Category Archives: Sex Addiction

Video game addiction now an illness says World Health Organisation with conflicting treatments available

By Samuel Port

In a development that might worry parents, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has now classified video game addiction as an official illness.

But the message is very much don’t panic, it’s not an epidemic – it’s a pathological disorder – published in the 11th revision of their International Classification of Diseases book.

The gaming disorder refers to people whose lives have been consumed by video games to the point where their health is in jeopardy.

UK Addiction Treatment (UKAT) – an organisation that have offered private therapy centres for gaming addiction alongside drugs and alcohol rehabilitation – conduct an abstinence based policy across the board, an approach to treatment where one size fits all.

Claire Havey, UKAT Head of Communications, said: “Something in their lives has gone very wrong for them, they’re almost putting a plaster on an open wound and whether that plaster is gaming 18 hours a day or whether that plaster is injecting heroine: the wound is still there. They will carry on doing that and re-applying the plaster until [they believe] that wound is healed.”

The abstinence treatment extends to mobile technology. They are only allowed access to a smart phone one hour a day after completing the initial assessments and treatments. This hour is closely monitored by therapists to ensure they don’t play games.

However, Stockport based psychotherapist Barbara Wallace believes that an abstinence lead treatment can ultimately be more damaging for a patient’s long-term health.

She said: “They might have withdrawal symptoms. So depending on the person, we’d have a plan of action to ween the person off gradually or to just abstain.

“I’d look at what impact that is going to have on them. We wouldn’t know what the particular withdrawal symptoms were going to be.”

Comparing it to her treatment of sex addiction, she stated that patients would usually want to return to a healthy sexual relationship post treatment and the same applies to gaming addicts.

Wallace proposed a plan where patients cut the gaming time down and worked in healthier activities alongside it.

She said: “If you take away a coping mechanism, you might be setting them up to fail – if you think about it, drug addicts get methadone.”

Ultimately, both courses of treatment target the addict’s compulsion to receive the dopamine fix that gaming provides – examining their triggers.

Setting up the patient for life post-treatment is where the opposing treatment methods come in to contention.

Written By Samuel Port

For Mancunian Matters

Carlton House, 16-18 Albert Square, Manchester, M2 5PE

Copyright © Mancunian Matters 1997-2018.

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POWER OF PEER SUPPORT- an abbreviated chronology

by William White

The concept of “wounded healer”–the idea that people who have survived illness or trauma may have special abilities to help others facing similar challenges–has deep roots within the history of addiction treatment and recovery.  During the 1980s and 1990s, the perceived value of the wounded healer was eclipsed by the growth and professionalization of the addiction treatment workforce in the United States.  Between 1965 and 2010, the percentage of addiction professionals with lived personal/family experience of addiction recovery plummeted from more than 70% of the workforce to approximately 30% as educational credentials became valued more than experiential knowledge.  Today, there is growing recognition of the value of peer-based recovery support services provided to individuals and families outside the framework of recovery mutual aid societies.  A new generation of peer helpers is working in volunteer and paid roles within new grassroots recovery community organizations, within addiction treatment programs, and within such allied fields as primary healthcare, child welfare, and criminal justice. This trend reflects not a rejection of scientific knowledge and professional treatment, but an effort to integrate addiction science, cumulative clinical experience, and knowledge drawn from the lived personal/family experience of addiction recovery.

Working under such titles as recovery coach, recovery support specialist, peer helper, and recovery guide, peers are filling support roles across the stages of addiction recovery.  Their growing presence represents a historical milestone in the evolution of addiction treatment and recovery support in the U.S.–functions that falls outside the boundaries of the recovery mutual aid sponsor and the addiction counselor.   Given the increasing number of requests I am receiving for information on peer recovery support services, here is an abbreviated chronology of what I and my co-authors have written about such recovery support roles.

To explore how peer recovery support services are being implementing in diverse cultural contexts, readers may also wish to explore my interviews with:

  • Cathy Nugent on Recovery Community Mobilization and Recovery Support
  • Tom Hill on Recovery Advocacy and the State of Recovery Support Services
  • Don Coyhis and Eva Petoskey on Recovery Support in Indian tribal communities
  • Phillip Valentine on Recovery Support Services in Connecticut
  • Walter Ginter on Medication Assisted Recovery Support Services in New York City

There is a zone of energy, authenticity and effectiveness that characterizes the earliest stages of successful social and therapeutic movements.  These qualities can be diluted or lost as movements become institutionalized (e.g., professionalized, commercialized or colonized by larger forces within the culture).  The documentation of the earliest contributions of these movements thus takes on both historical and practical importance.

