"Counseling (individual and/or group) and other behavioral therapies are critical components of effective treatment for addiction."

In therapy, patients address issues of motivation, build skills to resist drug use, replace drug-using activities with constructive and rewarding nondrug-using activities, and improve problem-solving abilities. Behavioral therapy also facilitates interpersonal relationships and the individual's ability to function in the family and community and the workplace.

Many newly sober persons mistake what happens in a 12-Step meeting for "therapy". Please be assured that the 12-Steppers are not therapists; they are recovering people who have found a particular road to abstinence through taking those 12 Steps and learning to apply principles out in the world beyond meetings.

Therapy (whether the setting is individual or group) is run by an educated, credentialed individual who may or may not be a recovering person.