Psychotherapies for Marijuana Use Disorder and Anxiety: CBT and Family Therapies

This article discusses the effectiveness of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and family therapies in treating marijuana use disorder and anxiety. It explains how CBT helps individuals identify triggering patterns and control their actions and thinking procedures, while family therapies involve family members in supporting the individual with the disorder. The article also highlights the positive outcomes of these psychotherapies, such as improving communication and relationship quality among family members and preventing marijuana use from spreading throughout families or generations.

Running head: THERAPIES
THERAPIES
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Psychotherapies can be described as the term that are often applied for the variety of
treatment techniques aiming to help the persons in indentifying and changing troubling emotions
as well as thoughts and behaviors (Volkow et al., 2016). The psychotherapies are seen to take
place with licensed as well as trained mental health care professionals and the clients meeting for
one or with other patients or family members in the group settings. This assignment would be
putting focus on two major therapies like cognitive behavioral therapies as well as family
therapies. Their intervention procedures on marijuana disorder and anxiety issues in clients will
be discussed.
Cognitive behavioral therapy can be defined as the short-term, goal-oriented
psychotherapy treatment that mainly follows a hands-on, practical approach towards problem
solving. The main aim of this therapy is to bring changes in the different patterns of the thinking
or the behaviors that are behind the difficulties of the problems faced by the individuals. This
helps to change the ways that the patients feel. Researchers have conducted various studies and
have found that CBT successfully help in treating a wide range of issues in the life of individuals
(Fortuna et al., 2018). This may range from sleeping difficulties or relationship programs to that
of drug as well as alcohol abuse and even anxiety and depressions. This approach is mainly seen
to work by modifying the attitudes of the people as well as their behaviors. This is done by
focusing on the thoughts as well as the images, beliefs and attitudes that are harbored by the
individuals. Studies opine that the therapists mainly want to investigate how these procedures
relate to the ways a person behaves and to the way of dealing of different emotional problems.
Marijuana use disorder can be defined as the continuous use of cannabis in spite of
clinically significant distress as well as impairment experienced by the individuals. This is
mainly seen to include symptoms including a strong desire of the individuals to take cannabis as

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well as also facing difficulties in controlling the uses. They are seen to be persisting in the use of
the drug despite different harmful consequences. They are seen to ensure a higher priority to
cannabis use than many other activities and obligations. They are also seen to experience
increased tolerance to the different outcomes of the drug. This disorder is associate with negative
outcomes on the quality of lives of the individuals (Velthorst et al., 2015). It is seen to cause
significant impairment in the academic as well as occupational functioning. The individuals are
also seen to develop suspiciousness as well as social withdrawal. Such individuals are also seen
to produce intoxicated behavior as well as impaired driving. They are also seen to develop
impulsivity as well as take up different risk taking activities and show irresponsibility. It also
causes various types of cognitive impairment. It leads to impairment in the motor coordination. It
also causes sensation of slowed time as well as impaired judgment (Palmier et al., 2017). It is
also seen to cause decreased short-term memory as well as impaired leaning as well as apathy. It
also causes psychosis as well as delirium. It also causes emotional distress like anxiety as well as
panic.
One of the positive outcomes that cognitive behavioral therapy brings to the treatment of
marijuana addiction is its emphasis on the long-term maintenance. The drug users of marijuana
are often seen to be subjected into relapse episodes. Therefore, therapists need to teach patients a
new set of attitudes as well as skills on which the clients can rely on the long run. These attitudes
and skills can not only help in the improvement of the sense of self-efficacy in the patients but
can also lead to reduction of different life stressors (Lee, 2015). This might otherwise cause
increase in the risk of the relapse.
The therapists performing the CBT can help the clients to learn the various ways of
delaying and distracting in responding to the cravings. This is mainly done by helping the

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individuals in getting engaged in different constructive activities like that of writing or
journaling, communicating with the supportive people, going for different meetings as well as
other positive means by which the individuals can successfully ride out of the wave of craving
until it dies away. The therapists would be also helping the client in identifying different
dysfunctional ways of thinking and accordingly modifying them through motivational
communication techniques (Blankers et al., 2016). The therapists help the patients to develop a
repertoire of appropriately assertive comments so that the client can effectively turn down
offers of smoking cannabis from peers or some other people. The therapists also help the clients
in learning how to solve different problems effectively and directly rather than trying to drown
out different problems by getting impaired as this only serves in worsening the issues. The
professionals are also seen to help the patients to practice the different behaviors as well as the
attitudes of self-respect that include counteracting beliefs. This would prevent the individuals
from undermining oneself and can prevent them from suffering from hopelessness and
helplessness that are often experienced by the people who want to withdraw the addiction. The
therapists are also seen to help the patient by providing different referrals of healthy social
support. They encourage the individuals in meeting with friends, family, relatives and others
who support sobriety and thereby staying away from those people who would undermine
different therapeutic goals (James et al., 2015). The professionals are also seen to make different
lifestyle changes that would support sobriety as well as self-efficacy. This would include
different healthy lifestyles for the patients helping them to adopt ways to refrain themselves from
cursing as well as raging. They are also helped in engaging in different meaningful hobbies as
well as doing things that promote spirituality and serenity.

