My friend is turning 50. He has been taking cough medicine every night for years. He takes medicine every day even in the absence of cough. He says that only then can he sleep peacefully. Is this habit dangerous...can he be rescued from it?
Dr. Suba Charles
Psychiatrist Subha Charles from Chennai gives the answer...
Many people have the habit of using cough medicine every day without need. This is definitely a dangerous habit. Due to the anti-allergic properties and the calming and sleep-inducing properties of the drug, we see the habit of using it in many age groups.
This habit can be divided into two types. One is physical dependence. Another is called psychological dependence. Alcoholics are an example of physical dependence.
Cough medicine
This means that people who have been addicted to alcohol for many years will at some point become unable to live without it. That is, when they wake up in the morning, they want to drink alcohol. They drink alcohol and go to work. Without it, they say that their arms and legs tremble and they feel unable to be normal.
The same thing happens with the habit of taking cough medicine. That is, they are used to taking cough medicine every day and at some point, if they do not have it, they will not be able to sleep at all or will experience problems such as delayed sleep.
Psychological dependence is the state of being mentally dependent on a substance. For example, some people may have to go to the hospital frequently and get injections. In fact, they are not malnourished. But they will go to the doctor and ask for it. Doctors who know about them will give them an injection filled with just distilled water without any medicine. The concerned person will be satisfied with that. This is the type of person who fills the bottle with a different flavored liquid instead of cough medicine and is satisfied with drinking it without realizing it.
Just like doing routine things like turning off the stove and locking the house before going to bed after finishing all the household chores, sleeping after drinking cough medicine is a routine for many people.
Cough medicine
Start with half a cap, one cap and gradually increase the dose. At some point some people go to the point where they can't sleep even after drinking a bottle of medicine a day. That is what we refer to as physical dependence. However, for women, such physical dependencies are often not involved. Most people suffer from psychological dependence.
If you forget to take cough medicine with you when you go abroad, you will worry about it for a while. Then they fall asleep without that thought and without the need for it. When they return home and see the usual place where they keep the medicine, they will start taking it again with psychological motivation.
thisg; We need to see what kind of personality addicts have. Accordingly, they can be freed from this habit. For example, ``This medicine has side effects.'' That's why it's not available now. This can be done by instilling a fear like 'this has been banned' and save them from taking that drug.
They can also relocate medicine bottles from where they usually keep cough medicine. You can try to distract them by putting some other things that they like that will soothe their mind in the place where the medicine bottle used to be.
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