Women and Substance Use


Book Description

Elizabeth Ettorre offers a clear account of women and substance use in a field which has been resistant to a woman-oriented perspective. The authors of most "addiction studies" view women as stigmatized and marginalized. Ettorre strongly counters this perspective. She focuses specifically on women's use of alcohol, prescribed drugs (specifically minor tranquilizers), heroin, tobacco, and food. Using the term "substance use" rather than "abuse" throughout the text, she directly challenges ideas regarding women in the field of addiction. More significantly, Ettorre deliberately puts forward a feminist perspective rooted in the identity and consciousness of women substance users. In order to expose the major misconception held by both clinicians and researchers in the field--that women substance abusers are a homogeneous group--Ettorre provides separate analyses of the different substances used and abused by women. She emphasizes the types of feminist strategies to use in the substance abuse field which will mobilize women. These strategies, she argues, must become increasingly visible if changes are to occur. Women need to build an alternative creative response which challenges the pervasive dogmatism in the substance abuse field.




Facing Addiction in America


Book Description

All across the United States, individuals, families, communities, and health care systems are struggling to cope with substance use, misuse, and substance use disorders. Substance misuse and substance use disorders have devastating effects, disrupt the future plans of too many young people, and all too often, end lives prematurely and tragically. Substance misuse is a major public health challenge and a priority for our nation to address. The effects of substance use are cumulative and costly for our society, placing burdens on workplaces, the health care system, families, states, and communities. The Report discusses opportunities to bring substance use disorder treatment and mainstream health care systems into alignment so that they can address a person's overall health, rather than a substance misuse or a physical health condition alone or in isolation. It also provides suggestions and recommendations for action that everyone-individuals, families, community leaders, law enforcement, health care professionals, policymakers, and researchers-can take to prevent substance misuse and reduce its consequences.




Counseling Addicted Women


Book Description

The result of the combined efforts of staff at a substance abuse treatment center, this book provides practical, hands-on guidance for working with addicted women. With staff and client training exercises at the end of each chapter, this comprehensive guide places particular emphasis on the women and their special needs and concerns. Special issues and populations addressed include: pregnancy and substance abuse; designing treatment programs; homeless women; and substance abuse in the workplace.







Anxiety and Substance Use Disorders


Book Description

Disorders of anxiety and substance use are, for some reason, rarely treated in an integrated fashion by professionals. This timely volume addresses this glaring omission with dispatches from the frontlines of research and treatment. Thirty-four international experts offer findings, theories, and intervention strategies for this common form of dual disorder, across a range of substances and of anxiety disorders, to give the reader comprehensive knowledge in a practical format.




Woman of Substances


Book Description

A young woman's journey into addiction and treatment. Journalist Jenny Valentish takes a gendered look at drugs and alcohol, using her own story to light the way.







Seeking Safety


Book Description

This manual presents the first empirically studied, integrative treatment approach developed specifically for co-occurring PTSD and substance abuse. For persons with this prevalent and difficult-to-treat dual diagnosis, the most urgent clinical need is to establish safety--to work toward discontinuing substance use, letting go of dangerous relationships, and gaining control over such extreme symptoms as dissociation and self-harm. The manual is divided into 25 specific units or topics, addressing a range of different cognitive, behavioral, and interpersonal domains. Each topic provides highly practical tools and techniques to engage patients in treatment; teach "safe coping skills" that apply to both disorders; and restore ideals that have been lost, including respect, care, protection, and healing. Structured yet flexible, topics can be conducted in any order and in a range of different formats and settings. The volume is designed for maximum ease of use with a large-size format and helpful reproducible therapist sheets and handouts, which purchasers can also download and print at the companion webpage. See also the author's self-help guide Finding Your Best Self, Revised Edition: Recovery from Addiction, Trauma, or Both, an ideal client recommendation.




Women and Alcohol


Book Description

Issues relating to alcohol 'misuse' can only properly be understood within their social and environmental contexts. This research and practice based book explores social models of alcohol misuse to offer a sociological approach to its treatment. Through considering the social meaning of women's alcohol use, the book challenges current policy and practice in the field. It raises concerns about the political role of 'treatment' in making women behave, or to be 'well', and aims to develop a new approach to women's drinking and new ways of aiding recovery, at national and local levels. With contributions from service users, academics and practitioners, this is essential reading for those studying addiction, gender and the social background to alcohol problems.