What Is The Best Recipe For Successful Addiction Recovery?

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Not all alcoholism rehab stories are success stories. For most people, it means having to deal with a lot of emotional turmoil within the family, having a stranger pull out a loved one you can no longer control, and having your hopes up once that loved one is released back into your care, only to get disappointed again because of relapses. Many blame the methodology of some alcohol rehab and detox centers. While this may be true to some degree, there are other factors too that determine how successful a program can be; for example, if the treatment program is gender specific, i.e., women’s or men’s addiction treatment.

Willingness to receive help

Alcohol is an addictive substance. To some degree, the alcohol content in a person’s body will make him/her crave more. However, it is not the only factor that comes into play. Many addicted individuals are also triggered by alcohol abuse because of psychological problems. If s/he still sees alcohol as a way to escape from these problems, no type of treatment would work.

Since alcoholism is also a psychological condition, rehab for alcoholism is only successful if the patient recognizes that she or she needs help. The strongest enemy of any rehab program is the resistance of the addicted patient. This wall of resistance needs to be broken down first before the patient’s recovery can progress.

Support from the family

Patients who have just completed their inpatient rehab for alcoholism will be released back to their old environment. They may receive outpatient support (in the form of group counseling sessions), but the ones who will be affecting recovering patients the most once they are back in the real world are their families. Some rehabilitation programs forget to factor in the role of the family in this entire process. Because of this, recovering alcoholics suffer from relapses.

This roots in the misconception that patients who have been released from rehabilitation centers are already strong enough to resist addiction on their own. This is not true. The environment inside the rehabilitation is controlled and ideal for recovery. Once the patients are released to their old environments, they are exposed to the old addiction triggers. Unless the family understands and supports the recovering patient’s needs for recovery, there is always the danger that the patient will regress.

How can families support recovering alcoholics? During the first few days of the release, patients should not be exposed to alcoholic beverages. This means that the house needs to be free from any alcoholic drinks, which may tempt the patient back into addiction. The family should also protect the recovering patient from possible peer pressure. If any stressors in the home or at work are triggering the addiction, family members should help patients cope with them better.

The family should heal too

Effective alcoholism rehab programs also consider how addiction has affected other family members. They offer to counsel those who may need help after a harrowing experience. Before the patient is released back into the family’s care, it is important that all the family members know his/her needs. They cannot be wholly supportive if they are wounded from experiencing themselves.

If they hold any grudges against the recovering patient for failing to live a normal life, this has to be dealt with before the patient goes out of the rehabilitation center. During the outpatient treatments, sober family members will have to be emotionally strong because the recovering patient will be drawing from this collective strength to get better.

Importance of Overcoming Eating Disorders for a Happy Life

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Eating disorders are mental disorders with a serious debilitating impact on health, productivity, and relationships. Almost 20 million women and 10 million men in the United States suffer from a clinical eating disorder at one point in their life, including anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, binge eating disorder, or an Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified (EDNOS).

A major contributor to the development of anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa is body dissatisfaction, where people tend to judge their bodies according to certain parameters. They are more concerned about flaunting a flawless look and could go to any extent to achieve this. An eating disorder is categorized as a mental illness because of the following reasons:

  • Restricting food intake, binging, and purging are associated with changes in the brain structure, metabolism, and neurochemistry, and these factors make it exceedingly difficult to change the behavioral patterns of individuals with eating disorders.
  • Eating disorders are linked to cognitive and emotional impairment that can affect the ability to carry out day-to-day activities.
  • Such disorders are life-threatening illnesses that pave the way for numerous medical complications to take root.

Important Facts About Eating Disorders

  • Eating disorders are serious mental health conditions. Such disorders are bio-psychosocial diseases that can seriously impact one’s health, productivity, and relationship. They are real, complex mental conditions that can pose a significant threat to life if it gets out of hand.
  • They are not women-specific disorders. Men and women both have insecurities about the way they look, which can contribute to the development of an eating disorder, although more women than men are afflicted with eating disorders.
  • They can affect all aspects of life. An eating disorder can ruin one’s life. It can impact the relationships with family members, friends, and coworkers. It can also lower one’s performance in education and at work. Individuals with eating disorders can experience their thoughts, emotions, attitudes, and behaviors to be revolving only around their weight and food.
  • Individuals with such disorders cannot just get over it. One cannot simply choose to eat right to cure an eating disorder. Such disorders affect people’s perceptions regarding their body image that tend to dictate their habits and behavior, and these aspects cannot change overnight. Even the treatment for eating disorders concentrates on altering one’s thoughts and behaviors over the course of time.
  • Eating is more sophisticated for individuals with eating disorders. Such individuals tend to scrutinize the type of food they eat and how they consume it. Eating less portion of food can take even longer than those without any eating disorders because they introspect how the food will affect their figure. Sometimes, such thoughts can be overwhelming.
  • They are life-threatening problems. Mortality rates for anorexia nervosa are the highest among any psychiatric disorder. It is 12 times higher than all the causes of death for females aged between 15 and 24 years.

