Process of Addiction

After watching the videos of recovering addicts, I learned that some of the characteristics of addiction, are very similar even though the experience can be different from each individual.  First, I noticed there seemed to always be a feeling of not belonging present within the individual, usually starting from a young age.  Many of the individuals felt emotionally abandoned by their caregivers at an early age.  It reminded me of the still-face procedure where they had an infant and their parent interacting in a room and then they would instruct the parent to become still-emotionless and unresponsive to the infant.  They found in doing this, what alarmed the infant the most, increased a release of cortisol and distress, was the parent being unresponsive to the baby.  I wondered if this type of interaction, on a repeated basis, would lead to something later such as addiction that we've seen in the videos.

What surprised me was that it really didn't matter the circumstances, or the family members around the addict, it wasn't enough to quit, unless they wanted it themselves.  I've heard that many times before, but I think there was a small part of me that wanted to believe "if they only loved them enough they would quit" etc.  But after seeing these videos, I realized the relationships just didn't make that type of impact on the addict.  That it's not because of a relationship that they are healed, it's because they must have wanted the healing for themselves first.

What I learned is that the feelings and goals of the addicts, was no different than any other person in the world.  They all longed to be accepted, loved, to have a stable home and financial situation, and to feel happiness.  I could see how easy it would be for someone to go down a path of addiction that may of otherwise not, because of circumstances and lack of resources.  I learned how resilient people can be.  Watching their stories, seeing the pain in their eyes, and the empowerment they felt taking their life back, was really moving.  

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