Everyone has learned ways of trying to cope with distress in their lives; some of these ways may encourage Discharge, many of them provide temporary alleviation or suppression. In addition to psychological defenses and Control Patterns, many people use chemicals which have effects on their moods and mind states. Some chemicals may be so much a part of life that people do not stop to think how they are using them, e.g. caffeine, alcohol, nicotine. Others are specifically prescribed to counteract the effects of stress, depression, mental illness.

All such chemicals are likely to interfere with discharge processes, as they form ways of suppressing Distress rather than letting it out. So, experienced co-counsellors strongly recommend that people do not take in chemicals at times which would mean that the chemicals are likely to be active in their bodies during co-counselling sessions. Thus smoking, drinking alcohol, using tranquilizers and sometimes drinking tea and coffee are likely to be discouraged or specifically prohibited during co-counselling workshops. Many co-counsellors who have put work into the area of food and drink choose to exclude drugs and mood changing chemicals from their bodies all the time. However everyone needs to work on their own distresses in the area and see what happens.

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