The line of treatment for eating disorders depends on the patient’s bio-psychosocial assessment. Care can be provided in specialized health care facilities under the supervision of experts like therapists, dieticians, psychiatrists, and primary care physicians. Eating disorders can impact various aspects of one’s life and can make people susceptible to other physical health conditions, so you should not delay the treatment, or things can worsen with time.

Does The Second Round Of Parenthood Raise Mental Health Issues?

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Due to a number of factors, the job of raising children is increasingly being passed onto grandparents. Reasons like long working hours, distant commutes across multiple locations, becoming a parent at a young age, incarceration, and death of a parent are making it difficult for parents to devote enough time to their children. Then there are those children whose parents suffer from substance use disorders (SUDs) and mental illnesses and are undergoing recovery. All these reasons contribute to grandparents actively taking up the responsibility of looking after their grandchildren.

This is what is going on in hundreds of households in the US. The grandparents have no problem raising their grandchildren. However, this has led to the emergence of a new problem – mental health disorders. It has been noted that while a grandparent makes the transition from the grandparent to becoming a parent again, they face challenging situations which may make them susceptible to developing mental health problems.

Taking care of grandchildren can cause depression. Oftentimes, grandparents report getting stressed out because of the financial stress and inaccessibility to support services. A majority of these grandparents are nearing retirement or are already retired and are thus, living on limited incomes. In such a scenario, when a grandchild enters the household, the cost of living escalates, especially if the grandchild has special needs.

Grandparents taking care of grandchildren have to choose between their families and jobs. Sometimes, the retired ones have to return to work to make ends meet. On the other hand, some of them working outside the home have to quit their jobs because the cost of child care is too high. Such shifts can cause stress leading to depression.

A positive development in such a scenario is the establishment and availability of free programs exclusively for grandparents dealing with mental health disorders. A mental health worker from one such program center said that it becomes disturbing and demanding for a grandparent to raise a child and go through the process of parenthood again. He shared a story of a woman in her late 50s who was raising her grandson single-handedly. While anger fits in children are common, it reminded her of her abusive husband and the trauma she had to suffer when she was in the relationship. However, timely counseling and guidance helped her overcome the trauma and also helped her deal with the anger fits in her grandson.

The golden years of life sometimes become quite lonely. Experts urge grandparents to use this as an opportunity to connect with their grandchildren and children. Nothing sounds more melodious than the laughter of children. They also advise older people to seek help for any mental health problem they are facing, adding that there is nothing to be embarrassed about.

If you or your loved one is experiencing any symptoms of an underlying mental disorder, you can seek help from a professional facility and speak to an expert who can guide you with information on a wide range of mental health treatment centers offering evidence-based treatment programs customized to suit the patient’s requirements. You can also have a chat online with a representative to seek advice on the best residential mental health treatment options.

What are the Personalities Types and Tendency to Addictions?

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The addictive personality is a kind of psychological trait that predisposes an individual to addiction. Various studies have shown that there are definite implications in the brain that contribute to addiction. Some people are more prone to addictions as compared to others, but it’s an issue under debate.

Additive personalities are persons that crave a series of addictions, i.e., drugs, alcohol, sex, gambling, etc. A person suffering from an addictive personality is usually strung out most time since his cravings are more extreme so than that of common addicts.

Addiction makes a person unable to stop the intake of that thing even though he is aware of its harmful effects, or maybe he already being the sufferer of it.

Additive personality types are commonly known as ENNEAGRAM, which has variants of the personality types, i.e., there is more than one type. While this is one of the controversial diagnoses, it is gaining ground as a subject to study. The diagnosis is generally claimed to be linked with the abuse of substances, including alcohol, drugs, etc.

