Whatever your situation, if you are in denial, you won’t begin to resolve your problems. Denial has been defined as a set of automatic and unconscious thoughts, feelings, urges, actions and social reactions and there are different levels of denial:

• At the first level, you may just be misinformed and have the wrong information about addiction, you may not realize that you can become dependent on a substance or what the signs are as they relate to you.

• At the second level, you are said to be consciously defensive; there is an internal battle between the addictive thinking which wants you to continue consuming and the sober thinking which wants you to stop consuming.

• At level three of denial, you are unconsciously defensive; you automatically and unconsciously steer your thinking away from any information which acknowledges you are addicted.

• Level four clients are delusional and wholly deny that their substance use is a serious problem in the face of obvious evidence to the contrary.

A vital part of drug and alcohol addiction treatment is the learning of denial management strategies. Here at CASA Recovery, our therapists can help you recognize your denial patterns and teach you healthy coping strategies. You may be delusional about your level of addiction due to brain dysfunction caused by your substance abuse disorder but once you have begun the journey of recovery you will have insight into denial. While learning healthy coping strategies in addiction rehab you will become informed about the role of denial in addiction, learn techniques to help you deal with entrenched thinking patterns and recognize when you are lapsing into old ways.