Drug Rehab Center

Geoff Thompson, MA, CCC

Geoff Thompson, Program Director for Sunshine Coast Health Centre, talks about the need for human beings to connect and why this can sometimes lead to unhealthy relationships.

Geoff Thompson, MA, CCC

Geoff Thompson, Program Director for Sunshine Coast Health Centre, discusses the fundamental importance of being and feeling connected as opposed to isolated especially in addiction recovery.

Geoff Thompson, MA, CCC

Geoff Thompson, Program Director for the Sunshine Coast Health Centre, talks about the human need to feel comfortable in your surroundngs, feeling a sense of belonging.

Geoff Thompson, MA, CCC

Geoff Thompson, Program Director for Sunshine Coast Health Centre, discusses why it takes the human infant’s brain so long to develop and what this has to do with the importance of relationships.

Geoff Thompson, MA, CCC

Geoff Thompson, Program Director for Sunshine Coast Health Centre, talks about why “confirmation bias” may cause you to find facts that support your belief in the barriers that stop you from dealing with your addiction, and how to overcome this.

By Geoff Thompson – MA, CCC
Program Director

Lots of men who have participated at Sunshine Coast Health Center struggle with things beyond addiction. Some typical challenges are depression, anxiety and panic attacks, post-traumatic stress disorder, grief over losing a loved one, and attention deficit disorder.

In the old days of addiction treatment, counsellors didn’t pay much attention to these issues. Mental health professionals didn’t want to work with them because they were addicts; addiction counsellors didn’t want to work with them because they had mental health struggles. Mostly, they just fell through the cracks in the system.

Thankfully, this has mostly changed now. At Sunshine Coast we routinely deal with both the addiction and any mental health issue. All the counsellors have graduate training and Dr. Howard, our psychiatrist, has been a great blessing, helping us with diagnoses and medications.

There is a popular idea that those suffering from depression, attention deficit, trauma, grief, and so on are less capable than ‘normal’ people. But think about this: some of the most successful people in the world have suffered from mental health issues. Here’s a few:
• Kay Redfield Jamison (bipolar)—Professor of psychiatry at Johns Hopkins University Medical School
• Matthew Good (bipolar)—Canadian musician
• John Nash (likely schizophrenia)—Nobel prize winner, who was the subject of the book and movie, A Beautiful Mind.

This list could go on endlessly: singer Judy Collins, actor Jean-Claude van Damme, and so on. Some say Isaac Newton, Beethoven, and others who have profoundly influenced the world struggled with mental health issues. If we add an addiction problem, and the list includes:
• Robert Munsch (addiction, obsessive-compulsive and bipolar disorders)—Canadian children’s author. Munsch revealed last month that he suffered from mental issues and that he had recently achieved four months of clean time from cocaine and alcohol
• Eugene O’Neill (addiction, major depressive disorder)—Nobel prize winner for literature

So, some of the most famous people in the world have had mental health challenges and yet managed to do some amazing things.

Still, some do think that they are somehow less than ‘normal’ people, and some of those with both mental issues and addiction think that they are really different. In this article we’ll explore these co-occurring problems and how to deal with them.

Part One — Addiction and Mental Health Issues

Many people believe that addicts with mental health problems are ‘medicating’ their problem with alcohol or drugs. They tell us about research that says, for example, 50 percent of the people with post traumatic stress disorder have severe substance use. It’s interesting that some clients feel relieved when they get a mental health diagnosis. ‘Ah,’ they think, ‘So that explains why I keep doing drugs’.

But we have to be cautious about how we interpret this research. When we say that 50 percent of those with trauma are addicted, this is based on what are known as correlational studies. This research simply discovers if there is some link between two things. Just because we find a link does not mean that one causes the other.

One of the most famous psychiatrists in the addiction field is Ken Minkoff. Minkoff argues that those with mental health issues use drugs for the same reasons that all addicts use drugs, which is to deal with loneliness, feelings that they are different, feelings that they don’t belong, boredom, and so on.

Research on the self-medication theory is actually rather weak. When we analyze the research, we discover that there are lots of questions about self-medicating that remain unanswered. Some researchers claim that the self-medication theory was invented by those who don’t understand addiction. A major study soon to be published claims that it will go a long way toward dispelling the self-medication theory.

Some researchers point out that the drugs used are often poor choices if the addict is using them as a substitute for medication. One of the more obvious examples is cocaine. Many people with anxiety problems use coke. Since anxiety ramps up the body’s nervous system, one would think that the medication should decrease activity in the nervous system. But coke ramps it up. So it doesn’t really make a lot of sense biologically. So why do they use it? We do know that coke often gives a user the sense of power or is great as a distraction — get all that irritating clutter out of their head. These are the common reasons why people say they use coke, regardless of whether they have mental issues or not.

Part Two — Attitude

Many health care professions look at someone struggling with bipolar disorder or major depressive disorder or post traumatic stress disorder as ‘mentally ill’.

Sunshine Coast does not like this interpretation. Here’s why. There is a lot of evidence that if a professional tells a client that he is mentally ill, then the client might come to believe that there is something wrong with him. He might believe that he is different, abnormal, defective, and so on.

