How Do I Know If I Suffer

              From the Disease of Addiction?

ADDICTION - To devote or surrender oneself to something habitually or obsessively.

DISEASE - A condition that impairs the performance of a vital function, a harmful development.

You know you are suffering from the disease of addiction if you cannot stop behaving in a way that threatens to ruin your life. That seems simple enough, right? But it's not. Because when you are acting in a way that threatens to ruin all that you treasure, you are in the midst of an intoxication that is the result of your own behavior. You are no longer able to care about the people and things that matter to you. You are caught in the vortex of addiction and can no longer see or hear anything that makes sense. The only thing that's important is to be able to continue the addictive behaviors, which you believe make you feel better, at any cost. Just like the definition says, you have surrendered yourself to a behavior that impairs your vital functioning.

You have a hunger for connection, a giant hole inside of you that nothing else seems to fill. Every time you stop the behaviors you experience the awful feelings that you have no words to describe. Fear. That's the best you can do. It's what makes you run to keep a step ahead. It is larger than any other feeling in your experience. You know that if you stop you will be consumed, fall apart, maybe even die. You know, without any doubt, that you are basically a bad person. Not that you let anyone else know that. You have learned to put on a good front. But what is behind that front, in your mind, is a fraud. A pretender. A failure. If anyone knew your secret they would not or could not love you. You feel doomed, so you do it again - and for a few moments you don't feel so bad.

In very unscientific terms, think of it this way; we all have a little drug manufacturing plant in our brains. When we feel especially good, we get a rush of brain chemicals called serotonins. Ahhh, that feels great. When we are angry or frightened, we get a rush of adrenaline. Wowwww, that feels powerful. When we are anxious, nervous, worried, or beside ourselves with anticipation we get a flood of epinephrine. Pure jet fuel. When we are sexually involved we get enough of a chemical rush to drown in and we immediately want for more. When we eat a Reeses Peanut Butter Cup we hunger for another. One is never enough. If we win on a scratch ticket, we buy more scratch tickets! We can feel the rush. We feel G R E A T!!!!! And we want to do it again, and again, and again.

Drunk on our own brain chemicals, we are running away from our feelings and the chemical reaction we get from our own compulsive, addictive behavior numbs those feelings. We get intoxicated from the rush of our brain chemicals. We turn up the heat. We lose our sense of balance and rationality. We turn into Superman or Wonder Woman. We cannot get enough. We are trying to fill the hole that is inside of us - but we can't seem to do it.

Now there is help as near as your phone.

It's time to ask for help before your world comes crashing down around you.