Glenjo99

Reading a really good book by Bessel Van der Kolk at the moment, called The body keeps the score.

​​​​​​Its about Trauma, big or small and how we store it in our bodies. I was thinking how appropriate it is for many people on this forum as being in a relationship or experiencing an addicts behaviour can be very traumatic. I know on many occassions when the addict popped back up in my life, my body went right into anxiety, shaking and causing me to feel out of sync. Obviously my body, had kept the score and stored my previous experiences with him, and his reappearing triggered those memories again. I ignored it a lot of the time because I was unsure what the anxiety meant! I wanted to believe something that wasn't real. I now know I deserve only the best, a healthy relationship with myself first and foremost and eventually with someone secure, kind and caring.

​​​​​​I find it fascinating that we can be carrying around these types of trauma without any awareness, and can put it down to other things. Our bodies are amazing. I intend getting better at listening to mine. Heinsight is great and if I had listened to mine earlier and truly trusted it I would not have experienced so many new hurts, but I am where I am. The book also talks about therapy and the benefits of yoga in releasing trauma.

Self care is so important, particularly when one is prone to those memories and feelings of fear/anxiety.

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August252015

What a great post - so very true, for any of us caught in addiction & families with it, and other trauma.

I certainly see it over the years, in myself and my parents and I can't reverse the toll but am grateful to be able to take care of myself now.

CRRHCC

Gabor Mate (author and addiction specialists) talks about childhood trauma being the source of all addictions. There is a lot of truth in his philosophy.

On a personal note, after more than 4 decades of drinking and drugging, I have learned that addictions are caused by one overwhelming emotion, "Feeling intolerably helpless." These feelings are precipitated by circumstances that make me feel trapped, powerless and lacking control. I use to regain control of my feelings with quick fixes and mood changers of drugs and booze. Now I regain control of my same feelings with more health behaviors that empower me and are of high value to me. (something I enjoy or anything besides the drink or drugs).

What I really want is a sense of control. What I really seek is not a drink, a drug, but a sense of empowerment, especially in the face of feeling overwhelmed, helpless, trapped and powerless.

Glenjo99

So interesting to hear it from both sides. I've heard that lot of addicts cannot regulate emotions the way non addicts may. What are your healthy behaviours that help you control your feelings, if you don't mind sharing?

trailmix

Funny, I woke up with a great headache today and opened F&F and yours is the first post I see.

I know exactly where this headache is coming from, now I need to solve that. bah, humbug.

Thanks for this post GJ.

Mango212

Thanks, Glenjo! As I allow awareness of these things --- mind/body/spirit/muscle memory/etc. -- the easier it is to recover.

AutumnMama

This may sound weird, but i have tried to embrace the anxiety that my body sends me when I'm around my qualifiers. I spent so long trying to ignore it, trying to 'will it away.' What I was really doing was telling myself that my feelings weren't true or important.

Now I recognize it as my body saying (sometimes screaming!) that "this person hurt you" or "I don't trust this person"

What I'm struggling with is if my body's response is in proportion to the actual threat level of the qualifier. Because I also recognize the anxiety sometimes when I'm around people that I am just meeting for the first time--is my body sensing something that I haven't rationally picked up on yet?

pdm22

Last year I went on a trip with a friend. Her addict ex found her on Social Media, after 17 years, and she got swept up all over again, and planned this trip to see him, and I went with her as a support. On the flight over there I got this horrible migraine.

The flight attendant even noticed, I must have been green , she was like “it’s okay honey, we’ll be landing soon”. I must have looked a fright. The ex played games the whole time we were there, telling her he was on his way, then kept blowing her off. She and I both ended up being sick the whole time, she actually almost passed out on me a few times. She never actually saw him. And a week later, she was back to talking to him!! Which just goes to show you how deep and pervasive this stuff can be.

And yeah, the body knows. Maybe we are born with this, but I think my instincts were developed/ honed in the home environment I grew up in too; when my stomach starts tingling or I get a bad “gut” reaction to someone, even if it’s someone I just met, I know that’s my inner “higher self” (or whatever you want to call it), warning me about something. It’s important to take pause when that happens. In my experience, that kind of thing usually means something.

Glenjo99

Your welcome Trailmix, hope you got it sorted.

Glenjo99

That's interesting isn't it. I too have experienced that feeling around people I have just met. From what I have learned recently, I decide to trust my body in this and not chance it. When the addict who was in my life reappeared last Nov after 5 months dissappearing, my body went into a state of anxiety for a whole week I kid you not! Even after that I still ignored it to an extent.

Never again!

Glenjo99

Sorry to hear about your friend, that was horrible to do that to her. I tool believe these feelings, we're developed in early childhood, and when we meet certain adults that trigger a similar response in us, it's familiar. I have learned, familiar isn't necessarily good.