Some people believe that the predisposition to addiction is just like a combination of biological, psychological, and environmental factors. As happens with other issues of psychology and behavior, the distinct combinations have their different characteristics.

Addictive personalities are affected by the gender basis is another issue as for some, the male gender is more disposable to the addictions as compared to their female counterparts, but the reason behind these can be set to their social exposure as well financial and social accountability.

Though age factor does play a big role, as young people are more prone to addictions, this can also be laid behind as all depends on the check the parents or the person himself has on his own personality and the acts. This may happen as the culprits can easily influence youngsters.

Dependency is the common element that leads a person to addiction. When a person is addicted or else dependent, they will often rely on influences to support their suffering. When a person lacks compartments of their person, they often fall into the dependency stage. If a person cannot be alone or learn to live with themselves, they often resort to dependency, which in turn leads them in the wrong direction, including addictions.

One category of Addictive personality is known as ‘Reformer.’ Though, in view of some scholars, this makes no sense since they find that this is merely another type of personality in the world. The reformers at the first level of addiction claimed to be discriminating and wise. The person sees things in a realistic light and is very prone to making the truths known to others. That is, he believes and tries to show his good wisdom to others.

Addictive personality is complex since the nine groups of personalities have qualities that are marked as humane. Some of the qualities include the helper, reformer, etc., and these types focus on consideration, caring, truth, etc. The peacemaker is one of the addictive personalities. This sounds ludicrous, especially when you consider that this person is agreeable, easygoing, receptive, complacent, reassuring, etc.

The challenger would most likely be fitting in the additional category since this type is dominating, powerful, willful, confronting, etc. Anyone with dominating personality often is dependent on others in a different light, i.e., depending on others for a source to control. These types often fear being injured by others or else controlled.

Is Impulsive Behavior a Risk Factor in Food Addiction?

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Studies suggest that individuals who struggle with eating disorders have a higher probability of experiencing impulsive behavior than healthy people, such as speaking out of line and regretting afterward. This also goes for starting an activity that they will later regret doing. The question of whether or not the impulsive behavior began before the onset of the eating disorder is still not answered or clear. There are some theories saying that the overall impulsive behavior comes about through the eating disorder of food addiction. Eating disorders are divided into three classes:

  1. Anorexia nervosa
  2. Bulimia nervosa
  3. Binge eating, which is referred to as compulsive eating or overeating.

According to the experimental research, subjects who more impulsive are more prone to rapidly start being eating. They have less control over their behavior, and display heightened cravings. And of course, people that are considered less impulsive show that they can control their overall impulsive behavior, and do not display abnormal eating behaviors.

These findings of various pieces of research are crucial in understanding not only eating disorders, but also, impulsive behavior in total. It seems that someone’s personality or ability to control their impulses is influenced by the individual’s eating habits. It deals with the brain’s ability to control their actions, even though the consequences are clearly visible. The impulsive subjects in studies show more activity in the area of the brain that deals with reward evaluation and impulsive behavior. The science behind human behavior is often found in the brain, where activity, also known as “neurological activity,” due to the fact that decision-making abilities and impulsivity are immediate effects of brain activity.

Genetics can also play a role because impulsivity can be a family trait, which are sometimes associated with so-called addictive personalities. It is important to remember that not everyone’s brain works exactly the same as the next person, so personality traits vary in accordance to infinite factors, such as events witnessed in life, observational learning, IQ differences, and how they deal with different substances, including food.

The studies show that impulsive behavior can be a risk factor in the development of food addiction or other eating disorders. Those who display such behavior should be extra careful not to participate in activity that could possibly lead to obsessions, cravings, or uncontrollable urges, such as eating, drinking, using drugs, watching porn, or gambling. If the person has this kind of disposition, then it is important that they make their chioces appropriately.

If you see the sign of suffering from food addiction, you need to go for the treatment immediately, or it will start cause other physical issue as well. Food addiction is a disease that ruins your body gradually. This disease takes over your life and can harm the people closest to you and, of coure, yourself. Literally, you can feel it overpowering you, which indicates the time to break it. You can find help in this regard at food addiction treatment centers that can give you a treatment plan that suits your medical and psychological requirements. Treatment is critical to the health of your mind and body.

How do we develop Food Addiction?

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It’s a fact of our human chemistry that we must consume food, or we’ll die. So, how can someone develop food addiction? And if we are addicted and decide to find treatment, then how do we become sober from food? Indeed, it is a bizarre notion.

