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Most People with Addiction Simply Grow Out of It

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Re: Most People with Addiction Simply Grow Out of It

#91

Post by RickHull »

jalanb wrote: post #61
RickHull wrote: post #46

I take issue with the headline, and I didn't see any support for it in the article -- that people simply grow out of addiction. Treatment or not, we can call that process of reducing one's addictive behaviors growth , but I don't think you can find any addicts -- former or otherwise -- their families, or addiction treatment specialists, who would call that process simple .

Actually, speaking as a former addict, I would call it simple. Damned hard, fucking painful, betimes hopeless, ..., but the most consistent memory from my early recovery was the simplicity of the process. There really was only one thing important: stay clean. In my own case I aimed for staying clean for 2 years. And for those two years that was not "the most important thing", it was the only thing that mattered. Othe…

Rules may be simple, but adherence to them is not. For some, it may be impossible. Consider the first 2 rules of dating:

    1. Be attractive
    2. Don't be unattractive
The rule for winning is simply to score more points than the other team. Immortality is governed by the simple rule: Stay alive

None of these are simple processes, and it diminishes the discourse to treat them as such. I am thankful for your counterexample to my challenge, but I'm not convinced that, if asked sincerely about how you have managed your recovery from addiction, you could possibly sincerely respond: I simply grew out of it.

Re: Most People with Addiction Simply Grow Out of It

#92

Post by ChristianBundy »

tekromancr wrote: post #85
BigChiefSmokem wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't have answer this but I have to ask, did you find some other less severe addiction to cope - like marijuana for example? I ask because, well, your username.

Your name would also imply some level of cannabis use. Also, cartoon racism.

Oh, do me next!

Re: Most People with Addiction Simply Grow Out of It

#93

Post by Dylan16807 »

tjradcliffe wrote: post #87
Dylan16807 wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I get H1N1 flu with pneumonia, I might get worse and die or I might get better, but there's only one fundamental type. You can't reliably classify based on outcome.

Epidemiologcially, similar symptoms that progress to different outcomes is one of the key tools in understanding the underlying mechanisms of a disease, so to say "you can't reliably classify based on outcomes" is incorrect. Sometimes you can, sometimes you can't, and it is always worth asking the question "how come?" when you get very different outcomes from the same disease-causing agent. In the general case there…

>Sometimes you can, sometimes you can't, and it is always worth asking the question "how come?"

That's why I said 'reliably'. It's a great tool but it's not an oracle, and wuliwong was very heavily implying it's enough.

Re: Most People with Addiction Simply Grow Out of It

#94

Post by 0x420 »

elliottcarlson wrote: post #69
0x420 wrote: post #43

As someone who struggled with cocaine, heroin and prescription opioid addictions throughout my teenage years, this resonates with me quite a bit, but I'm not sure if I agree with the conclusions the author is drawing. I got clean with no help either - and yet, many years later, I still consider myself "in recovery." I view my recovery as a never-ending process; even though I haven't touched the substances themselves…

Every one will have a different experience, and some people will need more help than others. I was a meth addict (but was also a frequent abuser of a large variety of other substances) and quit cold turkey during a cross country bus ride to the east coast. Ever since then I have been clean, and only take part in drinking alcohol. That first year was insanely hard, and the mere thought of meth would make my hands clam…

Yes, that was more or less my point. I'm wary of analyses of addiction that try to conflate every survivor's experience into a single, monolithic thing. There are similarities, to be sure, but it's more complex than most people realize.

Re: Most People with Addiction Simply Grow Out of It

#95

Post by Loughla »

sterlingross wrote: post #66

From my experience and observations, most people don't grow out of being addicted, they simply shift their focus of addiction. This often goes unnoticed because there are many people who are addicted to things that the majority of society wouldn't consider an addiction. One might give up an "unhealthy" addiction for a socially acceptable one. Or their unhealthy addiction may simply shift, from one substance to anothe…

That's actually unbelievably eye-opening for me. I'm dealing with a family member who, for the last three years, has slid into alcoholism head first. We've not been able to put an identifier on when or why it started, but it started. Looking at it now, though, he has always been the kind of person who has a 'project' going at home that he is unbelievably tied up in; woodworking, singing, hunting, metalworking. Always something. We've always assumed it was some kind of high-functioning autism or some other kind of tic caused by his childhood.

