I don't believe that my daughter was experimenting when she became an addict. I know that she was clinically depressed and suffered from anxiety and wanted relief. Just recently I went through a bout with terrible anxiety. It got so bad that it was affecting my life. I went to the doctor and was put on medication for it. I don't like the feeling when I first take it because I feel high. I have always hated not feeling normal, but the anxiety was so great that I was not feeling normal anyway. My medication is not supposed to be addicting and I know that I won't abuse it. My daughter thought that she had found a solution to her problems when she snorted that first oxy. She told me it did not make her high, it just made her feel normal. Now she uses to not be sick and to not feel the destruction that she has caused. So there is something in her brain that is different from the something in my brain. I don't like the feeling of being high, she sees it as making her normal. The one thing I do know since this anxiety attack is I have so much more compassion for her. And now she has put herself into that vicious cycle where she uses to reduce the depression and anxiety and when she stops the depression and anxiety become overwhelming. I don't know the answer to her addiction but I know it was not a choice for her to become an addict. It was more self-preservation, self-medicating. So I believe in the chemical imbalance theory of addiction. And since we say that anxiety is a disease and I believe that chemical imbalances can cause that, then I say that people who are self-medicating have a disease. A disease called addiction. Multi-layered needing a multi-layered approach. Hugs, Marle