Drug addiction is a progressive disease, but at what point in the progression is it time to get help from drug rehab professionals? When someone drinks alcohol every day, but never gets drunk, or parties and does cocaine or ecstasy every weekend, but never during the week days, are they addicts in need of drug rehab? We often say that there is an addiction problem when life becomes unmanageable in various ways, however addiction is progressive. For some people nothing seems to be unmanageable until suddenly, everything is.

There is no universal scale with which to measure the extent of addiction in everyone who abuses drugs and alcohol, but addiction is a dangerous game to play and no matter what the substance, any abuse is walking a very thin line. It’s tough to figure out who has a problem and who doesn’t. It doesn’t take falling down drunk or multiple drug offenses, or stealing from loved ones to be an addict. All it takes is a dependence - just to feel normal, or to go to sleep for the night. Perhaps, instead of determining addiction as life becoming unmanageable, we should take a look at what is and is not manageable when we don’t drink or do the drugs that normally “get us through” a good night’s sleep or a night out with friends. First, can we deny ourselves that drink or drug and second, has the perceived quality of our life changed in any way without these substances? This is a question that has to be answered on a personal level and hopefully, with vigilance, it can be answered before addiction gets a solid grasp on life and begins to make things unmanageable - making the need for alcohol rehabilitation and drug rehab imminent.