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Signs Your Loved One Needs Cocaine Addiction Treatment
As one of the most addictive drugs on the market, cocaine exerts a tremendous strain on brain and body functions over time. If your loved one abuses cocaine on a regular basis, signs of needed cocaine addiction treatment will become glaringly apparent over time.
As with all forms of addiction, signs of cocaine addiction take shape within a person's daily behaviors, emotional demeanor and physical appearance. Considering how powerful cocaine's effects can be, in the absence of needed cocaine addiction treatment, your loved one stands to experience the very worst of addiction's effects in his or her life.
Cocaine's Damaging Effects
The damaging effects of cocaine result from its ability to stimulate dopamine secretion processes in the brain. Dopamine, one of a handful of essential neurotransmitter chemicals, regulates pain and pleasure sensations, and also plays a central role in regulating the brain reward system, according to the University of Maryland.
In effect, much of the cocaine addiction treatment process works to "reset" brain reward system functions back to normal using a behavior-based treatment approach.
Signs of Cocaine Addiction
According to the National Center for Biotechnology Information, cocaine's effects on the brain reward system account for the compulsive drug-using behavior that addiction breeds. Consequently, signs of addiction become most apparent within a person's daily motivations, priorities and behaviors, some of which include:
- Drastic mood swings
- Severe depression episodes
- Paranoia
- Persistent drug cravings
- Drastic weight loss
- Withdrawing from friends and family
- Problems on the job
- Relationship conflicts
- Aggressive and/or violent-prone behavior displays
- Disregard for negative consequences resulting from drug use
The brain also develops an ongoing tolerance for cocaine's effects, so a person has to keep ingesting larger doses in order to experience a "high" effect. These developments tend to give rise to financial problems, and oftentimes legal problems since maintaining ongoing supplies of the drug requires a continuous influx of cash.
The Need for Cocaine Addiction Treatment
Without some form of cocaine addiction treatment help, a person's overall condition will continue to decline to the point where he or she stands to develop serious medical and/or psychological problems along the way. Ultimately, the sooner your loved receives needed treatment help the better his or her chances of making a full recovery.