In recent decades, the addiction treatment field has been marked by a loss of recovery volunteers within the addiction treatment milieu, reduced recovery representation among addiction counselors, addiction counselor training that denies the legitimacy of experiential knowledge, and weakened connections between what are now defined as addiction treatment businesses and indigenous communities of recovery.  It is in this context that new peer recovery support service roles promise several unique contributions: living proof of the reality and transformative power of long-term addiction recovery, recovery attraction via mutual identification, a service relationship lacking any hint of contempt or moral superiority, knowledge of and assertive linkage to local communities of recovery, and experience-grounded guidance through the stages of recovery.

The advent of peer recovery support services is an important milestone within the history of addiction treatment and recovery.  Such services stand as potentially important resources to speed recovery initiation, enhance service retention in addiction treatment and facilitate the transitions to recovery maintenance, enhance the quality of personal/family life in long-term recovery and to support efforts to break intergenerational cycles of addiction and related problems.  Cumulative experience and scientific research will tell whether the promises of peer recovery support services are fulfilled and sustained.  If such service relationships achieve their promise but are then lost, their presence in this era will stand as a valuable artifact to be rediscovered in the future, just as this power is now being rediscovered.

 

This post was first presented on William White’s blog on August 22, 2014, and it is still an important reference article today. This post, was written by William White, an Emeritus Senior Research Consultant at Chestnut Health Systems / Lighthouse Institute and past-chair of the board of Recovery Communities United. Bill has a Master’s degree in Addiction Studies and has worked full time in the addictions field since 1969 as a streetworker, counselor, clinical director, researcher and well-traveled trainer and consultant. He has authored or co-authored more than 400 articles, monographs, research reports and book chapters and 20 books. His book, Slaying the Dragon – The History of Addiction Treatment and Recovery in America, received the McGovern Family Foundation Award for the best book on addiction recovery. Bill was featured in the Bill Moyers’ PBS special “Close To Home: Addiction in America” and Showtime’s documentary “Smoking, Drinking and Drugging in the 20th Century.” Bill’s sustained contributions to the field have been acknowledged by awards from the National Association of Addiction Treatment Providers, the National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence, NAADAC: The Association of Addiction Professionals, the American Society of Addiction Medicine, and the Native American Wellbriety Movement. Bill’s widely read papers on recovery advocacy have been published by the Johnson Institute in a book entitled Let’s Go Make Some History: Chronicles of the New Addiction Recovery Advocacy Movement.

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Men’s Healing Retreat – June 28 – July 1 in West Chester, Pa

Encounter something you may have never experienced before; the emotional hole in your heart. Come to the Men’s Healing Retreat, Thursday, June 28- Sunday, July 1 at the Temenos Retreat House in West Chester, Pa to begin this exploration.

Join a group of twelve men and Dr David Forbes to expand beyond deep rooted beliefs and leave the ‘old negative tapes’ behind. Dr Forbes is a Founding Diplomate of the American Board of Integrative/Holistic Medicine and past president of the American Holistic Medical Association (AIHM). He is fully trained in PEER® Therapy (Primary Emotional Energy Recovery). He is committed to help people mend their emotional pain through PEER® Therapy retreats.

Retreat guests enjoy single rooms, with a private bath. Double room accommodations are available on request. Bed and bath linens are provided. All meals, from Thursday dinner to Sunday lunch will be served at the Retreat House, additional beverages and snacks are included. Single room registration fee is $985.

For more information go to the web site: www.MensHealingRetreat.com

Feel free to contact: Michael Spadaro, 215-805-5240, MichaelSpadaro1@Comcast.net      for more information.

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Posted in Addiction, Addiction Recovery Posts, alcohol, Alcoholism, Drug Abuse, Family Dynamics, Gambling, internet addiction disorder, Pornography, pornography addiction, Recovery Coaching, Relapse, relationships, Sex Addiction, Sleep Deprivation, Sleep Loss | Tagged , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Men’s Healing Retreat – June 28 – July 1 in West Chester, Pa