CRRHCC

In my opinion, one could argue that all addictions stem from lack of emotional control. EQ is a buzz word these days in business and psychology. Eq is your emotional IQ. Eq is using your emotions to work for you instead of against you. "A fool vents all their feelings but a wise person holds them in check." Proverbs 29:11.

The behaviors I use to empower myself and regain control over intolerable feelings are exercise (ride a road bike 4 days a week), reading, journaling and most of all my personal relationship with Jesus Christ. When your values trump your addiction, there is no addiction! No rocket science here. Just an understanding of human psychology and the synergy of behavior science and scripture and applying it to oneself.

AnvilheadII

i am not arguing that many/most addictions do stem from some earlier trauma/issue. however there are also drugs that are so powerful, that even when taken in small amounts or for a valid prescribed medical reason, can become addictive without any underlying causes. and they are as difficult to get off of as any other substance, for any other reason.

we could look at the opioid epidemic....there is no way that suddenly "everyone" with childhood issues got hooked on oxy, fentanyl, heroin. they are just such powerful drugs that it doesn't take much to get hooked. and once you're hooked, you're hooked.

CRRHCC

No one gets addicted to a substance or behavior unless they have learned it does something for them. Addictive behavior always serves and emotional purpose and that purpose is usually to escape the trap of feeling helpless. Addicts have learned to empower themselves and regain control of how they feel, with a displaced quick fix or mood changer of substances and other behaviors. Non-addicts empower themselves and regain control of their feelings by facing them directly or replacing them with a more direct healthy high-value behavior.

AnvilheadII

of course the fact that these powerful drugs DO something for the user is why they are willing to do it again. however, they don't do so to GET addicted......i think this report sums it up:

https://abcnews.go.com/Health/fentan..._headlines_hed

excerpt: Last month, a study published in JAMA Network Open revealed that the number of opioid-related deaths in the United States has more than quadrupled in the past 18 years. The opioid epidemic has come in three waves, according to the study, with the third and current wave being tied to the increased use of what the study authors call illicitly manufactured synthetic opioids, including drugs like fentanyl.

pdm22

The book is over 20 years old now, not sure if anyone here is familiar with it, but The Angry Heart: Overcoming Borderline and Addictive Disorders, goes over this. They have a “trauma scale”, all of the things that are traumatizing for a child. Some are things beyond a caregiver’s control. At the top of the scale are things like sexual, physical, and emotional abuse. The death of a parent or a loved one; watching someone else in the house get abused, a parent’s addiction, moving around a lot...all sorts of things.

Anyways, they do get into what happens during the HS, college “partying” experiences, and how some people get addicted simply because they had no idea how addictive some substances are. They were hanging out with friends and going along with whatever partying was going on, and unwittingly slipped into addiction. I believe they said if you don’t really have a history of trauma, your recovery may not be the same as for someone who does. But it’s been a while since I read the book, I’d have to find the passage in the book that went over this.

However, it was written before the days of the opioid epidemic, and psychiatric drugs coming on the scene to the extent they are now. Also these days the heavier drugs are no longer just in the big cities, they’ve really spread like a cancer, so there’s that. Other scenarios happen too, but I do think many people are getting addicted by taking drugs as prescribed. And often have no idea what kind roller coaster ride they may have signed up for. Or things like ambien or “seroquel for sleep”, and what happens to them/ the horrible withdrawal when they try to stop. Psychiatrist Peter Breggin has some great info on this. The article on what happened to Whitney Houston and the Xanax is a good one.

Givenup2018

I guess the body mirrors what it has been through. We all suffer a form of PTSD living with an addict imo. The anxiety, the numbness, the uncertainty of what is going to happen, the fear, the anger at being helpless, the avoidance, reminders of the events we have had to endure............no wonder the body remembers! The emotional being goes back for more but the physiological being says 'enough' and wants out.

Glenjo99

Great way of putting it. That would be the cognitive dissonance. It's when the emotional being has enough is so important but can take a long time.

CRRHCC

There is a reason why millions of Americans are addicts. Dr. Arnold Washton states "The inner disease that makes us so vulnerable to addiction, seems to originate in our belief system, for the beliefs we hold about ourselves, others, and the world around us determine to a large degree our feelings, personality, and outward behavior."

Bottom line is that when folks think that life should be fair, easy, painless and we should always get what we want, chemical abuse is often used as a viable antidote. In retrospect, this is exactly what I believed. The problem is, that when the addictive personality believes that life should be easy, fair and painless! When we allow ourselves to think in this, "entitled," fashion, we lower our threshold to adversity, to feeling frustrated, helpless and overwhelmed. If we insist on avoiding emotional pain, on being comfortable all the time, we will seek ways to avoid reality, to escape our negative mood. With respect to addictive thinking, this type of corrupted belief system is the very core of addictive thinking and can lead to attempting to regain control with a, "Quick fix or mood changer," of drugs and or other errant behaviors, all designed to change the way we feel emotionally.