At Sunshine Coast, we see those suffering from these issues as no different than anyone else. Each of us is unique. Those suffering from addiction or depression or chronic pain or a heart condition are simply working through their own struggles, as any human being has to.

Basically, they didn’t ask for this to happen to them, but it did. So, they have a choice to make: Do I become a victim to my struggles or do I accept them as part of what I deal with and get on with my life.

There’s a saying in the recovery field that “Attitude is everything.” We’re not sure if it’s everything, but it certainly is a big part of whether someone lives a good life or not. The great psychiatrist Viktor Frankl, who we talk about at Sunshine Coast, wrote and spoke a great deal about developing a positive attitude. He considered a good attitude to be essential to living a personally meaningful life.

Attitude is basically accepting that depression or attention deficit or whatever is simply part of your life right now. Like having diabetes or eye problems or addiction, you still get to make choices.

Part Three — Courage

Many great thinkers, such as the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche or the addict-writer Eugene O’Neill, tell us that suffering is a natural part of life. Many believe that overcoming suffering is how we mature and grow as people. Perhaps because of modern advertising, we tend to believe today that we shouldn’t suffer. Advertisements tell us that there is a pill or some technique that will make suffering go away.

The truth is that some have more good days than bad, some have more bad than good. But we know that everyone has bad days. One of the tricks to living the good life is to trudge through the bad days. This takes courage (some psychologists use the word ‘resilience’ or ‘hardiness’, which are a little more complex than ‘courage’ but basically the same thing). 

Courage is an interesting trait. Most people consider courage as acting in spite of fear or suffering. Many suffering people find it difficult to act, to do something. Those with depression, for instance, often deal with it passively — just sleeping when they feel tired, not eating because they may lack an appetite. But dealing passively with mental health problems is usually not too helpful, at least in any long-term way. A better way is to force themselves to get up, have a shower, exercise, do some activity. This is often very difficult because they have no energy. So, it does take courage to act in spite of suffering.

As clients who have attended the new program at Sunshine Coast know, one of the ways to develop courage is to remember why you would act in spite of suffering. What is the reason you would trudge on, force yourself to do something that you don’t want to do? If you have a goal, a mission, it makes it easier to deal with the ‘bad’ things in life. For most people, having a mission or goal gives them courage.

Part Four — Faith

This can mean religious faith, but it doesn’t have to. It’s actually used in psychology.

Faith means that you have hope that things will get better — even though you may not know how or why. In a way, it can feel like jumping out of a plane without a parachute. You have no idea how you are going to land safely, but someone says, “Just do it. It’ll be okay.” Those of you who are involved in 12-step programs know this experience. This is very similar to Step 3. You just have to have faith that things will work out if you continue working on recovery.

For those with addiction and mental health issues, it may sometimes feel that they’re stuck. They’ve been courageous trudging through the tough days, and then, bang, it happens again — the major depression, anxiety, or whatever. Perhaps they know others in early recovery who are going through what they’re going through. It’s often not very pleasant.

One of the great blessings of 12-step and other recovery programs is that there are many members who have overcome their struggles with addiction and gotten a handle on a mental health issue. For those struggling with depression, etc, these people are inspiring. And they often can give others clues to how they can overcome mental issues.

Meeting someone who is dealing with the same issue is one way for people who are struggling to develop faith that things will get better. Even if they have no personal experience and don’t understand how their lives can improve, there are real people around them who have pulled it off.

Part Five — Transcendence

The key to overcoming suffering—overcoming depression, bipolar disorder, attention deficit, and so on—is not to pretend it doesn’t exist or avoid thinking about it. The key is to transcend it. Basically, in real life, this looks like ‘Okay, I’ve got a problem. I don’t like it, but I’m stuck with it, so I’ll just deal with it and get on with the business of living’.

Suffering is reality for all human beings. We all suffer: lose loved ones, lose pets, find out we have a major medical condition, get into a car accident, get our heart broken, and, of course, have an addiction. Those with co-occurring mental health issues have their own struggles and, in some ways, struggle more than the average person.

But the thing to remember is that there is no thunderbolt coming down from the heavens to save us. The only person who can save me is me. The only person who can save you is you. Each of us makes decisions that determine the kind of life we lead. As we pointed out in the introduction to this article, many people suffering from mental issues have done remarkably well in life and contributed greatly to make others’ lives better.

Geoff Thompson, MA, CCC

Geoff Thompson, Program Director for Sunshine Coast Health Centre, discusses the term “confirmation bias” and what psychologists have learned about the different ways individuals will intake & process information.

Geoff Thompson, MA, CCC

Geoff Thompson, Program Director for Sunshine Coast Health Centre, pulls together 4 key concepts for “living the good life.”

Geoff Thompson, MA, CCC

Geoff Thompson, Program Director for Sunshine Coast Health Centre, discusses the nature of suffering and how to make sense of bad things happening to good people.

Geoff Thompson, MA, CCC

Geoff Thompson, Program Director for Sunshine Coast Health Centre, discusses Viktor Frankl’s theory that happiness is the by-product of a personally meaningful life, and that addiction is a response to a life that is not personally meaningful.