First, food addicts don’t stop eating. The objective of recovery from a food addiction is to eat without guilt, without obsessive and compulsive behaviors, and to live without thinking about food every waking minute. There is clearly a difference between eating food and being obsessed with eating food. Eating a bowl of ice cream at 2 o’clock in the morning doesn’t mean you have an addiction to food. Eating when you’re not really hungry, however, could be an indication that you might have a problem. Likewise, if you feel guilt when you eat, if you hide food you’re eating, or if you get emotional relief from eating certain foods, then there’s a strong indication of food addiction in your behavior.

To determine your real pattern of eating, begin by keeping a diary. So, you record what, when, and the amount you eat, and if you were hungry, bored, or unable to stop yourself from eating. Using a piece of graph paper, simply place the times on the left and the dates across the top. Next, develop a code for your reasons for eating, and maybe even your favorite foods, so you don’t have to write as much. Enter everything you eat, which means you’ll need to keep it with you when you go out. Keep the diary for 2-4 weeks, and then chart the data. You’ll see if there is a pattern, and from that pattern, you’ll be able to determine your habits.

If you find that you are sluggish from overeating on a regular basis, if you suffer anxiety when you try to avoid certain foods, if you become agitated when you can’t eat particular food, or if your eating habits interfere with your ability to function normally in a job, home, school, or other relationships, then you should consider yourself in need of professional addiction treatment.

But how does a food addiction differ from alcohol or drug addiction? In many ways it doesn’t. It can be as dangerous as heroin or cocaine. Your heart races. Your thoughts are about your next bite. Unhealthy foods target the same receptors as drugs, alcohol, and cigarettes. The chances are that you’ll react like a substance abuser and need treatment.

You can’t do it alone, any more than you can break a drug habit or alcoholism by yourself. Like drug and alcohol addiction, you may need to hit your own bottom before you seek real help. You don’t see what food is doing to your life, and you are killing yourself slowly.

Many people are overweight because they overeat. They don’t feel out of control. But a food addict can’t stop thinking about food. Working a 12 Step program, you can address your addiction in a safe, judgment-free environment with others who understand your problem because they share it as well. But until you’re ready to stop the insanity, you’ll be busy changing nothing and denying what everyone else sees. So, what is the first step?

Some people find checking into an addiction rehab that specializes in food addictions as well is a great way to start. If you’re not ready for that, you can start by throwing away all the junk food in your house. In fact, bag it and take it to a dumpster at least 10 miles from home. The reason is that many food addicts will go so far as to dig through the garbage to reclaim their lost food. Begin a structured regiment of walking, exercise, or writing. The point is to do something that will help you refocus your attention on something other than food. Find a meeting of OA, Overeaters Anonymous. If you find you’re struggling, rethink a rehab. Once you decide to work on your food addiction, you can find calm and peace without feeding your addiction.

What is a Relapse Prevention Plan?

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The first stages of an addiction relapse happen long before the drugs and drinks again enter the body. It starts when the addict returns to their old ways of thinking and coping. It may be weeks or even months later before the addict actually uses it again. It means that there is almost always time for successful relapse prevention. Thus, a relapse prevention plan is a part of a good addiction treatment program.

Relapse prevention includes both planning and a commitment to following that plan. Since there are numerous warning signs before a relapse occurs, a key part of a relapse prevention plan is being honest with yourself about what events might trigger it and determining how to respond ahead of time.

Going over potential relapse triggers and the appropriate response is something that should include those who are aiding the addict’s recovery effort, like a counselor or sponsor in a 12-step program. Successful recovery requires the help of others, and relapse prevention is perhaps the best example of that.

Lots of things can trigger a relapse, like a divorce or the death of a loved one. Oftentimes, it is more subtle things that work to bring on a relapse, like anxiety or anger, among others. These things grow more powerful if they are left unaddressed and can lead to exhaustion, which can prompt the desire to escape, leading to thoughts about using drugs or alcohol again.

The addicts need to realize that they caused this upon themselves. Blaming others will not work even if you do it for your whole life. You think that your problem is drugs or alcohol consumption, but the actual problem is the whole way of thinking.

One may think that why relapse prevention is necessary when one can enter the addiction treatment again after the relapse. Theoretically talking, yes, it is so possible, but there are plenty of addicts who relapse, and then they never find their way back into sobriety. The journey from addiction to recovery has often been described as a trip to hell and back. Once been to hell, no one would want to take a trip back, so why to take the risk when you can stay safe.

