CBT for Substance Use Disorders
Cognitive-behavioral therapy or CBT is the most commonly used evidence-based treatment for substance use disorders including addictions to drugs, alcohol, and pain medication. CBT is a talking therapy, designed to help modify behaviors and thought patterns that lead to substance use and relapse so that you no longer feel the need to use substances as an escape. Cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) programs are used at our facilities in Laguna Beach, CA to work through these behavior patterns. Learn more about our Laguna Beach, CA addiction treatment therapy programs.
Many rehabilitation clinics now use CBT as part of their initial short-term treatment for many types of substance use disorders. CBT is used by licensed addiction therapists to identify harmful behavior and thought patterns, which drive people to use and towards relapse so that they can work on correcting those behaviors and helping patients to stay clean or sober.
What is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
Most people suffering from substance dependence struggle with destructive behavior patterns, negative thinking, and sometimes comorbid disorders such as anxiety or depression. Cognitive-behavioral therapy helps you to work through these issues to change thinking patterns and therefore the behavior that your thinking creates.
Cognitive-behavioral therapy was developed during the late 1980s and early 90s, blending techniques from cognitive therapy and behavioral therapy to create a new method that tackled both behaviors and thought patterns. Dialectical behavior therapy (DBT), a particular kind of CBT, was developed at approximately the same time. Learn more about the Laguna Beach, CA dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) program.
The therapy is designed around the idea that developing harmful behavior patterns like substance abuse requires a learning process, which can then be unlearned.