipation, slowed breathing and heart rate, heart failure, seizures and increased risk of HIV / AIDS and hepatitis.

In some cases, individuals with opiate addiction die. This is not uncommon.

Being in this situation can often be terrifying, exhausting, depressing, upsetting and deeply shaming. The future may seem totally bleak and pointless, and the only thing that seems to make you feel better is taking opiates.

See how you can start treatment at Life Works.

What is recovery?

There are many misconceptions about what being “in recovery” means. Recovery is commonly misunderstood, especially by people who have not received treatment and also among their friends and families.

At Life Works, we truly understand that the prospect of recovery can seem frightening. You may believe that recovery offers you nothing but a lifetime of having to live with your own problems, frustrations and feelings without even being allowed to take opiates. Imagining your life like this may seem incredibly daunting and overwhelming. Faced with a choice between your life as it is, or recovery, it is understandable why you may have reservations about recovery.

However, by finding the strength to seek professional help, you will get the support and guidance you need to start reaping the benefits of the first stage of recovery.

We believe recovery is about so much more than getting detoxed and abstaining from drugs. We define recovery as getting your life back, especially those aspects that are valuable and precious to you. It also means putting more into your life than you may have previously and finding meaning either once again, or for the first time ever. Recovery means creating a healthy, fulfilling and meaningful life that is characterised by abstinence from drugs, more effective tools for coping with the stresses of life, and a greater connection with yourself, those close to you and the larger community.

At Life Works, we strongly believe that recovery is not about what you are taking out of your life, but rather what you put back into it. Opiate addiction is a disease of isolation and the life of someone dependent on opiates tends to get smaller and smaller. Recovery is about expanding and enhancing your life.

By taking that first step and receiving treatment for your stimulant problem at Life Works, you will be able to start leading the new life you deserve.

See how you can start treatment at Life Works.

Life Works is a leading behavioural health clinic for the treatment of opiate addiction.

If you need help or advice about your opiate addiction, please call us on 0800 081 0700 to speak to one of our counsellors in confidence or email us for more information.

We can answer any questions or concerns you may have and help you find the right treatment.