Addiction

How would you feel if someone you loved lost their life to drugs' Well, people are losing family and friends to drug addiction every day. So how do we help them' Or can we' The first part of helping a situation is to understand why it occurs. If you have someone who is a victim of substance abuse, you should understand why they started using. It can be deeper than the top layer. There is still hope after drug addiction and they can overcome. It will take encouragement, understanding and knowledge of the problem at hand. Whether it is a family member, a close friend, or within yourself, drugs do not have to take life as you know it, or slowly cause death. The cause of drug addiction is known or thought to be a wide variety of reasons. People get what they call “high” on drugs to get a feeling of self-satisfaction, of elation, and of euphoria. After the substance is used it alters the level of their conscience. It has also been said that someone partake in the use of drugs due to child hood trauma, or there upbringing. Theories have said for some it originates as a way to rebel against parents or imitate elders. Dr. David N. Nurco writes that many addicts come from home situations where the father was absent or punitive, and the mother was permissive or inconsistent or it was a single parent home. Dr. Lawrence J. Hatterer has a similar conclusion. His finding say that people with more injurious addictions come from neglect by one or both parents causing the child to lack the knowledge of how to deal with disappointment and failure. It is also said that if a child is criticized or punished too much they may take drugs as a way of punishing themselves for being “bad”. Although these reasons may have a part they are inadequate to explain the universal use of drugs by human beings. For years people wonder the reason people use, but in fact, there may be as much reasons people take drugs as there are people who use drugs. Addiction and its details vary a great deal, but almost all include the components tolerance and withdrawal. Tolerance is the way a person’s body becomes accustomed to a certain drug or substance. The drugs affect the highest level of the body’s nervous system, or emotional and intellectual intelligence. As the nervous system try to compensate for the toxin-induced change that drugs create. It builds a state where the adjustments are automatically activated whenever the drug is used again. Someone’s tolerance comes after using the substance for a period of time. The bodies system and the organs within someone’s body build up a defense that allows the drugs to function smoothly. The physical results make the body need more and more of the drug or substance to get to the same level as the first time. On the other hand there are withdrawals. Withdrawal is when someone stops using a substance for a period of time. Usually when someone is going through withdrawal it can affect them psychologically and or physically. When it is psychological it grows from the emotional reasons that they first start using drugs. For instance, someone may partake in a certain substance because they feel like they cannot emotionally cope with a stressful situation. There are also physical results of withdrawal. The person usually suffers physically with muscle cramps, difficulty sleeping, or trouble eating, also nausea. When using certain drugs the body cells change. When the substance is not be used anymore the body’s cells cannot immediately adjust back to normal. The person’s body is than chemically dependent in order for the person to feel well. When the chemical is not being consumed anymore certain symptoms may occur like vomiting, cramps, and tremors. The pain and discomfort caused during withdrawal causes the user to turn back to their substance of choice. A psychologist Mark Twain sums up the futility of the struggle that addict go through more than a hundred years ago he stated “To_ cease smoking is the easiest thing I ever did. I ought to know it because I’ve done it a thousand times”. _As long as people understand that there is not an easy way or quick fix to drug addiction will they be able to begin the long journey to recovery. You may know someone who has an addiction we tend to think of their situation quantitatively. We focus on how much a person may use instead of listening to what the experience is when they do so; when that happen we miss the essential components that define addiction as a disease. We see drug addicts to be bad people, and tend to turn or back on people who use. But if addiction is seen as a disease, would you turn your back on someone you love because they got cancer due to smoking' What makes it difficult to help an addict is early in the course of the addict’s disease; they have a problem accepting that something is wrong. When someone tries to challenge there dangerous behavior they become defensive and resentful. When we take the focus off the addict and on the addiction we can be less judgmental of the person causing them to build a wall from being helped. While most people look down on people who do drugs such as, narcotics, depressants, stimulants and hallucinogens. Those same people may be substance abusers themselves. The average person can be addicted to common things such as food. If someone addicted to crack cocaine takes a hit to take away the pain of a painful divorce and another person eats constantly to bury their pain. Is one greater than the other, or is there still simply a serious problem. Some people cannot function without having their early morning cup of coffee. Because it is just coffee is there not a problem in the fact that someone thinks they can not start there day without. That just explains that addiction is addiction, the substance of choice is not the problem, but the reason it is being used is. One day I was watching the television show intervention. The girl was addicted to heroin. She had been raped by her uncle as a small child at a young age. Her family did not believe which gave her a problem dealing with abandonment. She was able to get clean from drugs when she got married and pregnant. Having a baby seemed to fill the void that heroin once did before, but when her husband left them, the abandonment took over again. Her child was taken from herand the only way she would be able to have visitation rights was to pass two drug tests. I seemed to get a better understanding of how sick someone is when addicted when the girl said “I cannot see my child because I keep doing drugs, so I keep doing drugs because I cannot see my child”. It further explains how addiction is a vicious cycle that some people cannot figure their way out. Although, some substance are more common and some are not they still can be treated. Treatments include but are not limited to, chemical detoxification, methadone maintenance, self-help groups and residential therapeutic communities. Chemical detoxification is usually an impatient treatment that last from 7 to 21 days. It is designed for a person addicted to narcotic drugs to detoxify the drug from there system. But, detoxification is a temporary treatment that gives the addict a chance to reduce their drug intake. Self-help groups also commonly known as the 12-step program are made up of people who meet on a regular basis to facilitate their recovery from their specific substance of abuse. Residential therapeutic communities are a complete treatment environment in which the clinical staff is recovering addicts. The goal of this treatment is to change the negative patterns of thinking and behavior. All treatment programs are made with the hope to rid people of their dangerous lifestyle; all substance abuse cases are not ended. The abuser can go through treatment but the craving can overpower their sobriety causing them to relapse, which means to partake in the substance again. When you or someone you love decided to get into a treatment program, it takes more than a visit. You have to be strong to stay sober and have to be understanding to help someone else stay sober. So if you or someone is at risk of losing their life to drugs, would you have the understanding to help them or yourself' Would you be able to evaluate the problem' Or would you be quick to judge and turn your back on a problem that covers America. It may be difficult to ever get to the main source of the problem, but if we equip ourselves with knowledge of the issue we can have the armor we need to go up against this “drug war”. Through knowledge the essential nature of addiction appears, and a path to recovery become clear. We have to treat drug addiction as if it were an onion. An onion has many layers and although the procedures of peeling back each layer may be uncomfortable and cause many tears. Eventually, you will reach the center.