Let’s face it sometimes when you are in throes of an active addiction you need help. There is absolutely no shame in that as drugs can (should that be will) take just about anyone down. So, if you find yourself struggling and are looking for a place to turn I’m going to share some of my own personal experiences about where to get help.

Doing drugs is a tough business. Sure, it’s all fun and games at first. But, in time, it becomes a lot less fun and a lot more of a nightmare. There were times towards the end of my using days that I would actively hope that the cops would bust in arrest me. I was that miserable. I just needed something to happen, an event, that would allow me to break out of the lifestyle that was destroying me. I’ve been there. I get it.

So, there are a couple of options for those seeking drug addiction help. There is the most pressing, immediate need to get you off of drugs safely and then the more long term goal to provide you with an environment that supports your recovery. In my opinion, the best option to accomplish both goals is to check yourself into a drug rehab center. The reason that I can recommend rehab so wholeheartedly is because rehab will both get you off of drugs safely and with minimal discomfort and provide you some sort of framework to help ensure that you don’t wind up back on drugs when you get out.

If you are searching for drug rehab information, a good site to check out is drugfree.org which can provide you with a lot of baseline information about what type of services are available in your area. Drugfree.org can start to give you a glimmer of hope back. And rehab will really come through in this department. When I was in the midst of my active addiction, life seemed hopeless and meaningless. One of the great virtues of rehab is that, in very nearly every case, you are able to re-discover your hope and begin to think that life is worth living again.

I recognize that at this moment, if you are just beginning to look for addiction help, that life is probably not very rosy. I just want to remind you that your current feelings are not facts. No matter how bleak the situation looks right now, you will find that if you give yourself a chance to get some distance from it, gain some perspective, that you will start to see why life is worth living. I don’t suggest that this is likely to happen. Regardless of your present circumstances, life will surely get better if you take the steps to better yourself. Again, this is a guarantee.

But, there are those for whom rehab is simply not an option. Sometimes the cost of treatment is prohibitive and, for whatever reason, they don’t want to head off to a state subsidized rehab. First, of all, I want to reassert that even if you have to go to a free rehab center you chances are better than if you simply try to combat the beast on your own. Rehab separates you from the environment and circumstances that are killing you presently. If it has to be a free rehab, so be it.

Now, for those who simply refuse to enter rehab, I have a couple of suggestions. The first thing I would advise is that, regardless of the consequences, that you separate yourself from the present environment that you find yourself in. The fact of the matter is that your present environment contributes to your addiction. As they say is NA, you need to find new playgrounds and playmates. Therefore, if you can move in with your parents, sibling or sober friend, you should, by all means, do so.

Once you are out of the poisonous environment, you need to start inserting yourself into the solution. You need to attend as many twelve step meetings as possible. Go to AA, NA, CA… whatever. Just start to immerse yourself into the solution and the best way to do that is to surround yourself with people who are not drinking or using. You need to move in to the club. Go to at least three meetings a day. Hit a morning, an evening and a late night. Whatever. Just drink the fellowship like it’s water to a thirsty man. Find a sponsor, go to the coffee shop after the meeting, get as many phone numbers as possible. In time, you can return to your life and start to tie up the many loose ends that you have left behind.

But it will take time. You don’t want to ever return to your old, poisonous environment. You are not going to want to go back anyway. There may be a few friends or a girlfriend that you feel you can just not live without. However, I want to remind you, that you cannot only live without them, you must live without them. It may be a tough pill to swallow, but I know that if you continue to put one foot in front of the other, you will come to agree with me that a new life is the best solution.

If you find yourself in this desperate situation today I would advise you to pack a bag immediately and start looking for a rehab. Don’t worry about finding the perfect treatment center, you can almost just pick the first one that you see online. In many respects, most rehabs are the same anyway. So, don’t spend days or weeks doing research. Pick one. Call them. Drive there. End of story. You will be happy that you did.

People who are considering going into drug rehab for the first time often want to know about the drug rehab cost. Well at Drug Rehab Tales, I cut through the crap and give you straight answers that you can count on. In order to determine the cost of treatment you are going to have to answer some questions about yourself.

The first thing you need to figure out is if you have insurance. If you have insurance the next step is to figure out if the insurance company covers any or all of a stay in a residential inpatient treatment center. In the even that you do not have insurance, you may be thinking about going to an outpatient rehab program to save money. I have to tell you I do not recommend that. While going to an outpatient center will save you some money over an inpatient rehab it will ultimately just cost you more. You see, outpatient rehab doesn’t work, or works very rarely, so to take part in one is just really like throwing your money away since it isn’t going to work anyway. Atleast an inpatient rehab program might work so you’re getting something for your money. An outpatient is probably not going to do much for you. That’s been my experience anyway.

So back to the cost of drug rehab. Let’s say that you do have insurance but it doesn’t cover drug or alcohol rehabs. So what do you do? First, let me say, don’t panic. There are many great rehabs that can work out payment plans with you so that you are not killed all at once with a huge bill that you simply can not pay. So, exactly what is the drug rehab cost? The short answer is that it varies. You can find free drug rehab in many cases, though I don’t really recommend that. Then there are middle rehabs and finally there are high end rehabs.

