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AUSTIN (KXAN) – After a year and a half of untreated drug addiction, Anisa Madero spent her 17th birthday in a rehab facility.
A birthday with no cake, gifts, and miles from high school friends may not be the ideal celebration for most. However, Madero was grateful to be able to spend any time in hospital – even on her birthday.
“I wasn’t worried if I would pass my math exam or if my clothes would be ironed for school tomorrow?” Said Madero. “No, my situation was: where should I lay my head at night?”
Today Madero is 20 years old, sober, and a community guest specialist on an adult drug treatment program. Her time in treatment as a teenager played a crucial role in her current sobriety.
“Being in an institution with many women in the same boat in different waters was kind of heartwarming because an addict helps an addict; an alcoholic helps an alcoholic, ”she said.
“If only I would learn [sobriety] now it would be ten times harder, at least ten times harder, ”said Madero.
Despite the positive effects of inpatient treatment centers on Madero and others, few women in the state receive inpatient drug treatment as teenagers.
Over 70 percent of the beds available for adolescents for inpatient drug treatment in Texas are for men. Male teenagers in the state have more than twice as many options for treatment options as women of the same age.
Although addiction rates have historically been higher in men, the estimated 260 bed difference does not reflect current needs for female adolescent drug treatment in the state.
“It isolates the females who want rest. They don’t have that many people to call. Your network is automatically smaller than that of men, ”said Libbey Sanford, program director at University High School, a sober school in Austin.
KXAN obtained the RTC facility data through the Texas Public Information Act from the Texas Health and Human Services Commission. However, following discussions with employees from various RTCs during the reporting process, several corrections were made to the data.
There are only two all-female adolescent RTCs, verses over 13 devoted to adolescent treatment. A key difference in treating men and women with drug problems is length of stay and the severity of addiction once women reach inpatient treatment, said Dr. Hani Talebi, a licensed psychologist working with the Meadows Policy Institute.
“We know that women often stay in RTCs longer than men, and we know that they will come with more symptoms and more acute problems associated with Substance Abuse Disorder (SUD),” said Talebi.
Madero’s first stay at an RTC was six months.
The difficulty girls have in finding treatment has a definite impact once they begin recovering from their addiction. However, it is difficult to quantify the problems of young women with drug addiction in the state – beyond length of stay in RTCs – due to a lack of research, Talebi said.
“I think that limits our ability to make meaningful conclusions about what we see out there,” he said.
The long road to recovery
Unlike boys who can be inpatient in Austin, girls with addiction problems have to drive nearly three hours to Houston for each inpatient treatment.
“Community is so vital to recovery … I think it’s a lot harder to build that when you have to get out of town,” said Sanford.
Austin University High School is accepting referrals from inpatient treatment centers and referring relapsed students to various RTCs.
“Women often have to travel to the home for care,” said Sanford. “It’s harder for parents to get involved, we see success when the whole family is treated and done their own job, and I think that’s more difficult because there are no treatment centers for women.”
Phoenix House, which has an all-male RTC in Austin and a mixed RTC in Dallas, has been hosting teens from 70 to 80 different Texas counties in the last year alone.
“The reason we are seeing this from so many counties is that so few beds have been made available for adolescents with an addiction disorder who have no source of funding or who are financed by government funds,” said Bart. Loewen, CEO of Phoenix House.
The recommendation roadblock
In contrast to adult RTCs, there are very few self-referrals in youth programs. This means that someone has to identify a teenager with a problem and force them to seek treatment. According to Stacey Burns, chief clinical officer at Nexus Recovery in Dallas, referrals for adolescent substance abuse disorders typically come from schools, juvenile justice programs, or parents.
The problem with this referral system stems from the habit of thinking about addiction, Talebi said.
When schools switched online and courts temporarily closed due to COVID-19, two of the three all-female youth RTC programs were closed to needy customers. The Selena House, which Madero visited as a teenager, closed in August 2020.
Residents of the Selena Center are painting a mural in San Antonio. A Selena Center resident admitted that prior to treatment, she sprayed graffiti on the same wall that she was painting with her peers. (Courtesy Selena Center)
“The systems that are in place for admission, screening and identification of diagnostic criteria for admission are usually geared towards male presentation,” said Talebi. “Men who have more acute overt presentations compared to women who tend to be more covert and internalized have an approach to dealing with their distress.”
Loewen sees recommendations for both young men and women. He said most of the boys in the Phoenix House facilities were from the Texas Juvenile Justice Department. It is not so clear where girls are being referred from because it is “just so different,” he added.
“If the boys do something, the consequences are quicker,” said Loewen. “I think by the time our parents and our community deal with female behavior, they will probably be a little further in their usage behavior.”
Sanford noted that many of her students enter alternative high school after leaving a behavioral or mental health program, not addiction-oriented treatment. Your observation may reflect a larger trend towards treating women’s drug use as the cause of an underlying mental illness.
“We miss a lot if we just say, ‘Oh, she’s got depression’ … ‘She’s dealing with this problem or this problem,'” said Talebi. “Part of it is packaged in social norms and expectations.”
Madero completed three inpatient mental health programs during her addiction treatment, separate from any counseling.
The double diagnosis of mental illness and addiction is common, and treating both is important. However, according to Talebi, being dependent on women can only prolong a young woman’s recovery as the cause of another problem.
“Essentially, this is what happens: [females] take longer to get treatment because they are badly rated and examined, ”said Talebi. “By the time they finally get some kind of justifying admission, they are already suffering from acutely psychiatric illnesses.”
“Small second chance”
“I think sometimes you have to be torn out of the environment you are in to get healthy and healthy,” said Sanford.
A common alternative to inpatient treatment for adolescents are outpatient programs in which adolescents are treated during the day but sleep at home.
But these outpatient programs have drawbacks. If a teen was using drugs in their bedroom, returning to that bedroom immediately after the outpatient consultation could potentially result in a quick relapse, Sanford said.
“There are so many triggers that we are not aware of, and I think if a child cannot get well on an (intensive outpatient program), I think they need shelter to escape the current environment.” Pure ” said Sanford.
For Madero, being able to receive treatment around the clock and outside of her home was critical to her sobriety. However, teenage female RTCs continue to struggle with referrals, making it less likely that women like Madero will find treatment sooner.
“Some girls, like me, just need that little second chance, that little nudge. We didn’t grow up right, ”said Madero.
Madero had access to treatment at the now-closed Selena House in San Antonio. She credited the center for keeping her off the street and even staying alive. Today, girls in central Texas have no local treatment options.
“The Selena Center has shown me a positive outcome in life,” said Madero. “They showed me how to live life instead of just trying to survive life every day.”
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https://www.kxan.com/investigations/adolescent-females-face-multiple-barriers-to-drug-treatment-in-texas/
