Addiction and Substance Issues

Unhealthy substance use and substance abuse impacts many people.

For the person using, you might feel shame, guilt, alone, and powerless. You might also feel angry. Perhaps, the use of substances is the result of some other pain in your life. Past trauma, grief, uncontrollable anxiety, or low self esteem. If you’re in recovery you are on the journey of learning to live your life in a new way. You are having to make ammends, you having to fill your time with new activities. Perhaps, you are having to shift out of your friend group. This is stressful and uncomfortable.

Therapy can help you to learn how to take power away from the past. You can heal from the trauma, you can learn to manage distressing feelings. You can self soothe. You can have healthy and happy relationships.

For the parent of someone that is using, there is nothing more scary, painful, and fear inducing than watching your child do something that puts them at risk for injury and so many other things. There might also be anger over a history of painful interactions induced by drugs or alcohol. Perhaps painful fights, theft, or even physical altercations have occurred.

Therapy can help you learn to better communicate with your child about your boundaries, find ways that you can offer support without enabling. Most importantly, it can help you to heal the parts of yourself that are in immense pain about your child’s pain or about the interactions you have had with your child.

For the partner, you might notice yourself carrying the burden of your partner’s healing. It can be painful to watch someone you love so much struggle. It can also be infuriating to see the impact on your family. Perhaps your partner has put the family at risk by driving under the influence, spending too much money, getting into fights, etc. Maybe you notice the impact on their health. There might also be regrettable incidents that have occurred between the two of you.

Therapy can help you learn to have a voice, set boundaries, and check in with yourself about the impact. You can also learn to identify ways in which you might be enabling the behavior. Just as important as learning how to deal with it in the here and now is learning to deal with the things that have happened in the past. You deserve to have a space to heal from the stress, trauma, or anger that you’ve felt dealing with the issue.

Our Addictions Issues Therapists:

Ariel Stern, LPC and Virginia Harr, LCSW are trained and experienced in supporting you in healing from the impact of substance use or abuse. They provide a supportive environment to explore the ways in which this has impacted your life and give you a recipe for moving forward.

Virginia brings with her the experience of working for several years with individuals in the process of recovery from opiate addiction. She enjoys helping people better understand their triggers, find new ways of coping, and collaborate with them on creating new lives that support those changes.

Ariel brings with her experiences of working in community mental health in both substance abuse and family clinics. She is a ESFT therapist (Eco-systemic family therapist) and is highly skilled in support families manage the impact of substances. She is also trained in Gottman Method couples therapy so often supports couples dealing with the impact of substances.

Please note. We are not a rehab center. If you are ready or in need of rehabilitation and are ready to begin your journey into sobriety, we are happy to meet with you and guide you towards the right rehab program for you.