I truly believe abuse and addiction, of any kind: drugs, sex, food, alcohol, money, work, etc., is a symptom of a bigger issue. Whether is be trauma, mental illness, genetics...........there is a CAUSE.
My first ex was in detox when the big news was "addiction is a disease", and all my hopes for his recovery were dashed. Great, my guy has an excuse every time he sticks a needle in his arm, "Hey, it's a disease, I can't help it". I felt like the medical community just gave addicts a free pass.
Wouldn't that mean I had a disease? And if it was a disease, was I cured? Or was it laying dormant?
Navigating through the medical and psychiatric community is HARD. And you can find just about any answer to fit your needs or wants.
Right now I think Dr.s, rehabs, and Big Pharma are making far to much money off the backs of people who are in pain, mentally and physically, to really focus on prevention through early detection, be it genetics or environment.
My first husband was molested as a child, and latter saw the atrocities of Viet Nam. He self medicated. Alcohol, drugs.
My 2nd husband was bipolar, paranoid schizophrenic. He didn't KNOW his behavior was something he inherited from his bio mother, and his adopted mom refused to even entertain the idea...........but she sure as heck bought him beer when he wanted it because it chilled him out. He drank and drugged to keep the voices at bay, until it tipped him into his first psychotic episode when he got sober for 2 weeks...and boy, was it a doozey.
My daughter? Pure stupidity. She wanted to know what the big deal was about heroin, her dad did it, her husband did it, why was it so hard to stop? Her husband shot her up, and that's all she wrote. Put a chemical in your body that the first time you do it makes you sicker than a dog within the first 15 minutes, and when you decide to "kick", once again, sicker than a dog, but for a good 72 hours or more. She has no predisposition, no mental illness, no trauma. She's just doing it when she does it because she can and she likes it.
My youngest brother missed the physical abuse by our dad, the verbal abuse wasn't as bad, being ignored was, but it all came to a head in less than 2 short years when our mom left my dad, and my brother found proof that our father was gay. When confronted, my dad threw him out of the house at age 17, 4 months shy of graduating high school. He was the "good Mormon kid", never smoked, drank, used drugs, swore, or took the Lords name in vain. He had planned on going on a mission. He would have been any parent's ideal of an awesome son. Now, his mom abandoned him, his dad threw him out because he spoke the truth, the Church ignored him, and the rest of the family shunned him, except me. He turned on everything he was brought up to be. He had no real world experience, he had been so isolated in that Mormon "bubble", he didn't have a clue. I had him move in with me, and I made sure he graduated, in the meantime, he was working his rear off at Tower records every night to get money to buy his own vehicle.
A lot of pain, abandonment, judgement, never feeling he was up to our dad's expectations. He slowly started self medicating. He did exceptional in anything he put his mind to. He was the ideal functioning substance abuser, just like his big sis, me.
Much later in life, his wife divorced him because he was diagnosed with chronic depression. She couldn't accept it or deal with it. He wasn't the "perfect husband" any more, he was "defective". And the snowball started rolling....
It stopped dead in it's tracks when he almost killed a highway worker and himself one night, during on and off blackouts. He was arrested in his tuxedo, coming from a big business party. He was put in jail. His Jeep was toast. He was lucky he walked away from the crash.
Over 4 years ago, he quit every legal and illicit addiction he had. And he's never looked back because he KNOWS why he was doing it. And he faced his demons. I don't worry about him because he's like me. We have our battle scars but the war is over.
My other brother? In a post a few weeks back I mentioned that he started his career as an alcoholic about 2 years ago. Straight up Mormon, mission, Temple marriage, 4 kids, own business...........well about 5 years ago he started loosing his religion, he left the church, 3 years ago his wife left him, then he hooked up with an old high school flame, got married, and everything that was near and dear to him didn't matter anymore. He was "mom's favorite", my dad's "good son". He reminds me of my daughter, doing something just to check it out, and getting sucked in.
He had plenty of examples of "what not to do" in his first 50 years of life. And he doesn't believe in therapy or psychiatrists.
Not going into my younger sister.....this has gotten to long, lol!
So, how does one classify this as a disease? Is it maybe just one's inability to cope? Is it self medicating for an underlying mental illness? Or is it just something stupid that someone does and the addictive properties of the substance make them a slave to it?
I believe it's more than a blanket statement by the AMA or psychiatrists at large. I think it's as personal and as individual as the life it takes over. Just my experience and my opinion....for what it's worth.
