Long-term and destructive effects of drug use on physical and mental health
The process of drug addiction occurs with just a few days of drug use.
but treatment and return to normal life can take months or even years.
More important is the fact that addiction may not even disappear completely from your body and you always deal with its side effects.
The power of drugs can be understood by the fact that even taking a dose of some of them is all that is needed for addiction to occur.
Frequent and long-term use of drugs changes the structure of the brain and makes it more dependent on drugs.
The brain and body are so accustomed to this substance that the day your body tries to stop taking the drug, your body reacts with negative effects such as withdrawal symptoms.
What are the long-term effects of addiction on mental health?
● Depression
Various mood disorders, including depression, are complications of substance use. Medications cause significant changes in the brain that cause depressive symptoms. Some people who refuse treatment in addiction clinics choose self-medication with medication that makes the condition even worse.
● Damage to brain memory
Drugs affect the brain and reduce the ability to perceive and store information for later use. Not only does this make it difficult to remember things, it also makes it harder for addicts to store new information in the brain.
● Paranoia
Some drugs, such as marijuana and cocaine, make the user pessimistic and suspicious. The symptoms become more severe over time.
Also, people who suffer from addiction tend to hide their addictive behaviours from their friends and family and lie to them.
● Brain structure
Addiction has a significant effect on the brain and changes its structure.
When a drug is taken for a long time, our body becomes accustomed to that drug and becomes dependent on the drug.
This dependency has so much affecting the addict that even if the person decides to cut off, it does not accept the brain.
Short-term effects of drugs on mental health
● Anxiety disorder caused by drug
use After consumption, the person may experience a sudden panic attack in which the heart rate increases and the consumer experiences sweating, tremors, shortness of breath, and fear of losing control.
One feels surrounded by something strange and unreal and has lost one’s identity and sense of reality.
● Psychosis
Psychotropic drugs can cause hallucination and delusions in the consumer. One hears and sees things that do not exist, and this can be very dangerous for the consumer and those around him.
● Mood disorders
Many drug users experience feelings of depression, sadness, restlessness, irritability, fatigue, loss of pleasure, hallucinations, and nervous behaviours. These feelings are mood disorders and may be caused by drugs such as cocaine, amphetamines, heroin and methadone.
The destructive effects of addiction on family mental health
The first blows of addiction hit the family. Addiction destroys the addicted family, and their children and their future. Addiction for the family is nothing but distress and worry. Happiness has no meaning in the family of addicts.
Addiction, because of its high cost, also causes financial problems for families after a while. These problems are a danger to corruption and error for other family members.
If family members are mentally healthy and can cope with stress or under the care and supervision of one of their non-addicted parents, the presence of an addicted parent will affect their mood and cause a mental imbalance and social problems.
Addiction affects the family in various ways, directly and indirectly. Family distress, worry, etc. Are the result of the addiction of a family member. Addiction of the father of the family causes many problems.
The effect of maternal addiction on child mental health
A psychologist states that maternal addiction has a direct impact on children’s mental health, she said: the mother has a decisive role in the peace of the family and can certainly deliver good children to society, but a mother who is addicted does not have all the criteria of motherhood and with these conditions, she has difficulty in raising her child.
The effects of an addicted mother on the child’s self-confidence
A child with good self-confidence certainly a mother with good self-confidence has been able to form this schema in her child and raise her child’s level of awareness, but unfortunately when the mother does not have this condition, this schema does not form in the child, even when the child she does not feel satisfied, it is a defect of a mother who did not create this good feeling in her child during her child’s upbringing and did not approve of him with encouragement
. Children of addicted families have feelings of self-doubt, stubbornness, depression, and anxiety, and are unable to say (No) to what others say.
Unfortunately, children who grow up in these families lose their true identity.
These children experience fear, anxiety and failure in any kind of relationship, and even in adulthood, due to this fear and lack of self-confidence, they cannot succeed in their relationships because they are not taught any schema of self-confidence.
Living with addiction disorder and mental health
It is difficult to live with the problem of drug abuse and mental illness .
In this case, both mental illness and drug addiction have their own signs and symptoms, and in some way disrupt the functioning of the person at home, work, school and other areas of life.
The problem becomes more complex as the disorders simultaneously affect each other. The problem of drug addiction becomes exacerbated mental illness.
When the problem of addiction worsens, the symptoms of mental illness also get worse.
There is always hope
The effects of drugs on mental health are complex and multidimensional but, both disorders are treatable.
Recovering from the effects of these two problems on each other requires patience, commitment and motivation, but with the help of a specialised team, recovery is certainly not far off.