The relapse prevention plan involves those around the addict, including the sponsor and counselors and the addict’s family members. A supportive family can make a big difference between the phase of addiction recovery and relapse. Ultimately, recovery is the addict’s responsibility, but family members who seek their own counseling or attend 12-step groups like Al-Anon for friends and family of problem drinkers can learn how to best help the addict stay clean and sober.

Also, it is not enough to just identify possible relapse triggers. The addict must also alter how he or she responds to those relapse triggers. For instance, an alcoholic can avoid bars or parties that trigger the desire to drink again. If work-related stress is a relapse trigger, you can learn how to say no to extra projects, limit your total workweek to your standard hours, meditate and perform other relaxation exercises.

One most important step is to ask for help when you need it. You may feel upset about using drugs or alcohol again, but don’t let yourself become bogged down in guilt or self-pity. Lots of recovering addicts relapse at one point. The goal of recovery is progress, not perfection.

The Importance of Natural Detox Drinks

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Detox is a common topic regarding weight loss, but it is not limited to it. Detox for addiction treatment is, in fact, the very first step of the treatment process. Detoxification means you need to trash out the toxins from your body with the help of another medium. The best medium to help you detoxify is water. Water cleans your colon and eliminates unwanted toxins from your body. If your body is detoxed properly, you will easily get rid of many diseases. There are many diseases caused by toxins, and one of them is obesity. Thus, obese people need to detoxify their bodies since the presence of toxins is one of the major contributors to fat.

To make sure you detoxify successfully, you need a medium to help you. Besides plain water, there are other ways that help you eliminate toxins, but you cannot escape from the liquid medium, and it mainly includes detox drinks.

Detox drinks are available in a variety. Some are in tea form, and some are in fruit juice. No matter what, they all detoxify well. Detox drinks can be natural or chemical. Natural drinks contain organic ingredients, whereas chemical detox drinks are formulated with chemical formulas. So, you have options to go for either natural or chemical detox drinks. It is better to go for natural detox drinks because they have almost no health risk involved when compared with chemically formed detox drinks.

These drinks are made from different recipes. Commercial detox drinks are kept inside glass storage and sold by a number of brands in beautiful packaging. They are believed to be consisting of high fiber, which is good for detox. These fibers enable the unwanted particles and toxins to go out from your body. Once the toxins have been flushed out of your body, your hut will be cleaned, and it will also help in losing weight. In fact, this is the purpose of taking these commercial detox drinks. Detox fruit juices also contain specific features that help in eliminating toxins. However, not all of them are beneficial since some detox drinks may contain high sugar, which is not good for dieterss.

Natural detox drinks are much better than commercial detox drinks. They are easy to prepare and contain a high nutritional value with healthy ingredients. Also, the ingredients are in organic form. Some good natural detox drinks include papaya lime juice, cucumber dragon fruit juice, and banana kiwi juice. You can see that these drinks consist of natural ingredients. They also provide other vitamins and nutrients that are good for your body. Detox drinks like cucumber lime juice provide vitamin C and B for your body while helping you cleanse your body from the inside.

When compared to commercial ones, natural recipes are much more cost-effective too. You spend less to get the same result. In fact, the result you will get might be better. Also, they contain no to negligible health risks. Within a few simple steps, you can get your delicious and nutritious detox drinks.

The Rising Menace of American Addiction to Processed Foods

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Processed foods laced with copious amounts of taste-boosters like salt and sugar and artificial flavoring actually create what is tantamount to an addiction inside the human brain, and the companies who sell these items know the science better than anyone and have been perfectly content to exploit it for their own financial benefit.

People generally use processed foods because they are fast and convenient and taste delicious, and when these foods have been purposely engineered to produce physiological cravings that will keep consumers coming back again and again, junk food preferences can turn very quickly into powerful compulsions where addiction treatment can be a must-have.

The steady expansion of the American waistline is a testament to how effective the product optimization strategies of the food companies have been, and given the fact that the dangers of eating junk food have been widely publicized for decades with no apparent effect on our collective eating habits, it is hard to draw the conclusion that a lack of willpower is the only reason for our obesity epidemic. In addition to their massively-funded advertising campaigns, the processed food industry spends billions on research and development each and every year, and its food scientists carry out extensive consumer testing to find the perfect combination of ingredients that will make its various offerings delicious and irresistible.

