Posted on 12/12/2017 9:30:01 AM PST by JockoManning
My household emphatically agrees with this analysis.
The 'therefore what' is a bit trickier than the analysis, however.
The challenge seems to be to avoid enabling the addiction while working to bond with and help build a more constructive sense of the self within the addict.
Yes....many changes are afoot in evaluating root causes of “addiction” and how to deal with them. I’ll pass this on to a friend who is affected by this.
Stop treating a BEHAVIOR as an ILLNESS! I am tired of having my tax money go to support morons who CHOOSE to light up, sniff or inject substances that render them incapable of caring for themselves.
For the alcoholic they have a different issue...they process alcohol differently which makes them crave a drink
For the addict they have a hard time detoxing
For both they suffer from incomprehensible demoralization. They are spiritually bankrupt. Until they can change this way of looking at the world they are doomed to die a miserable and lonely death
I think (not my field, just my observation) that addicts lack basic coping skills.
That would sort of align with the argument you put forth.
This theory may address the issue for some, but for many it is a mile wide of the mark.
Mid-career, highly successful people, with overwhelming circles of friends and family.
Somehow feel the need for “a little help” to maintain the pace, move from coke, which has “worked” for a time, to crack...which takes over and drives them into a ditch.
Lawyer friend,
Aerospace Exec,
Software Exec,
Several honor role students in my graduating class.
I think it is complicated and varies from person to person. I have coping skills, a career, family and a life and used to just drink socially. Before I knew it, I was hiding alcohol, lying about how much I was consuming and having problems with almost every aspect of my life. Since alcohol was impacting me negatively and putting me in contact with law enforcement, I had to really evaluate how I had gotten to that point. So I decided to give up drinking altogether and I credit AA with getting me where I needed to be. Severn years sober for me. I have never tried any hard drugs and wouldn’t, but it isn’t much of a leap to see myself hooked on something. Scares me still.
I'm thinking that in a society in which "everyone gets a trophy" and little snowflakes are given safe spaces to deal with daily trauma, then people may not be learning how to authentically assess themselves.
I'm not sure it will all add up to more addictions, but I do think it really screws with the brain in bad ways.
.for one.....lack of contentment....
people just can not be happy and its deliberate...because only you can make yourself happy and content..
bump
One note: My housemate, in all his decades of counseling and teaching never observed ONE case where an addict of any kind was lacking a significant degree of RAD--Attachment Disorder from the first 6 years of an unbonded, unconnected life. And, that does NOT mean that the parents didn't love the child.
As other research has indicated, it does likely indicate that the child did NOT FEEL loved.
Excellent topic. I agree with the OP that self is the issue. Sobriety is within a person, not dependent upon circumstance. There are addicts in my life, too.
Mental health (depression, anxiety) issues have been underlying problems with many addicts.
I’d like to disagree without thoroughly reading, so please disregard this if it demonstrates a lack of understanding the premise.
I agree that pathways are literally formed in the brain, many many in the first few years of life, that can be crucial in determining thought and awareness and even influencing emotion and drive for later life. I disagree that in someone without a genetic predisposition to addiction, being neglected early in life will lead toward substance abuse.
This is one of those situations where how the surrounding adults dealt with substances, as well as any genetic tendencies, plays more of a role than neglect or even lack of love. This is my opinion.
RAD could be the worst condition in the world for a child to have. Better to have a terminal disease than an inability to love. I don’t doubt that a total lack of empathy and often morality contributes to a general decline in self care, and then thus makes addiction less of a boogeyman to avoid (because you just don’t care). I don’t think it specifically leads to addiction. As ruinous as it is to the individual and those who attempt to love or care for him.
Bookmark
Congratulations for seven years!
Moreover if you have some of the oppositional, defiant features of the condition, you seek out things like addictions because it will just piss your parents off even more.
Yes....many changes are afoot in evaluating root causes of “addiction” and how to deal with them. I’ll pass this on to a friend who is affected by this.
Thanks for your kind reply.
I think we particularly liked this article because it speaks to hard scientific evidence about [b]FOUNDATIONAL ROOT CAUSES.
Certainly a host of ills spring forth out of a corrupted, flawed, trashed sense of self--particularly of self-worth or, more precisely--the LACK of significant positive self-worth.
It's more than a little complicated.
It's a big cause for humility vs haughtiness.
It's more than a little cause for compassion regardless of the perversities involved.
My housemate and his colleague came to agree that 80+% of the general population suffers from significant levels of Reactive Attachment Disorder.
Illness? DIS-EASE? Depends on one's dictionary.
RAD results in chronic problems of low self-worth; poor family relationships; poor work relationships; poor social relationships; poor impulse control; poor modes of emotional expression.
And, actually MRI studies have repeatedly demonstrated that those with serious degrees of RAD have LITERAL PHYSIOLOGICAL BRAIN DAMAGE in 2 areas of the brain: (A) the area managing RELATIONSHIPS and (B) the area managing emotional expression.
Which part of PHYSIOLOGICAL BRAIN DAMAGE do you believe should not be classified as an ILLNESS?
Have you been your whole life and now 100% free from all addictions? How much RAD have your relationships demonstrated?
Yes, I struggle sometimes with compassion for folks who chronically make stupid choices that cost us taxpayers plenty. Personally, I think parents should qualify (but not to the government) to be allowed to have children. And those with horrible parenting might should be fined--but too often, they are already on welfare to begin with. So what is your solution for that?
Have you ever wanted some compassion for repeatedly dysfunctional habit patterns that cost others in some way or another? What about if those dysfunctional patters were more or less through no conscious choice to go down that path on your own?
We don't have a handy solution. We just know and this article confirms that RAD and the wholesale lack of early life SUFFICIENT AFFECTIONATE UNCONDITIONAL LOVE contributes to a whole long list of dreadful things to individuals, families and society. Actually Youtuber Stefan Molyneux has some apt things to say about this whole ball of wax, as well.
At what point do we lay aside blame long enough to come up some EFFECTIVE solutions? I've never observed blaming the downtrodden to work very well at solving much of anything--regardless of the reasonableness of their having a big chunk of the responsibility.
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