Women drug abuse in Europe : Gender identity - Irefrea

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ole of double dependency so typical of the woman heroin addict is conducive to hersubordination to her male and addict companion, who is the one with whom shemaintains this double dependency - on him and on heroin. In principle, codependencyis not a specific phenomenon of women but social and cultural conditionants havedetermined the almost absolute prevalence of this problem in women.Many factors will influence the genesis of codependency. For Bononato (1996), thedevelopment of codependency would have three keys: the family environment where ithas been developed, the educational differences between men and women and thefailure of the affective couple relationship. The maternal figure in the familyenvironment is going to be fundamental. A family with an alcoholic father andcodependent mother transmits this attitude to their children who grow up doublyinfluenced in a negative way (the figure of the father as an addict and that of thecodependent mother). Thus, the woman learns how to relate and, on leaving home, willchoose with excessive remarkable, consciously or unconsciously, a dependentpersonality to develop her own codependent personality.In 1988, Block published a study of 105 girls from 3 to 14 years of age, to verifywhether or not on the commencement of the follow up, personality characteristics andthe family context, would enable prognosis of drug use in adolescence. Their resultsunderline the psychological focus as opposed to the sociological one in the etiology ofdrug dependencies. They also found differences in respect of gender, in the face ofenvironmental factors, women are more vulnerable so that the socio-familycharacteristics have the greatest influence in respect of drug use in adolescents.Quite often, social genesis of addictions is related to an anomalous structure in thefamily of origin or to a distorted family dynamic. The family environment is another ofthe factors which occupies a predominant place, not surprisingly as it is the environmentwhere the addict spend the larger part of his or her infancy and adolescence.There are few doubts about the repercussion of a conflictive family atmosphere onthe psychological development of a person. A broken home, with fighting and loss ofroles is going to cause severe maladjustments in the child’s social relationship. Needleand Doherty published a study in 1990 on the influence of parental divorce and asecond marriage on drug use. They found that divorce has negative effects on maleadolescents but not on the females. However, the father or mother having custody andremarrying influences a higher drug use in girls and a lower use in boys. Althoughhaving said this, the group with the highest drug use is that of adolescents with parentswho separated during their adolescence.In 1992 Zimmer-Höfler and Dobler-Mikola proposed the following hypothesis onthis aspect, ‘The absence of a parent of the same sex is a significant factor in thedevelopment of addiction’. To do so they based their findings on the fact that there is ahigher percentage of male addicts where the father was missing from the broken homethan female addicts where the absence of the mother in the broken home is minimal.31
In 1994, the NIDA published a report on women and drug abuse in which inaddition to drawing attention to essential points for the particular understanding of thewoman addict, states that women who abuse drugs frequently present a low self-esteem,little confidence in themselves and feelings of weakness, loneliness and isolation fromsocial support.We can appreciate that addiction in women may be directly related to determineddisorders which are more frequent or more difficult to diagnose in determined stages ofthe feminine evolutive development.THE DEPENDENCY RELATIONSHIPFocussing on women drug addict, we see that they are to be found at a lowereconomic level than male addicts and this is, normally, a reflection of society ingeneral. The differentiated access to recourses is also reflected in the case of men andwomen addicts and this contributes to creating one more factor of inequality, whichmust be faced by the female addict.Drug use then becomes the principal method of facing these situations. Buckstein(1989) in a work on comorbility between substance abuse and other psychopathologies,pointed out hyperkinesia as a risk factor, principally for the behaviour disordersassociated with it and the relationship between eating behaviour disorders andaddiction, without analysing if this were a result of the personality type of these patientsor of the affective disorders which are generally concomitant with bulimia-anorexia.The physical image is a key factor in the social integration of women and in access tobenefits as, for example, finding work or social success. Coping with