Anxiety and Alcohol Addiction: Diagnosis and Treatment

Suffering from anxiety disorder can be crippling. It limits your ability to engage in life, meet responsibilities, or achieve your goals. Some people turn to substances like alcohol to control those symptoms, hoping to calm their minds and nerves to make it through the day. Over time, both conditions can spiral, becoming impossible to control. Anxiety and alcohol addiction are often co-occurring disorders, and treatment for both is available.

Mental Health Hope provides you with a direct connection to mental health disorder treatment as well as substance use disorder treatment. You will work closely with our team for care, or we will help you find the treatment options best suited for your needs.

Understanding the Connection Between Anxiety and Alcohol Addiction

Alcohol use disorder (AUD) and anxiety can occur at the same time. You may have one condition that leads to the other.

Alcohol adjusts brain chemistry. It impacts the way your brain and overall central nervous system function. Because alcohol is a depressant, it typically slows down the function of the brain. You feel relaxed and calm. Some people feel a sense of euphoria. The result is a significant reduction in negative feelings.

A person with anxiety disorders may turn to alcohol for that exact reaction. Anxiety disorders ramp up the brain’s performance, stimulating your heart, breathing, and mind to work harder. Alcohol may slow that process, which is why you may be drawn to drinking as your anxiety symptoms worsen.

Alcohol Consumption Leads to Addiction

Alcohol misuse over time increases the risk of dependency. The continued use of the drug rewires the brain. It correlates the use of the substance with feel-good feelings and reduced anxiety. You may seek out alcohol for anxiety relief, but over time, your brain is craving it on a constant basis.

Alcohol can be a dangerous substance, especially when consumed in large amounts on a consistent basis. That causes health complications, including life-threatening diseases.

How Anxiety and Alcohol Addiction Treatment Works

A person with both an anxiety disorder and alcohol use disorder needs treatment for both at the same time. Co-occurring disorders like this benefit from a combined treatment approach. This may include one or more of the following treatments.

Alcohol Detox

Detoxification is a natural process that strips the body of alcohol. By removing the toxins, it forces the brain to re-learn how to function again without them. As that happens, you may feel intense symptoms of pain, illness, and anxiety. In a detox center, there’s control over those symptoms through medication and illness support.

Detox takes several days. During this process, you’ll remain at the treatment center receiving care in a 24-hour medically monitored treatment program. You will also have access to medications to stabilize any acute mental health symptoms you have.

Residential Treatment

Residential treatment allows you to live at the treatment location for several weeks while you work on your physical and mental health needs. You’ll receive comprehensive help for your withdrawal symptoms, while also learning how to control your anxiety.

In residential treatment, your therapists will provide medication management to manage anxiety and related disorders. You’ll also engage in psychotherapy, or talk therapy, which helps you learn how to control negative thought processes that often lead to poor behavioral decisions. Residential treatment may include group therapy, holistic care, family treatment, and relapse prevention strategies.

Mental Health Retreats

A mental health retreat is a mental health hospital alternative. It provides you with a safe and comfortable place to spend time away from home while you focus on your anxiety and alcohol addiction symptoms. You will work with a licensed therapist through a variety of programs.

Outpatient Mental Health Treatment

Many people benefit from outpatient mental health treatment, which includes a partial hospitalization program and an intensive outpatient program, both of which are alternatives to a hospital psych ward. These programs allow you to live at home while getting mental health treatment numerous times a week until transitioning to traditional outpatient care.

How to Get Anxiety and Alcohol Addiction Treatment

If you are struggling with alcohol addiction and anxiety, or your loved one is, there are several things to do now.

• If you are at risk of harming yourself or anyone else, call 988 right now for immediate help.
• Use our resources at Mental Health Hope now. You can get a free, over-the-phone assessment to determine what your care options are.
• Learn how LifeSync Behavioral can help you get immediate help through our mental health retreats and treatment options.

Taking action right now helps you start on the path to long-term recovery and wellbeing. Do not wait to contact us to learn how we can help you. Anxiety and alcohol addiction can mean long-term complications to your life without treatment. However, our treatment plans put you on the path forward.