The intentional fostering of addiction is the stock and trade of the processed food industry, who under the banner of “giving the public what they want,” are doing everything they can to create an insatiable desire for the products they sell. It is unfortunate that the human body can so easily become addicted to unhealthy substances that give it an immediate boost of energy or satisfaction—equivalent to the “hit” that drug users refer to—but as long as the processed food companies can continue to reap insane profits from the human tendency to crave what is bad for them, un-nutritious foods will continue to predominate on the shelves of grocery stores everywhere.

Advertising focuses on attracting customers to these products at an early age. Cartoon characters are designed to get children excited about these sugar-laden products, and if you watch Saturday morning cartoons, you will understand why mother’s often feel pressured to fill the grocery cart with these unhealthy foods. Some even believe it’s time to treat food companies the way we treat big tobacco. The public grew tired of Joe Camel marketing cigarettes to children.

We can argue about whether or not addictions to processed junk foods are as strong or as firmly entrenched as addictions to drugs or alcohol. But even in the latter case, taking personal responsibility will always be the decisive factor—no matter what unhealthy product or substance a person has become dependent upon or addicted to, he or she must take the initiative to break that addiction, and he or she must be willing to see that commitment through to the end regardless of how difficult things become.

The convenience and addictive deliciousness of processed foods have helped the industry that manufactures them become one of the world’s most profitable. Nevertheless, a return to a healthier diet for the American people could be in the cards if we all make a firm decision to begin taking better care of our bodies, even if it means giving up foods we have come to love and desire. The cravings that these foods create when we consume them may be hard to resist, but if our determination to take control of our diets and our health is strong and immovable, we are undoubtedly capable of beating our junk food addiction. Just like any other kind of addict, junk food junkies can recover from their compulsions if their will is strong enough to make it happen.

Is REM Sleep Critical for Maintaining Emotional Health?

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Good health and overall wellness of the body pertaining to all aspects, i.e., mental, physical and psychological, are desired by everybody. However, not all people take enough measures and precautions to make sure all the dimensions of wellness. Among these dimensions, one is our rapid eye movement (REM) sleep patterns.

Maintaining adequate sleep levels is a foundation of good health, along with good nutrition and regular exercise. Whether sleep is sacrificed for work or pleasure, the effects are quickly felt in the form of low energy and irritability. Studies suggest that a lack of sleep may contribute to mental health problems, specifically symptoms connected with anxiety disorders like post-traumatic stress disorder, panic attacks, and overall dimension of wellness.

Researchers say that cells stimulated during rapid eye movement (REM) sleep play a critical role in the processing of emotional memory. While non-REM sleep is critical for physical health, playing an important part in the repairing of tissue and the bolstering of the immune system, among other repair and maintenance functions, rapid eye movement sleep is believed to be central to emotional and mental health and wellness.

Typically, dreaming occurs while in REM sleep, and the brain is more active when compared with non-REM sleep. REM sleep is also associated with sporadic changes in heart rate, respiration, and body temperature. In addition, rapid eye movement sleep activates the phasic pontine waves (P-waves) in the brain. The P-waves react to groups of cells that are associated with the neurotransmitter glutamate.

Also, REM sleep critical for recovery after a traumatic experience. The researchers base their work on the understanding that sleep plays a critical part in regulating emotions following a traumatic experience. When sleep problems are persistent, they are a predictor of anxiety disorders. One hallmark of anxiety disorders is the repeated experience of frightening memories that the individual cannot control.

The current preferred treatment for these fears is the use of exposure therapy, in which patients are coached through re-exposure to the frightening experience, with the goal of replacing the frightening memory with a different memory that competes with the frightening memory when that cue is re-encountered.

Adequate sleep is a prerequisite for the use of exposure therapy. Sleep on its own does not result in a successful treatment. Studies are aimed at determining which parts of the sleep cycle are critical in achieving success with exposure therapy. The researchers have used contextual fear extinction therapy to eliminate the conditioned fear so that the brain mechanisms could be measured for their role in exposure therapy. The findings of one study show that the introduction of fear-extinction training resulted in an increased level of rapid eye movement sleep. However, only 57% of the participants were able to retain the fear extinction past a 24-hour period. In the other 43% of participants, there was an absence of phasic P-wave activity, indicating that the fear-extinction memory was not retained, and they re-experienced the fear. The study’s findings highlight the critical role that the brain stem plays in the regulation of emotional memory.