If an adolescent boy in your family or peer group exhibits signs of process addiction, it may be time to seek help. At Foothills at Red Oak Recovery in Ellenboro, NC, we offer process addiction treatment to help you or your loved one recover from dependence on unhealthy behavior. First, let’s answer the question, “What is Process Addiction?”
What Is Process Addiction?
When people think about addiction, the first thing that comes to mind is typically substance abuse, such as nicotine, alcohol, and other drugs. There are many behaviors that people find rewarding and become addicted to. These include Internet use, gaming, eating, gambling, exercise, shopping, and other compulsive activities.
Similarities Between Process Addiction and Substance Abuse
Process addiction involves behavior that you continue to do despite negative consequences. Similarities between them include:
- Ways the disorders develop
- Symptoms
- Methods of treatment
- Genetic and environmental influences
- Neurobiology
These two disorders commonly occur together. This may complicate the recovery process. However, getting a proper diagnosis is the first step to healing.
Understanding Addiction
To answer the question, “What is process abuse?”, it’s important to understand addiction itself. A formal definition of addiction used to refer to illegal behaviors. For example, if you wanted to determine whether someone was an alcoholic, you might ask them how many times they had been arrested for drinking and driving. Fortunately, our understanding of addiction has become a lot more refined.
Addiction is a dependency on a substance or process that becomes the center of your life. Process addictions look a lot like substance abuse. However, there are important differences.
The Biology of Process Addiction
Process addiction starts with changes deep inside your brain. While you’re engaged in addictive behavior, your brain cells produce euphoric substances. Another part of your brain responds to this trigger. In fact, engaging in the process that triggers your addiction impacts the same part of the brain that makes you smile when you hear a baby laugh.
Behaviors that trigger process addictions include:
- Eating
- Shopping
- Having sex
- Gambling
You might become addicted to any of these activities and others. For example, when you are shopping, gambling, or playing video games, there’s a spike in pleasure chemicals in your brain.
Similarly, to substance abuse, this condition tends to escalate. You need more and more of the activity to get the same flood of euphoria in your brain.
Helpful Therapies
The goals of process addiction therapy include:
- Reducing the intensity of the addiction
- Decreasing the risk of relapse
- Increase the time between a return to process addiction behaviors
- Helping the client avoid returning to fullscale addiction or escalating to substance abuse disorders
Foothill at Red Oak Recovery in Ellenboro, NC
Foothills at Red Oak Recovery in Ellenboro, NC, provides a structured environment that introduces solutions and tools to overcome addiction. What is process addiction to you and how can we help you return to a productive life free of the dependence on unhealthy behaviors.
Adolescence is a difficult time in the best of circumstances. Our counselors and staff are uniquely qualified to offer peer and individual therapy to boys suffering from process addictions. There’s no need to feel alone. Through evidence-based treatment programs, we can help make process addiction a thing of the past for you or your child. Call us today at 866.300.5275 to find out more about our innovative programs or to register for a stay with us. Taking the first step often takes more courage than you’d expect — let us help you get the next ones on your road to recovery.
