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Drug addiction: The complex truth

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Re: Drug addiction: The complex truth

#81

Post by larrys »

jere wrote: post #54
bane wrote: post #38

Like lots of folks I drink a bit, and I smoke the occasional celebratory cigar. I'm fortunate to not have found myself addicted to anything though (that I'm aware of at least). However, I have family members who have deep addiction problems. Life affecting. One thing that I've noticed is that even when they get off of the substance, the addictive personality traits are still there -- years later. One of my relatives,…

You seem to be suggesting an initial addiction caused an addictive personality, but are you sure your relative wasn't prone to addictive behavior to begin with?

From my observation and knowledge over time I think your statement "prone to addictive behavior to begin with" is correct.

That said I'm not reading what you are saying the OP is possibly suggesting at all.

He says:

"One of my relatives, for example, managed to get herself off of drinking and smoking completely and was in counseling. The addictions, and the kinds of behaviors that come with maintaining addictions (all kinds of dissociative, anti-social, manipulative weirdness) were ruining her life. Strange thing was, after removing the substance, the behaviors persisted."

I don't see anything that suggests that the initial addiction caused further addictions at all in the above paragraph.

Re: Drug addiction: The complex truth

#82

Post by larrys »

geoka9 wrote: post #70
1337biz wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For example, she found a puzzle game on her phone that she would play obsessively Actually an interesting observation on how difficult it is to draw the line between obsession and passion. It seems that she (can devlop) an extremely high level of focus, something that what would probably regarded by many as a trait for becoming successful in a specific discipline.

Yes, that's what I thought, too. If only she could bring herself to getting hooked on a creative endeavour, she would achieve remarkable results.

Well anything that goes to this type of excess will be a problem though:

"a puzzle game on her phone that she would play obsessively* -- forgetting to eat, sleep, show up for work, having basic human interaction and even requiring physical therapy at one point for the muscle strain of sitting in the position to play the game for hours on end."

What we are probably dealing with here is more than a simple addiction (to which your suggestion is good and would definitely be in the right direction). What we have is a mental problem that includes addictive traits.

After all the DSM is fairly arbitrary (as are medical definitions).

Re: Drug addiction: The complex truth

#83

Post by larrys »

pekk wrote: post #63
ArbitraryLimits wrote: post #32

I remember from college my Econ 101 textbook had a sidebar on heroin use by military personnel in Vietnam - apparently (according to my memory of an unattributed source) 90% of personnel stationed in Vietnam tried heroin at least once, and then 89% of them stopped when they left. Why an economics textbook? The authors were trying to illustrate 1) the role of substitutes on consumption of a particular good - there was…

Heroin has properties attractive to people in a hopeless, brutal war beyond what they can get from bridge club. Self-medication is not exactly recreation. You should also look skeptically at claims that having unprotected sex with possible HIV carriers guarantees that you will get HIV. But you should still put a goddamn condom on.

"to people in a hopeless, brutal war"

Exactly. Because it's heroin combined with other shit going on that almost certainly causes brain changes and chemical reactions on it's own.

So heroin in combo with war is not the same as heroin while visiting disney world on a nice summer day on your vacation (clearly my hypothesis nothing to back this up).

(There is by the way another "addictive" type behavior that starts at a time in ones life that, while not at war, is a time of deep changes in personality as well as hormonal changes. My hypothesis also suggests that this would add to the addictive nature of this activity as well in some people.)

Re: Drug addiction: The complex truth

#84

Post by cgore »

AznHisoka wrote: post #40
Ziomislaw wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you have a lot of opinions on what we all should do christian I presume?

Ha. I wanted to edit my post and add "(And please don't say God)". So the answer is no :)

That is basically the point of Ecclesiastes. King Solomon had access to everything, being king of one of the most powerful kingdoms of the time, worked his way through that whole list, and then at the end decided it was all pointless. He was a smart Paris Hilton, just with more money and absolute power.

Re: Drug addiction: The complex truth

#85

Post by Pxtl »

pekk wrote: post #63
ArbitraryLimits wrote: post #32

I remember from college my Econ 101 textbook had a sidebar on heroin use by military personnel in Vietnam - apparently (according to my memory of an unattributed source) 90% of personnel stationed in Vietnam tried heroin at least once, and then 89% of them stopped when they left. Why an economics textbook? The authors were trying to illustrate 1) the role of substitutes on consumption of a particular good - there was…

Heroin has properties attractive to people in a hopeless, brutal war beyond what they can get from bridge club. Self-medication is not exactly recreation. You should also look skeptically at claims that having unprotected sex with possible HIV carriers guarantees that you will get HIV. But you should still put a goddamn condom on.

