A Different Type of Addiction

The Fulton Community Supervision Center in Missouri provides trauma-informed, gender-specific care and services to women who face the risk of recidivism. Participants live at the center, where they receive services like cognitive behavioral therapy and classes that teach coping mechanisms and personal and professional development. Core to much of the programming is helping women find their self worth.

A comprehensive rehabilitation facility in Taos, New Mexico uses a holistic approach to curbing addiction by offering group therapy along with traditional medical treatment. By addressing deeper mental and emotional factors that can lead to addiction, the Questa Health Center has enabled addicts to face their demons head-on, with constant support.

In Ann Arbor, Michigan, the program Sisters United Resilient and Empowered, also called SURE Moms, offers counseling to mothers in an effort to address their trauma, and thus have an effect on their entire families. With research showing the connection between home life and criminal behavior, SURE Moms gives women the opportunity to provide their children with emotional support by giving them that same emotional support. What started as an informal bible study group is now funded by the city and offers regular, twice per week classes.

A church in Philadelphia is adept at ministering to those coming out of incarceration and drug use because its two pastors come from that very same world. They hold members accountable, which could mean a required stint in rehab before folks can use the various services of the church like housing, food and help with employment. As a result the recidivism rate of members is about five percent, far lower that the state-wide rate.

The Healing Hurt People program, or HHP, is an ER-based violence intervention program that works on the public health-based notion that violence - like other diseases that spread - can be prevented. It targets services to those at highest risk, patients like those in Philadelphia, who are being treated for violent injuries in the city's emergency rooms. Unlike other programs, it recognizes and attempts to heal the underlying emotional trauma that results from, and often predates, violent injury.

Child First is a program in Connecticut, where staff members deliver home-based parent guidance and child-parent psychotherapy to help prevent the detrimental physical and mental effects of toxic stress on children. The engagement is guided by an evidence-based methodology called Child-Parent Psychotherapy, which is grounded in collaborative problem solving.

Back on My Feet helps people experiencing homelessness and substance use through the power of exercise, specifically running. Participants have ran more than 950,000 miles and 70% of them have found employment and housing. Moreover, participating in the group helps people in need find a sense of community and build a support system.

Forest bathing encourages mindfulness in nature by focusing on sights and sounds in the forest, to calm the mind and relieve feelings of depression and anxiety. Several institutions use forest therapy as treatment options for various conditions, such as the Costa Rica Treatment Center, which helps people healing from addiction participate in forest bathing as part of their recovery. Forest bathing helps participants form a closer relationship with nature and themselves and learn how to regulate their emotions.

Building connections and learning to cope can help to break the inter-generational cycle of addiction. The nonprofit Eluna operates a camp in Dayton, Ohio, for children whose families have been ravaged by addiction. In addition to receiving the support of adult mentors, the children also engage in activities designed to teach them skills to manage their emotions. With funding from government subventions and private donations, Eluna plans to open several more camps nationwide.

Merging accountability with treatment promotes recovery for those charged with drug possession. In Franklin County, Ohio, the municipal court system operates a program called Helping Achieve Recovery Together. The court recovery program provides a two-year track for participants to receive mental health support from peers and the courts, with the goal of moving them from the criminal justice system and into treatment.