Healthy nutrition is paramount for healthy growth and development. Moreover, a healthy diet’s contribution during addiction recovery cannot be stressed enough. Poor nutrition and addiction go hand in hand. Unfortunately, the habit only stresses the body causing significant damage.
Among the significant addiction and nutrition health-related problems that are common includes:
- Marijuana: Increased appetite is the most significant nutritional challenge associated with marijuana, leading to the user becoming overweight.
- Stimulants: Drugs such as cocaine categorized as stimulants keeps the users awake for long by increasing their energy. This leads to electrolyte imbalance as well as dehydration. The stimulants also reduce the user’s appetite leading to low food intake; hence they become underweight.
- Opiates: Morphine and heroin are among the examples of opiates, and they affect the user’s gastrointestinal organs leading to health conditions including constipation and diarrhea.
- Alcohol: Alcohol affects organs such as the liver and pancreases leading to diseases such as liver cirrhosis, diabetes, seizures, and heart conditions.
During the recovery process, you not only want to shed off the addiction vice but also get back to enjoying an active and healthy life. As such, you need a healthy and energetic body, meaning that proper nutrition is significant. Moreover, proper nutrition helps in combating the withdrawal symptoms that can be daunting to the point of relapsing.
Recovery Stages
The first stage of addiction recovery is detoxification. The stage aims at flushing out the drugs out of your system. As you strive to maintain a drug-free lifestyle during the detoxification process, your body reacts as it is missing the usual dosage. During this stage, you need to replenish the body with enough nutrients to repair the wear and tear caused by the drugs. The process requires energy and mental focus, and with proper nutrition, you can be able to stay focused as the nutrients level in your body plays a vital role in shaping your moods.
After detoxification, the next stage is rehabilitation where you learn how the addiction began as well as how to avoid it in the future. Various therapies are involved during this stage, and one of them is learning proper nutrition to help you lead a healthier life.
Healthy nutrition
With the help of professional dietitians, you will learn how to include a healthy diet in every meal keeping in mind that the addiction phase may have caused health problems. Among the significant benefits of healthy nutrition during recovery include increased energy, improved mood, stronger immune system, and better memory, factors that help you to achieve full recovery. Such nutritional measures allow you to gain maximum recovery and enable you to be ready for the daily taxing activities.
In your quest of addiction recovery, you need a valuable partner who will see you through. That is where rehab centers come in. Unfortunately, finding a suitable rehab may not be a walk in the park. Worry no more, with the help of resources such as https://www.findrehabcenters.org/california/san-luis-obispo/cottage-outpatient-center/, your search is eased. You can weigh varying rehab centers until you get the one that fits your schedule and preferences.