Related:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rat_Park

tl:dr; Rats given access to their choice of clean water and morphine water, and placed in two enclosures: Rat cage and rat park. Rats living in a miserable rat cage will develop a morphine habit. Rats living in a pleasant rat park will avoid the morphine. Rats moved from rat cage to rat park easily kick their morphine habit after a brief period of withdrawal symptoms.

tl:dr;tl:dr;

Rats self-medicate with morphine IFF life is crap.

Re: Drug addiction: The complex truth

#86

Post by dusklight »

bane wrote: post #38

Like lots of folks I drink a bit, and I smoke the occasional celebratory cigar. I'm fortunate to not have found myself addicted to anything though (that I'm aware of at least). However, I have family members who have deep addiction problems. Life affecting. One thing that I've noticed is that even when they get off of the substance, the addictive personality traits are still there -- years later. One of my relatives,…

Pretty sure you are addicted to oxygen. You are probably addicted to hackernews also. This is not meant to be a banal comment. Addiction is not necessarily a bad thing. You could be addicted to hard work, for example. You could be addicted to your family. Being so addicted to your family that you would be willing to die in order to protect them is not necessarily a bad thing.

Re: Drug addiction: The complex truth

#87

Post by jere »

larrys wrote: post #81
jere wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You seem to be suggesting an initial addiction caused an addictive personality, but are you sure your relative wasn't prone to addictive behavior to begin with?

From my observation and knowledge over time I think your statement "prone to addictive behavior to begin with" is correct. That said I'm not reading what you are saying the OP is possibly suggesting at all. He says: "One of my relatives, for example, managed to get herself off of drinking and smoking completely and was in counseling. The addictions, and the kinds of behaviors that come with maintaining addictions (al…

>Strange thing was, after removing the substance, the behaviors persisted.

This part. Seems an odd thing to say if you knew the person had addictive behavior before... perhaps I'm misreading it.

Re: Drug addiction: The complex truth

#88

Post by dusklight »

NotAnEngineer wrote: post #47
bane wrote: post #38

Like lots of folks I drink a bit, and I smoke the occasional celebratory cigar. I'm fortunate to not have found myself addicted to anything though (that I'm aware of at least). However, I have family members who have deep addiction problems. Life affecting. One thing that I've noticed is that even when they get off of the substance, the addictive personality traits are still there -- years later. One of my relatives,…

This is the rule, not the exception, among addicts. Every recovery program (12-step or not) emphasizes that drugs are not a drug addict's only problem. Obviously they are a very destructive part of the problem, but every addict who stops using long enough learns that -- surprise! -- they're still a self-centered, fear-driven, manipulative, obsessive person. That stuff doesn't just go away when you stop using; if anyt…

That's very interesting. Do you think addicts already have those personality traits from before they became addicted, or the traits developed as a result of the addiction?

Re: Drug addiction: The complex truth

#89

Post by MichaelGG »

snom380 wrote: post #79
MichaelGG wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On meth: remember in the US this is a legally prescribed medication, and effectively indistinguishable from other amphetamines such as the Adderall mixture. There are plenty of professionals using amphetamines. The difference is probably that they're not smoking it for a rush, but using it to gain a long mental advantage. They're certainly very functional. On heroin: Opiates are far less harmful than smoking, as long…

Well, I think that a big part of those "functional" users are like functional alcoholics. They continue for many years to hold a job, but their daily usage causes problems for everyone around them. At least that's the story you'll often hear at family group meetings. Not the usual homeless drug addict story, but people keeping up appearances while hiding some pretty big problems. My brother was a functional meth user…

Well, I'm just gonna say arguing anecdotally is pointless. However, functional opiate and amphetamine users are not "hiding a big problem". In many cases, this is enabling them to deal with high-stress situations, or think more clearly. One example is Paul Erdős, a brilliant mathematician that used amphetamines quite a bit and found no reason to not use them. No hiding, no problem, no "keeping up appearances".

Don't by into the "addiction is bad" story that DARE and the like sell.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Erd%C5%91s

Re: Drug addiction: The complex truth

#90

Post by codesuela »

guerrilla wrote: post #78
1337biz wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For example, she found a puzzle game on her phone that she would play obsessively Actually an interesting observation on how difficult it is to draw the line between obsession and passion. It seems that she (can devlop) an extremely high level of focus, something that what would probably regarded by many as a trait for becoming successful in a specific discipline.

To me, this and the parent post are the most interesting thing here. I find myself to be quite like the parent's family member in that all that I do is obsessive, often to the point of self-destructive results. It's always been this way with work and hacking (to the extreme) and certainly for other less productive things like alcohol, food, news (ctrl-R) and especially television/films. What I'm wondering is if we co…

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