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Researchers are of the opinion that cognitive behavioral therapies help patients in
overcoming various drug addictions like marijuana in three effective manners. Firstly, it helps
in dismissing false beliefs and insecurities that lead to substance abuse like that of marijuana.
Secondly, it also helps in providing self-help tools that help in making the moods of the patients
better. Third, it also helps in teaching the patients with effective communication skills. Triggers
play one of the most important roles that make individuals get back into the cravings of the
smoking up marijuana repeatedly. This makes them addicted and keeps them away from
behaving sober (Carr, 2014). Therefore, cognitive behavioral therapies help in recovering
patients by making them successfully deal with triggers in three different ways. The first skill
that is to be developed is effective recognition of the different circumstances that lead to using of
the drug of cannabis. The second skill that needs to be developed is effective avoiding. This
would include removing yourself from different triggering situations whenever possible as well
as appropriate. The third skill is the effective coping. The therapist would use the CBT
techniques for effective addressing as well as alleviating of different emotions as well as
thoughts that leads to marijuana use (Patterson et al., 2018) .
Family therapy can be defined as the form of psychotherapy that helps in the reduction
of the distress as well as the conflicts by the improvement of the systems of interactions between
family members. Family therapists usually try to seek to have all the family members in the
room but it might not always become possible. The main distinguishing features between family
therapy and the individual counseling therapies are the perspectives as well as the framework and
do not really depend on how many people are present in the therapy sessions. Researchers are of
the opinion that this type of counseling mainly helps in viewing problems as residing in the
person (Gurman et al., 2014). Therefore, family therapy is often termed as strength based

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treatments. Positive outcomes of the family therapies mainly include development and
maintenance of healthy boundaries and helps in fostering cohesion as well as communication
among the family members. It also helps in promoting problem solving through understanding of
the family patterns as well as dynamics. It also helps in building empathy as well as
understanding and helps in reduction of the family conflict (Carr, 2014).
Anxiety disorders are seen to run in families. Researchers have noticed that parents with
anxiety are more likely to have children who are also suffering from anxiety. Therefore, it is
often found that family therapy can help in limiting the prevalence of anxiety in the children of
the parents who suffer from anxiety as well. Studies have suggested that with the help of family
therapies, it becomes possible for limiting the children’s susceptibility towards anxiety through
the therapy as well as adjustment in the parenting styles (Gurman et al., 2014). It is also seen that
in case of childhood anxiety disorders, untreated symptoms can linger as well and thereby grow
into anxiety that is more formidable in the adulthood. If the symptoms are not treated well, they
might get worsen and these might interfere with the development of friendships and relationships
within schools as well as in the career success. Moreover, unchecked anxieties have been found
to be linked with substance abuse as well as mental disorders.
Family therapies can be taken as one of the options for providing a safe dialogue about
the anxiety of the client and how it relates to the siblings as well as the parents. Researchers are
also of the opinion that anxiety of the affected member might be caused by the overall family
stress factors that needed to be addressed (Carr, 2014). Therefore, family therapy mainly remains
focused on the effective identification and modification of the family interactions as well as the
dynamics that help in serving to reinforce or worsen the anxiety symptoms of the individuals.
Researchers are of the opinion that when family undergoes the therapy together in anxiety

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treatment, recovery is seen to become a family effort rather than solely the individual’s burden
to bear. Here, the family members are made to learn constructive as well as helpful ways for
interacting with the individual who is suffering from anxiety. This should ensure that they do not
reinforce negative behaviors or worsen any symptoms.
Cognitive behavioral therapy is also used extensively for treatment of anxieties in
different individuals. This talk-therapy mainly helps the individuals suffering from anxiety as
well as the therapists to engage in conversations that are meant for identification as well as
replacement of the negative and unrealistic thinking patterns as well as behaviors. This form
of therapy sets itself apart from other types of talk therapies that anxiety mainly by focusing on
the learning as well as application of the cognitive as well as behavioral therapies for
management of anxiety (Lucasson et al., 2015). Researchers are of the opinion that unlike other
talk therapy that puts more focus on providing support, CBT is more problem focused and
goal-oriented. It is mainly aimed at teaching concrete skills that the individuals with anxiety
can apply in their daily lives. Over the course of the therapy, the individuals learn skills as well
as strategies and techniques for relaxation and for recognizing and reducing their own anxiety
(Selles et al., 2015).
Family therapy studies have shown that treatment approaches that are seen to involve the
family usually have better engagement as well as higher rates of success and even increased after
care participation. Huge number of benefits remains intricately associated with application of
family therapies in marijuana addicted patient treatment as well. Firstly, the interventions
applied by the family therapist assist the marijuana user to develop awareness of their needs and
behaviors (Ebert et al., 2015). Secondly, it also helps in the improvement of the mental and
physical state of the entire family units. Third, it also helps in the improvement of the

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communication styles as well as the relationship quality among the family members. Fourth, it
helps the families in understanding and thereby avoiding enabling behaviors. Fifth, it also helps
families in understanding as well as avoiding enabling behaviors. Sixth, it also helps in
addressing co-dependent behaviors that might be acting as barriers and causing prevention of the
recovery (Hanna, 2018). Seventh, it also helps the family members in learning as well as
understanding the systems that remain in place for supporting and deterring marijuana abuse.
Eight, it also helps in prevention of marijuana use from spreading throughout the families or
down through the different generations.
From the above discussion, it becomes clear that patients might suffer from marijuana use
as well as anxiety disorders that might affect the quality of their lives. Therefore, cognitive
behavioral therapy is one of the most famous evidence based therapies that can help people to
identify the triggering patterns and hence teach them to control their actions and thinking
procedures. These would help them to overcome various symptoms of marijuana use and anxiety
disorders successfully. Many therapists also adopt family based therapies. They involve the
family members and accordingly help them to identify the steps that would help them to support
the individuals with the disorder and act as the best support system to the client. These
psychotherapies would be helping the clients to overcome their disorders successfully and come
back to the normal course of life that were impacted by the disorders.

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