Looking at it with your lens, though, it's just an addictive personality. He's always gone full-bore into everything. Always. Now, instead of a socially acceptable 'hobby,' it's drinking.

Shit. That makes perfect sense.

Re: Most People with Addiction Simply Grow Out of It

#96

Post by BigChiefSmokem »

0x420 wrote: post #86
BigChiefSmokem wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't have answer this but I have to ask, did you find some other less severe addiction to cope - like marijuana for example? I ask because, well, your username.

No, I was completely sober for a few years after kicking all the hard stuff. I acquired a taste for marijuana relatively recently, and while I do smoke quite a bit nowadays, I don't think of it as a coping tool, just something I do for fun when I have time to kill.

Interesting, I myself vaporize (I don't like smoke) but it is mostly for medical reasons (I live in California) as I refuse to take hard pharmaceuticals. My doctor agrees.

Re: Most People with Addiction Simply Grow Out of It

#98

Post by tjradcliffe »

ugk wrote: post #50

As a sober addict I really can't comprehend the "flavor" of addiction the author describes. Most of my addict friends and acquaintances either worked at sobriety or died from using. Actually most died. If someone can just stop, most would simply say the person wasn't actually an addict.

I've seen this comment about "wasn't actually an addict" or "not really an addiction" in every discussion of this story, here and elsewhere.

I'm very curious as to why people say this, because it doesn't seem to add anything to the discussion or take it in any useful direction. I'm not trolling here: I really don't get it, and it bugs me a bit because it seems to distract the discussion from things that might be useful (and I've contributed to that distraction here, likely... sorry.)

Consider a similar case: small round blue cell tumours (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1867426/). These present identically in routine histology done on biopsied tissue, but in fact consist of four different types of underlying disease.

Neuroblastoma was identified in the 1800's. Non-Hodgin lymphoma wasn't fully classified until the 1960's. At no time did anyone say, "That's not actually a small round blue tumour" because that would have contributed nothing to the discussion.

If we treat "addiction" as a name for a set of symptoms that may arise from several underlying conditions, some of which can be corrected adequately by an act of will on the part of the individual and some of which cannot, we can start to ask interesting questions like:

1) How do we identify each type of underlying condition?

2) Are there more than two underlying conditions? Is there a more complex, more useful taxonomy?

3) Given the existence of a population that ages out or chooses to stop, are there ways that we can intervene to help them that exploit the specifics of their underlying condition that are different from what has proven to be effective in the population that does not age out and is not able to choose to stop?

And so on. All of these are useful, important, valuable things to say. "Then it's not really an addiction" is not.

Re: Most People with Addiction Simply Grow Out of It

#99

Post by blacksmith_tb »

The author asks rhetorically why this is a contentious theory - but it seems like wording alone has quite a bit to do with that. A claim like "many people with addictions simply grow out of them" is already much easier to accept than "most people". Of course, there do seem to be some sorts of addictions, like alcoholism, that if anything correlate more strongly with late adulthood, which makes them resistant to this explanation.

Re: Most People with Addiction Simply Grow Out of It

#100

Post by 0x420 »

BigChiefSmokem wrote: post #96
0x420 wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I was completely sober for a few years after kicking all the hard stuff. I acquired a taste for marijuana relatively recently, and while I do smoke quite a bit nowadays, I don't think of it as a coping tool, just something I do for fun when I have time to kill.

Interesting, I myself vaporize (I don't like smoke) but it is mostly for medical reasons (I live in California) as I refuse to take hard pharmaceuticals. My doctor agrees.

Getting a vape has been high on my list of priorities ever since I've become more invested in my health, which incidentally wasn't a concern until after I began smoking regularly.
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