You can expect to pay anywhere from $4,000 to $15,000 for a 28 day stay at a residential treatment center. Now, on the high end, you can pay up to $100,000 and more for a similar stay and an executive drug rehab or a luxury drug rehab. Now, most of us are not in the position where we can afford to rehab in luxury so I think the vast majority of us are looking at something in the mid-range category.

But drug rehab cost can often vary by the rehab because of the length of stay. There are many places which extend their stay well beyond 28 days. 90 day and longer treatment centers are becoming more popular and you must realize that if you are going to stay in a treatment center for three to six months you have to consider how all those monthly bills are going to start adding up.

In a nutshell that breaks down drug rehab costs. Hopefully you have insurance that will pay for drug and alcohol treatment centers because if you don’t the cost of rehab can get pretty expensive.

It didn’t take too long into my drug-using career for me to realize that I needed help for drug abuse. However, it did take a good bit longer before I actually did anything to help myself. I was too young, too self-sufficient to admit that I needed help for my substance abuse problem. I needed another couple of years of suffering before I was willing to accept help for drug abuse.

I’d always thought that I could dip my toe into the pool of illicit drugs. I, of course, never wanted to become an addict. I thought, maybe I can just use drugs occasionally. I’ll be a weekend warrior, I thought. And for a while I was able to contain my use.

I was slow in some ways to develop full blown addiction symptoms. I didn’t become an addict overnight and I sure wasn’t going to admit my problem that quickly either. For me, it was a slow progression from regular drinking to occasional marijuana abuse to heavy marijuana use to sampling harder drugs. Once I got to the street drugs it actually didn’t take too long for my world to begin to unravel. It was the getting there that took a moment however.

For me it was cocaine that eventually wrought havoc on my life. But it really doesn’t matter what your drug of choice might be. The progression generally follows the same path into greater despair and unmanageability.

Before cocaine I had been able to hide my bad behavior quite well I thought. I was drinking a twelve pack or more of beer a day and smoking marijuana about as often. I could sense, in all the little ways, that things were getting worse. There had been the DWI, the semesters I had to withdraw from college, and of course the frequent nights riddled with embarrassment. But I was just having fun, I thought.

But, if I was to be honest, I needed help for drug abuse before I even started abusing cocaine. I had become the picture of unmanagibility, but I wondered if anyone else had noticed.

Shortly before I first sampled cocaine I went to a meeting with a psychiatrist who himself is a recovering alcoholic/addict. I’d never discussed my binge drinking, pot use or general mismanagement of life with him. Still, he knew something was wrong. He asked me pointed questions about my drug and alcohol use and I answered half honestly.

He was alarmed. He recommended that I check into a treatment center, a drug rehab, for treatment of my addiction. But, it was too soon. I was not ready to listen. I calmly turned down his offer of rehab. I may need to quit, I thought to myself, but I certainly don’t need to check into rehab to do it.

Within a couple of months, while on vacation and at an inebriated moment, I was presented with the chance to try powder cocaine. I had this feeling that things had already gone to hell and I figured what do I have to lose?

As it turns out, I had a lot to lose. Though my drinking and pot use had progressed to the stage that professionals were suggesting that I enter rehab, I was still holding it together pretty well. I had even quit drinking and using altogether on my own for a short stretch. My finances were holding up and, though I felt terrible, I thought that I was managing just fine.

Everything changed when I first tried cocaine. Within a few short months, I had picked up a serious coke habit as well as nearly drained my bank account. I had found new “coke” friends with whom I had little in common and my behavior was becoming very erratic.

Within eight months of that first vacation use, things had completely flown off the handle. I was in a serious financial hole. I had lost weight and was beginning to experience concerning health problems. I was getting desperate.

But I was still too stubborn to accept help for drug abuse.

Looking back it was indescribable. I was miserable, I mean really suffering. However, I held on to my ego with both hands. If I couldn’t do this myself what kind of man was I?

Things got quite a bit worse and finally I called my psychiatrist and asked him about rehab. I felt so humiliated, so defeated. But, I was contemplating suicide I was so miserable. Things had truly hit rock bottom.

With my heart in my throat, I asked my shrink for help for drug abuse. I realized that somewhere, deep in my heart, I wanted to regain my hope for life. I knew that I could find it if I just gave myself a chance, a break from the three day binges, thousand dollar nights, and strip club ridiculousness.

He recommended a top treatment center and I packed a bag and made my way there. I was too defeated at that point to find my hope yet. I was simply hoping that if I could get away from the disaster that I drugs and alcohol had made of my life that I might give myself the chance to want to live to again.

What happened was remarkable. It wasn’t overnight and it wasn’t without work, but I found my hope at that rehab in Texas. Away from the hectic life I had been living, I got a break from the insanity. Within a couple of weeks I came to realize that my life had not always been a panicked hell.

There had been moments of serenity in the past. I had simply lost my way. It was a refreshing feeling that I obtained, learning once again that life can be worth living. I had regained my hope.

Going to rehab, actually turned out to be the best thing I had ever done for myself. It’s funny that I had needed it for several years before I finally got there. I was somewhat upset with myself that I allowed myself to waste so much of my life drowning in misery.

But, for me, it took what it took. I needed to fall down to the point that I was defeated, that I was willing to accept the help that was being offered me. Once, I got to that point I had nothing left to gain from holding onto my pride. I was ready to make a change.