Bad Habits or Formal Addiction?

Learning Impulse Control and Self Regulation of Your Own Actions

The fool who persists in his folly will soon become wise.

                                                                              ~ William Blake 

Impulse Control Disorder . . .
Not Otherwise Specified

Alternative Terms and Alternative Treatments:
Explore Holistic Approaches to Skillfully Modify Your Behavior.

Many people find stigmatized labels like “addict” or “addiction” to be demeaning, prejudicial, and far too over-used in the common language. If you suffer from addictive behavior problems that involve no chemicals, you might consider less stigmatizing terms to provide a foundation for your grasp and understanding of the nature of your unwanted habits and behavioral challenges.

Impulse Management, Compulsive Conduct, and Self-Regulation:

Doing What Works for You:
Learn the Personal Psychological
Competence to Manage Your Unwanted Habits

The Diagnostic Term: Impulse Control Disorders NOS (Not Otherwise Specified)  “represents . . . a residual diagnostic category for those (numerous) impulse control disorders (behavioral challenges) that do not fulfill the typical criteria for specific Psychiatric Disorders or Substance Use Disorders outlined in The Diagnostic Manual of Mental Disorders DSM IV (e.g. substance abuse, substance dependence, paraphilias).”

Does the Term “Addiction” or the “Disease Concept”
Really Help You Prepare Yourself for Behavior Change?
Can assuming the identity “I am an addict and alcoholic” truly enhance your motivation to change? Does identifying with such terms facilitate your ability to make necessary behavioral changes that help you to resolve unwanted habits and manage behaviors that do not work for you?

If your answers to these questions are “yes,” then we will head in that direction. However, if you are put off by such terms, we can explore the broad range of alternative options available from the research-based foundations and counseling methods developed in clinical psychology and the cognitive behavioral sciences.

Many addictive-compulsive behavior problems involve no chemicals. Given this fact, alternative viewpoints and treatment methods may help you step forward and seek the help that you desire.

One Might Legitimately Ask:
Just why must we insist that our unwanted habits take on the obtuse label “addiction”? Is it necessary for you refer to youself as an addict or alcoholic? Must we insist that you label myself an addict? Are truly powerless over your impulses and compulsive behaviors? Is the notion of a so-called disease process useful in solving your challent? Must we focus on “addictive” terms that identify us with some sort of pathology? Are you really to be considered sick and mentally ill?

Is It Not More Productive to Conclude:
Perhaps I am simply “stuck” with a really strong, repetitive, and unwanted habit. I have become behaviorally “trapped” and I now have recognized my need to learn how to behave differently!

The Process Learning Model of Addiction:
Skills Based Cognitive and Behavioral Therapy in Seattle

Are You Really an Addict or Alcoholic?
Alternative Terms and Alternative Treatments

Alternatives to Traditional “Rehabilitation” Treatment Programs in Seattle
Some of the more common disorders relevant to this diagnostic category include:

Impulsive Sexual Behaviors:
“Sex Addiction” may involve habitual promiscuity, compulsive masturbation, compulsive use of phone sex lines, cyber sex, chat rooms, or internet pornography. “Pornography addiction” involves an unwanted over-reliance or dependence on engaging in various forms of sexually related conduct.

Compulsive Shopping, Casino Gambling, Internet Games:
Compulsive Spending or oniomania , is an impulsive behavior that bears many similarities to kleptomania. There is substantial evidence of “co-morbidity” with other mood and anxiety disorders. Such compulsive shopping or “shopping addiction” like “gambling addiction” represents compulsive conduct that is routinely followed by subsequent remorse and regret. (Ades 1997). Mood regulation seems to be a major determinant of the motivation to engage in impulsive spending (Faber, 1992, O’Guinn & Faber, 1989). Frequently, people find their experience of shopping and acquiring new things to be exciting and mood-enhancing. However, just as with kleptomania, there is frequently a sense of remorse after engaging in such impulsive actions. There is evidence that treatment with serotonin reuptake inhibitors SSRI and other antidepressant medications may be helpful in alleviating the problem (McElroy, Satlin, Pope, Keck and Hudson, 1991).

Self-Mutilation and Self Cutting:
While this behavior can be present in a broad range of psychiatric disorders, such behavior is frequently associated with Borderline Personality Disorder. Such impulsive behavior is diagnosed as an Impulse Control Disorder, NOS (not otherwise specified) and refers to the actions of individuals who engage in self-harm by acting out impulses to episodically cut, scrape, or burn their skin.

The behavior routinely begins in early adolescence and becomes a habitual means of coping with internal emotional distress. Between the episodes of self-harm, the individual may report periods of calmness and stable functioning. It is noteworthy that eating disorders, alcoholism, and substance abuse or kleptomania may also accompany the clinical picture.

As with other disorders of this type, those who self-mutilate routinely report experiencing extreme distress or tension immediately before engaging in self-harm, followed by a perceived sense of relief or pleasure.

Behavior Problems:
Unwanted Habits Called Process Addictions

• Computer Gaming: Massively Multi-Player Online Role Play Games
• Chat Room and Compulsive Use of Other Internet Technology
• Hoarding and Collecting: Saving Everything Under the Sun
• Criticism and Verbal Abuse or Impulsive Anger or Violence
• Shoplifting “Frotting” and Other Strange High Risk Behaviors

A List of Addiction Treatment and Recovery Centers Near Seattle

Treatment-Centers.Net
A comprehensive listing of drug treatment centers, addiction rehabilitation centers, and alcohol rehab programs and drug treatment center referrals or information about addiction recovery resources. Treatment Centers.Net offers a national database of drug rehab centers and alcohol treatment programs, dual diagnosis hospitals and rehabilitation programs.

If you are concerned about sex addiction, or you are seeking counseling to resolve problems that involve internet pornography, cyber sex, chat room sex, phone sex, or the like — give Dr. Hart a call.

Private Counseling in Person or Via Telephone to Resolve Unwanted Habits:

Change Strategies: Learn Self-Regulation!

Located in the Wallingford District: Seattle Washington

Seattle Drug Counselor: Private Practice
Alcohol Drug Counseling Alternatives

Process Addiction = Non Chemical Addictive Behavior

Behavioral Addiction is Known as Process Addiction