Addiction: we are all addicted to something

Meet 3,4‑dihydroxyphenethylamine, also known as Dopamine. Dopamine is part of the com­plex neu­ro­trans­mit­ter sys­tem in our bod­ies that allows cells to com­mu­ni­cate with one another. 

Dopamine is fas­ci­nat­ing. It plays a role in behav­ior mod­i­fi­ca­tion, moti­va­tion, sleep, atten­tion span, cog­ni­tion, learn­ing, etc. It is tru­ly an amaz­ing com­pound. Dopamine helps liv­ing things sur­vive. Whenever we do some­thing that our body decides is good for us, dopamine is released, and we feel good. This process was essen­tial for the sur­vival of our ances­tors. This sim­ple chem­i­cal cre­ates a dri­ve to do things that are “good for” the body and “good for” sur­vival. Things like eat­ing, drink­ing, social bond­ing, and mak­ing babies.

But dopamine has a dark side that is not its fault. That dri­ve to con­sume things that are good for us has anoth­er name: addic­tion. Our bod­ies are lit­er­al­ly pro­grammed to devel­op addic­tions. This was ben­e­fi­cial to our ances­tors. They became addict­ed to calo­rie-rich foods like eggs and mam­moth brains (yum). This helped them sur­vive and repro­duce. That sur­vival and repro­duc­tion some­times came at a cost to oth­er ancient humans. Our ances­tors would steal, kill, etc. to get what their bod­ies told them they needed.

Unfortunately, our mod­ern world con­tains many things that our ancient ances­tors did not have access to. And our bod­ies are not always great at deter­min­ing which of those things are good for them. Sugar, fat, caf­feine, sex, alco­hol, gam­bling, shop­ping, hero­in, oxy­codone, cocaine. All of these all cause that same release of dopamine that tells our brains “this is good for you; get some more.” Our brains are hard­wired to become addict­ed to these things. To crave them. To do what­ev­er we have to do to get them, even though they are caus­ing us harm. 

Can we some­times over­come this dri­ve? Yes. But not always.

The way I see it, addic­tions fall into three basic categories:

1. Socially accept­able addic­tions (“We will laugh about them, make cute social media memes about them, engage in play­ful teas­ing about them.”) These include things like caf­feine, sug­ar, exer­cise, 900 calo­rie Starbucks drinks, and mak­ing over your house so it looks like Joanna Gaines threw up everywhere.
2. Socially frowned upon addic­tions (“We will not men­tion them to your face but will sigh and shake our heads when you walk away and dis­cuss how much we wish you didn’t have them.”) These include things like alco­hol, nico­tine, gam­bling, sex, and hoarding.
3. Socially taboo addic­tions (“We will scorn you as a low-life drain on soci­ety and try to pro­tect our chil­dren from your hor­ri­ble influ­ence; we will point to you and say ‘how can any­one get that low?’ and ‘why would any­one do that to them­selves?’”) These include things like hero­in, metham­phet­a­mines, and oxycodone.

What the %$&* is the point, Rebecca?

Maybe the point is that we are all addicts. If we are lucky, our addic­tions are lim­it­ed to social­ly accept­able ones. If we are real­ly lucky, we are able to man­age our addic­tions and be func­tion­al humans. But we are all addicts. Our brains are lit­er­al­ly hard­wired for addic­tion. I have addic­tions (no, I am not dis­cussing what they are). You have addic­tions (if you don’t know what they are, do a lit­tle self-reflection). 

Every per­son you meet, every per­son you inter­act with, every per­son out there has addic­tions. When we pass judg­ment on some­one else’s addic­tions and con­ve­nient­ly for­get our own, we do them an unkind­ness and our­selves a disservice.

You still haven’t got­ten to the real point, Rebecca!

Okay, the point is sim­ply this: extend grace, love and under­stand­ing to every­one strug­gling to over­come an addic­tion and every­one who is in recov­ery. Their strug­gle is real. 

They are not in addic­tion because they choose to be. They are not in addic­tion because they are a shi$$y indi­vid­ual. They are not in addic­tion because they are lazy. They are not in addic­tion because they weren’t raised right. They are in addic­tion because their brain is telling them this thing (drugs, sex, shop­ping, shiplap) is good for you. Do what­ev­er you need to do to get it. 

Is there hope for them? Yes. Is there hope for you? Yes. Will it be hard? Yes. Will they get there? Maybe. Will you get there? Maybe. Can you help? Yes! Extend love, grace, hope for heal­ing, prayers, and emo­tion­al sup­port to your fel­low addicts. 

We all fight these bat­tles and we should nev­er feel that we fight them alone.