Trauma and Substance Use Are Often Connected

In my experience, it’s rare to work with someone on substance use and not eventually find something underneath it. The two tend to go together more often than people expect.

That doesn’t mean everyone who struggles with alcohol or drugs has been through something dramatic. But a lot of the people I see, from Manchester to Bedford to Merrimack, started using to cope with something real. Something that happened. Something that never got talked about or worked through.

The substance becomes the solution before it becomes the problem. I think that’s an important and compassionate way to look at it. It means the person was managing the best way they knew how at the time. The trouble is that it stops working eventually, and what helped once can quietly take over.

When that’s the case, treating the substance use without looking at what’s underneath it usually doesn’t hold for very long. The work in counseling often goes a little deeper, toward understanding what you were carrying and finding a different way to carry it.

That’s not a scary process. It’s actually where a lot of people start to feel some real relief.

Reach me at my number 603.512.1075

Or visit my practice Paradigm Therapy, Bedford NH