GarryW,
Thank you for your response. I really appreciate it. I see things differently than you, but am more than willing to reconsider my own beliefs because in order to understand my brother I need to know what is true, and not what I think is true. You have been through addiction so your experience far outweighs my own thinking. In order to better understand what you have written I’d like to respond..
Originally Posted by GaryW
We also acknowledge that an addict that doesn't want to stop using will not stop using. They can be preached to, counseled, incarcerated, prayed over, beaten, analyzed, reasoned with and threatened...they will not stop until they are ready to. The best way to help a person seeking recovery is to be available for them when they become willing. The key is that they have to seek the help...not have it forced upon them.
That makes sense to me. However, I’ve read that many addicts decide to quit after a simple intervention by a doctor. So I hang on to the belief that maybe I’ll say something that someday will be helpful to my brother to maybe speed up the process for him to decide he is ready. He must be ready, but it seems to me that the decision to quit is a rational one based on the cost vs. the benefit and it seems that loving discussions might help tip the balance toward making the costs of quitting less and the benefits greater.
Originally Posted by GaryW
There is a major difference between a user, an abuser and an addict. Users and abusers have choice and preference, addicts don't. Once one becomes addicted to a substance, using said substance isn't optional...it's required. An addict who is in active addiction needs no logic, reason or belief to use. The disease of addiction is made up of 3 components (or factors): obsession, compulsion & total self-centeredness. Obsession is the mental preoccupation, or "fixed idea" of getting and using. Some even refer to it as a mental disease. Compulsion is the inability to stop using once one has started. And total self-centeredness piece is lacking the ability to see anything other than what is desired. In NA, self-centeredness is referred to as the spiritual aspect because we lose the ability to feel (for ourselves or others).
While I believe that the 3 components are major, I have a hard time accepting that once a person is addicted choice disappears, for two reasons. First, many addicts do make a choice to stop using when they get clean. If they had no ability to stop then that couldn’t happen. Second, according to the book Heavy Drinking research has shown that even the most severe alcoholics will choose to either not drink at all or to stop drinking after the first drink IF enough incentives are offered. That is true even if they are suffering withdrawal symptoms. So, it appears to me that the 3 factors make the addiction APPEAR to be out of control and make the exercise of choice VERY difficult, but they don’t actually result in a complete inability to stop using. For these reasons it seems to me that the differences between a user, an abuser, and an addict are primary ones of the DEGREE to which choice is made more difficult because the strength of the 3 factors you mention becomes greater over time.
I'm not sure how you're asserting that drugs cause pain. Withdrawal from drugs can cause pain, I understand that fully well. Receiving less pleasure only results in using a higher dosage or combining drugs to achieve a desired effect. I'm also unsure how consequences can provide pleasure of any kind, let alone "less pleasure." Acquiring a desire to stop using generally requires an addict to experience what is called a "bottom." This can differ from addict to addict and sometimes it can be something as simple as the loss of a job or relationship….
I can’t think of examples of drugs causing pain (except maybe overdose or sickness), but I’ve heard that the pleasure from using can decrease as the addiction gets worse, and the positive consequences from using (the rush, the inhibition, the sexual excitement, etc..) can be increasingly balanced out with the negative consequences--all the losses that come with it-like a job or relationship, which you mention. It seems to me that quitting is a choice that depends on these kinds of factors. The flipside to me is that using is therefore a choice that depends on the same kinds of factors--which can be many things.
My original
4. Craving is nothing more than the mind associating using with pleasure or relief from pain. Therefore, anything that changes one's thinking--whether that be a new environment certain drugs, new activities, new uses of the body (changes in sensations affects our thinking)--ie eating, sleep, exercise, etc.., or using techiques to think differently--affect the level of craving.
Your response:
The same applies here: cravings depend on the addict and their drug of choice. So we're in agreement except about the environment part because cravings can go far beyond being solely a mental thing...they can have physical aspects as well.
I think we may be saying the same thing, but ultimately the physical factors which affect craving, only work when one’s brain is involved in some way. For example, we can say that an advertisement for Budweiser triggers a strong craving, so the environment is critical. However, the advertisement only triggers cravings when a person sees it and thinks about it--even if the thought is very fleeting, and the same advertisement may affect a person differently under different circumstances.
My opinion is that you cannot get him to open up. If he wanted to discuss his addiction with you, he would. Your conclusions about why he doesn't may be on point, but on the other hand - he may just not be ready and nothing you can do can make him ready. I feel the best you can do is ensure that he knows that you love him and will be there for him when he decides to open up. He'll remember and appreciate it when the time comes.
Thank you Gary. Please don’t see my response as intending to be argumentative. I just want to get to the truth. Thanks again,
ted