With alcohol abuse, intervention achieves the best results if it is performed early on with the afflicted individual. Unfortunately, this usually doesn’t occur until the alcoholic’s problems have reached crisis level proportions.
It is a situation that exists when it is time to confront the individual based on how their drinking is affecting the family and friends around them.
Family, friends, and even co-workers each inform the alcoholic that their drinking is negatively impacting the lives of those around them and has become a problem that they can no longer tolerate.
Interventions require carefully developed and planned out strategies which usually results in the involvement of an experienced substance abuse counselor or counselors. It is important to remember that getting that individual into some type of treatment program is the goal and sole purpose of the intervention. There are usually counselors who are trained in assisting families and friends with the event available at most treatment centers.
Since the primary objective is to place the target individual in a position where they are most likely to pay attention and listen, interventions normally involve a confrontation that takes place in a controlled environment. There have even been interventions that take place at the alcoholic’s place of employment, usually with the full consent and cooperation of the individual’s employer.
Normally in the past, one of the criteria of the intervention would be to completely surprise the individual. Most recently, new techniques involve a discussion between the alcoholic and members of the “intervention team” wherein they inform them that they are talking to a professional regarding their drinking problem. This will usually transpire within several days of the intervention happening.
Oftentimes, this tends to make the alcoholic realize that the people who he or she considers to be the most important ones in their lives are meeting about his or her drinking problem. The result is that when the intervention occurs, the alcoholic is less likely to feel that they are being ambushed and surrounded by traitors.
