Gym instead sickroom
REUTLINGEN. Addiction does not move. Many addicts live from day to day, navels off from the outside world. Silke Gogolok them in motion. And to feel her body again - sometimes in the form of muscle soreness: the active center of Psychiatry Südwürttemberg occupational therapist has developed a fitness program for patients of addiction outpatient clinic in Reutlingen. The special feature: Training is not in the hospital's own premises, but in a gym.
The occupational therapist and fitness trainer Silke Gogolok goes with the patient's daily addiction clinic in a normal gym. This not only strengthens the back, but also the psyche.
The idea for the project is not by chance. Silke Gogolok is a trained fitness elliptical machine instructor and worked from 1999 to 2003, major studios. Then she retrained for occupational therapist. Even during training the request by the former medical director came Zwiefalter Clinic Professor Dr. Gerhard Längle whether she could imagine to build a fitness project for addicts. They could. "I thought that was really exciting to combine the new knowledge to the learned."
"Here they come again in the reality of"
Movement therapies, says the 28-year-old, are in the addiction treatment standard. The elaboration of their concept that is unique in Baden-Württemberg, is equal to it in several different points. It combines sport and addiction treatment in its own way. The main difference to conventional projects is the environment: therapist and patient meet in a normal gym, in the specific case »easy sports" in Reutlingen brick path. There they train like everyone else. "Here they come again in the reality of," says Silke Gogolok.
Get out of the self-created shell and into the normality and very gently back into everyday life - these are also the goals of the day hospital in the treatment of all types of addictions. The majority makes from alcohol and drug addiction, as well as drugs or gambling addiction can be a reason for admission to the day hospital. There the patients of 8 hold on until 16.30 clock. There are a variety of offers - from individual or group therapy to relapse prevention or conflict strategies. In the evening we return to familiar surroundings.
Addiction means the loss of structures and decision-making skills, says Silke Gogolok. Just as it is with their fitness program in which the psyche and not the muscle building in the foreground: the patient determine what device they work out whether they get on the stationary bike or elliptical machine and how long they make their perseverance unit. "It's about motivation and about changing something in life," called Silke Gogolok the goal. Participation in the fitness program is of course voluntary.
At the beginning of each training session is a welcome turn. "This is a kind of barometer of what every individual trusts." Then it's on to warm up again ergometer, then to the devices. Finally, perseverance is back on the agenda. The completed stations carry the participants in a plan. "This is a clear structure -. A thing that has a beginning and an end"
Addicts fog to be no longer feel themselves. Sports and exercise help to perceive the body back, says Silke Gogolok. Participants explore the gym from what still is, what resources they have - enormously important achievement. "What is not, they have experienced long enough." This training is a positive connotation, the joy of wearing a lot of movement to stabilize the patient, says occupational therapist. "The feedback at the end, I realize that the mood has generally improved."
"This is a low-threshold supply"
You go to the gym twice a week. The age range of elliptical machine participants ranges from 18 to 65 years. Some do only once, others ten to twelve times - depending on length of stay in the hospital. A "normal" fitness program can not be run through in such a short time, says Silke Gogolok. "This is a low-threshold range, but that's enough of."
She sees herself as an accompanist and impulse generator, which wishes to communicate that all the fun of the sport. "What the patient make out of it, I can not influence" Some have joined in the studio, others are a Nordic walking or gymnastics group have connected -. Thus the concept works.
Therefore, it has now been transferred to the addiction patients are treated on an inpatient in the Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy Reutlingen. And that might not be the end, as well as other groups of patients could benefit from this approach, according to hospital management.