her own bodymakes a further demand on the woman, which intensifies her oppressive situation in adifferent way from a man (Bañuelos 1994).Katzman (1991) reviewed all the clinical histories of women hospitalised for opiatedependency in a New York centre, and discovered that prior to the drug abuse, aroundone quarter had previously suffered a bulimia nervosa which, in addition, tended toreappear during detoxification periods. In their opinion, it is possible to establish abiographical sequence in these addict patients: very active adolescents who sporadicallycarry out bulimic behaviours, later take cannabis, increase weight and a persistentbehaviour of inactivity appears. This is followed by the commencement of behavioursto lose weight such as provoking vomiting and abusing laxatives. Subsequently, they goon to using opiates and they rapidly develop dependency, reduction in weight and adrop in their preoccupation with it.Griffin (1989) pointed out that the use of cocaine seems to have more specificreasons for women than for men in whom it only forms part of a wider socialbehaviour. The benzodiazepines, either hypnotics or anxiolitics are fully represented inthe menus of heroin addicts and constitute a very significant clinical and health32
Page 1: Women drug abuse in Europe:gender i
Page 5 and 6: © IREFREA & European CommissionI.S
Page 7 and 8: ORGANIZATIONS AND NATIONAL RESEARCH
Page 10 and 11: INDEXPagePreface(by P. Stocco, A. C
Page 12 and 13: PREFACEThis book presents a series
Page 14 and 15: female exposes herself to the risk
Page 16 and 17: DRUG ADDICTION AND MATERNITYActive
Page 18: devaluation of the daughter is ther
Page 21 and 22: Europe, leads to the situation that
Page 23 and 24: Accordingly, the study was construc
Page 25 and 26: -Dimension of maternity-Legal dimen
Page 28 and 29: CHAPTER 1WOMEN AND DRUG ABUSE. GENE
Page 30 and 31: Thom 1995, Nelson-Zlupko et al, Ett
Page 34 and 35: problem. The use of benzodiazepines
Page 36 and 37: THERAPYThe effectiveness of the dif
Page 38: - Diagnostic criteria and treatment
Page 41 and 42: The sphere of sexuality does not ap
Page 43 and 44: ehaviour of intravenous drug addict
Page 46 and 47: CHAPTER 3GENDER IDENTITY AND DRUG A
Page 48 and 49: of female drug addiction with respe
Page 50 and 51: It has also been noticed that it is
Page 52: even if this should not be neglecte
Page 55 and 56: The analysis of specific experience
Page 57 and 58: diploma and vice-versa a high perce
Page 59 and 60: (11.7%), or due to indifference (10
Page 61 and 62: drugs (9.1%). The same two typologi
Page 63 and 64: month (overall with ample variation
Page 65 and 66: out that the female sex is characte
Page 67 and 68: the school as an institution with t
Page 70 and 71: BEST PRACTICES(*)The aim of this pa
Page 72 and 73: Intervention methods:Network struct
Page 74 and 75: SPAIN1. Treatment centre for drug a
Page 76 and 77: The PIS has four double rooms, two
Page 78 and 79: 6. Comunidad terapéutica femeninaL
Page 80 and 81: Network contacts:Close co-operation
Page 82 and 83:
For whom:Women with babies.Interven
Page 84 and 85:
10. Programme for women with proble
Page 86 and 87:
tel.+49 30 6921782fax.+49 30 695061
Page 88 and 89:
2. Programme for sero-positive drug
Page 90 and 91:
Team:7 social operators of which 2
Page 92:
Therapeutic approach: individual an
Page 96 and 97:
VADEMECUMOne of the main aims of th
Page 98 and 99:
An MMP is seen as contra-indicated
Page 100 and 101:
11) Improving the activity of infor
Page 102:
34) During pregnancy addicted women
Page 106 and 107:
IREFREA:Drug-addiction and gender i
Page 108 and 109:
9) If no, why? (multiple choices)1:
Page 110 and 111:
19) What was the result? (multiple
Page 112 and 113:
• Could you explain the reason of
Page 114 and 115:
38) If your partner used to take dr
Page 116 and 117:
5: danger of diseases ❒ 48.56: ba
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60) Present relationship: (only 1 a
Page 120 and 121:
75) Which were your worries? (multi
Page 122 and 123:
6: drug-addiction ❒ 86.67: prejud
Page 124 and 125:
• How did doctors and the staff b
Page 126 and 127:
LEGAL DIMENSION113) Have you actual
Page 128 and 129:
• Have you ever felt discriminate
Page 130 and 131:
137) How old were you when you real
Page 132 and 133:
BIBLIOGRAPHYAgnoletto V., Cesarani
Page 134 and 135:
Booth, R. et al. (1991) “Intraven
Page 136 and 137:
Cuskey, W (1982) “Female Addictio
Page 138 and 139:
Gatti U., Marugo M. I., Malfatti D.
Page 140 and 141:
Lejeun-E C. (1997) “Prise en char
Page 142 and 143:
Modonutti G.B. (1996) “ Modelli d
Page 144 and 145:
Ravenna M. (1993) Adolescenti e dro
Page 146 and 147:
Swift, W., Copeland, J. Y Hall, W.
Page 150:
I R E F R E AIREFREA is a european
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Women drug abuse in Europe : Gender identity - Irefrea

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