Meta House

Alcohol and Drug Abuse

AODA treatment services include counseling, therapy, education, relapse prevention, process and goal setting, meditation, and urine screens. Women learn the causes of their substance addiction, while learning new ways to cope. They are empowered with the tools to manage trauma in order to reduce relapses. Meta House does not provide detoxification services; however, it is expected that many women will be admitted immediately after the detoxification.

One one One Counseling/Therapy sessions provide a setting to discuss and understand the most intimate details of each woman's life as it impacts on her substance use and desire to change it is also the opportunity to establish, review, and revise each woman's individual treatment plan, and to evaluate progress and focus on specific individual needs.

Process Groups provide a forum to address and discuss current problems and concerns, consider alternative strategies for coping with day to day challenges of recovery; teach new ways to handle trigger situations; and generate mutual support and a sense of belonging.

Group Counseling/Therapy Sessions provide a safe, confidential forum to encourage the process of introspection and internal change that helps to identify critical events, traumas, and situations from the past that influence current ways of thinking, coping, and relating to others. The implications of physical violence and sexual and emotional abuse are explored in depth, allowing the women to see the connections between their traumatic pasts and their current addictions.

Chemical Dependency Education provides instruction on the ways in which chemical abuse affects the women, their children and their relationships with other adults. The physical and mental health and social and economic consequencesof drug use are addressed.

"Seeking Safety" Treatment Group recognizes the majority of Meta House's clients have faced traumatic life experiences. The program makes the connections between the symptoms of trauma (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and other mental health disorders) and substance abuse/dependence. Teachers clients safe coping skills and techniques to manage trauma.

Smoking Cessation focuses on creating a positive, drug-free clinical setting. Tobacco is treated alongside drugs and alcohol as an addictive substance. Counselors establish treatment plans with clients to cope with potential triggers, cravings, and relapses. Counselors utilize motivational interviewing techniques to help clients explor and seek behavior change (smoking cessation). A smoking cessation group meets weekly and is madatory for smokers in the residential and transitional housing programs and available for clients in the outpatient program.

Mental Health Services

Mental Health Services are often needed for women who abuse substances because they typically suffer from co-occurring mental health disorders (a mental health disorder diagnosis along with a substance abuse disorder diagnosis). Women who abuse or are dependent on substances are very likely to have a history of childhood and adult abuse and trauma, which sometimes results in mental health concerns. With a multi-disciplinary and experienced staff, Meta House is uniquely equipped to support such women.

At Meta House we treat the whole person and women who suffer from mental health disorders face an additional barrier to recovery. We ensure that women who suffer from a co-occurring mental health disorder receive appropriate diagnoses, support and treatment and are equipped with the tools to manage their disorders, which increases their likelihood of successful recovery. All staff are trained to understand the dynamics of mental health and substance use especially when there is a history of trauma and abuse.

Services Components

• Professional Staff:Meta house is staffed with a psychiatrist who is also an addictionologist, Master's level mental health staff, and consulting psychologists.
• Trauma Treatment: a program specifically for women with substance use disorders
• Parenting Program for women with histories of childhood sexual abuse and other trauma
• Mental Health Assessments conducted by Wisconsin School of Psychiatry students.
• Referral Services to connect women with additional support when necessary.

Case Management

Recovering from substance abuse and addiction is only one of the challenges facing Meta House clients. Poverty, poor physical and mental health, past and current violence, inadequate housing, and lack of job and parenting skills add to the complexity of day-to-day life.

Most women we serve are involved not only in Alcohol and/or Other Drug Abuse (AODA) treatment at Meta House, but also other systems, such as child welfare, W-2 (Wisconsin’s TANF program), and the criminal justice system. While facing these complicated realities, most women enter treatment without a support network. Meta House has implemented intensive Case Management services to help women navigate through these complex systems and by helping her to:

• Build a network of family, friends, spiritual and professional support which increases her ability to cope after leaving treatment;
• Increase her retention in the program which will increase her ability to maintain sobriety;
• Coordinate her service plan.

Service Components

• Case Managers:From the time she is admitted, the client is assigned a Case Manager who will remain with her and her family throughout the course of treatment at Meta House. The case Manager serves as the point person for all service coordination, problem solving, crisis intervention, and retention and relapse prevention.
• Intensive Case Management to help women prioritize their needs and access resources, such as housing and medical services.
• Coordinated Care works closely with other systems to coordinate care, so that all the helpers are working together on the family's behalf.
• Single Plan of Care works with the members of the client's support network to reflect the individual woman's needs and drves her treatment

Child and Family

The philosophy at Meta House serves the goal of supporting children, teaching parenting, rebuilding and strengthening families, and breaking the cycle of intergenerational substance abuse. Meta House gives priority to pregnant, postpartum, and parenting women. Although Meta house coordinates child and family care with other agencies. Meta House is one of the only treatment centers in the state that allows children to live with their mothers in the residential treatment and housingprograms and to receive intervention services. Child care is provided.

Service Components

• Skill Building Classes: Parenting education and coaching, and child development classes; Nutrition, living, and health skills training; Social skill-building and cultural development; Substance abuse prevention and awareness classes for families and children.
• Nuturing Care Program focuses on teaching parents to be sensitive and aware of children's emotional needs and works with the family history and trauma
• In-home visits and individual sessions.
• Baby Health : Birth to 10 development screenings and pre-natal and post-natal care coordination.
• Mother, Child, and Family Interactions : includes family activities and outings and reunification services.

Vocational and Educational

Meta House recognizes the significance that education and vocational ability have on self-sufficiency, financial freedome and self-esteem. Upon entering Meta House, 54% of clients had not completed high school or received a GED.The majority of clients read at an 8th grade level and 17% are functionally illiterate. Substance abuse and lack of education usually leads to a scattered employment history. Due to social stigmas, it is very difficult for a person with a criminal record or a history of substance abuse to find employment.

The vocational and educational services at Meta House work to ensure that each of our clients has an increased sense of self-worth and sense of purpose; is less likely to relapse into active substance abuse, due to financial independence and sense of worth; and becomes a productive, contributing member of society.

Service Components

• Case Management: includes vocational/educational ase management and service plan development
• Assessments:upon entering treatment, initial vocational and educational assessments are provided, plus a job readiness assessment is given.
• Training:weekly vocational/educational group that covers topics such as budgeting, resume writing, application writing, dressing for success, interviewing skills and stress management.
• Support and Assistance: with W-2 TANF benefits, Social Security and Disability; Job retention support to ensure women maintain employment; Building relationships with businesses to find jobs for clients.
• On-Site Literacy Center provides assistance with reading, writing, spelling, and math skills, GED/HSED preperation, driver's license written test preparation, computer training software, and Testing for Adults Basic Education (TABE).