Many people with SUD find their attempts at sobriety are more successful with family therapy. This approach also prevents other family members from developing substance abuse issues. This approach helps many families break generational patterns and improve family dynamics.
Dr. Umhau encourages people to remember that the CRAFT method is not an intervention. Instead of an old-school intervention where the is baclofen addicting family and friends get together and ask the person to enroll in a rehabilitation program, the CRAFT method encourages close significant others (which the program calls CSOs) to reward their loved one when they choose sobriety or show control. Community Reinforcement and Family Training (CRAFT) is intended to help family members of addicts learn how to steer their loved one away from substance abuse.
This area of recovery practice appears poised to host rigorous studies of family member service access and outcomes among families of youth with SUD. Youth independence factors must play a large role in efforts to design strategies for involving family members in all aspects of youth SUD care. To be sure, even within the 15–26 age range, such strategies must account for developmental variation in the interaction between youth independence and expression of SUD risk and protective factors. Family therapy allows for all members of the family unit to be present and active in counseling and intervention. Family therapy may include one-on-one counseling to provide individual insights with the therapist in preparation of all the family members coming together in family therapy.
Substance Abuse Treatment and Family Therapy
Let’s take a closer look at how the CRAFT approach works and how it can benefits families and individuals with substance use disorders. Just as there is no single definition of family, how to force yourself to pee for a drug test there is also no typical family type. Families are quite diverse in organizational patterns and living arrangements. Some families consist of single parents, two parents, or grandparents serving as parents. Many others are intergenerational within the household and include extended family members, such as grandparents, uncles, aunts, cousins, other relatives, and close friends.
In systems theory, the family is a system of parts that is itself embedded in multiple systems—a community, a culture, a nation. Families strive for balance and self-regulate accordingly (Nichols & Davis, 2017). The next sections summarize key characteristics of families from a systems perspective.
Impact of the CRAFT Method
BSFT is based on the theory that unhealthy family dynamics cause adolescent SUD. If you have a family member with a substance use problem, research your options and consider talking to a therapist to help determine which method might be right for your family and situation. CRAFT can be a great choice for many people, but you may find that support groups like Al-Anon and Nar-Anon can also be beneficial.
Family Therapy for Substance Use Disorders and Addiction Recovery
- This type of therapy is used for married or cohabiting couples dealing with substance abuse issues.
- Ariss and Fairbairn (2020) completed a meta-analysis of family-involved treatments that condensed data from 2,115 adolescents and adults across 16 independent trials.
- Sometimes, families give decision-making power to children or to a specific child, allowing the child to control relationships between the two parents, between parents and other siblings, and so forth.
- Family therapy is beneficial to help resolve family issues and maladaptive transgenerational patterns.
This may be especially salient for young adults who are estranged from their families of origin but remain connected with other concerned adults in their family-of-choice circle. Research is needed to evaluate the potential benefits of infusing peer/community and DTC services with family-oriented programming that scaffolds youth to pursue healthy (re)connection with family and (re)investment in familial goals. Bowenian family therapy is ideal for people who do not want family involvement in their treatment and recovery process.
Levels of Family Involvement
People who misuse substances are likely to affect at least a handful of others who have or had some form of relationship with them, such as friends, partners, coworkers, relatives, and members of their communities. Substance use disorders (SUDs) affect not just those with the disorders, but also their families and other individuals who play significant roles in their lives. The extensive dossier of empirical support for involving family members in active treatment for youth SUD is summarized in the Introduction as well as in a plethora of systematic reviews and meta-analyses (e.g., Hogue et al., 2018; Hogue et al., in press; Tanner-Smith et al., 2013). Listen to Greenhouse Treatment Center’s Gary Malone, MD discuss the role of therapy in addiction treatment. Get professional help from an online addiction and mental health counselor from BetterHelp.
As a caution, providers should take stock of functional limitations in telehealth options for those families with unreliable access to required technology platforms. A family is a complex system that attempts to keep equilibrium (or “homeostasis,” in family therapy terms). When substance misuse occurs in the how long does a salvia trip last family, members will try to manage the behavior of the person who is using drugs or alcohol and the consequences of that use for the family. Some may view these responses as unhealthy, enabling, compensatory, or counterproductive, but they serve a purpose— to keep the system operating.
To be fair, SAMHSA’s (2020b) comprehensive roadmap makes extensive recommendations for involving families in SUD treatment. Beyond aspiration, actually transforming SUD systems of care to become relationship-oriented will require greater system-wide attunement to familial relationships and to cultural context characteristics that shape user experiences of SUD services (Kirmayer et al., 2016). It will also require a shift towards relational conceptualizations of problems and solutions, more fluid and flexible roles for youth and CSO, thicker and more complex narratives of youth and family lives, and from “alone” to “together” in SUD treatment.