Where Addiction Meets Your Brain

Many individuals have a history of injection drug use and are at risk for Hepatitis C.

It is my belief that escape is at the heart of all addiction. Brene Brown points out in her book "Daring Greatly," shame and guilt are fostered by our attempts to escape our feelings. She identifies three primary ways of escaping feelings.

One of the problems that I see frequently is patients with cross addiction, specifically those who are also being given “legitimate” prescription medications such as stimulants, benzodiazepines, opiates for bona fide symptoms.

Regarding oneself as important is a cornerstone for any of the behaviors mentioned above to happen.

If through therapy, AA, life experiences or a kind word, the addicted person comes to a place of self-validation and acceptance of their feelings, sobriety and a full life.

The dopamine dysregulation in the limbic system of the brain seen in addiction is not able to tell the difference between addictive drugs.

If, however, you are having a problem with your use like the other people that I see every day, we are here to help you.

People with BPD or borderline tendencies are demanding, hard on themselves and others, and in constant life crises. Here's how to help.

The answer is not whether to provide adequate pain relief. That is a given. There is no reason that anyone with addiction should be made to suffer needlessly. If we know that someone is going to suffer post-surgical pain or a similar level of pain for other reasons, the patient with addiction should be treated as one would treat anyone.

As more and more receptors build in the brain, more drugs, alcohol, and nicotine are needed to bring the person to a state of calm.

The more you use and the younger you start, the more the effect of the drug. And the effect of the drug is very simply to make you unmotivated and emotionally flat.

Untangling the triangles of addicted families can be a full-time job. Since one grows up in a family with a history and a present reality, as a child, one’s major frame of reference is the family constellation and the culture that goes along with it.

The problem with the mood alteration is that it doesn’t solve the problem. It just buys some time until the next stress, fear, craving or symptom occurs.

I argue that if someone can use an addictive substance without compulsive use then they are not an addict.

I like to think of it, projective identification, as an attempt by the person one is working with to inject you with a hypodermic and give you some of their soul whether you want it or not.

So the opiate problem is not solved. There is no perfect drug or therapy, but it is still a certainty that the use of street heroin or synthetic opiates is extremely lethal... So the opiate problem is not solved. There is no perfect drug or therapy, but it is still a certainty that the use of street heroin or synthetic opiates is extremely lethal.

After The Harrison Act was ratified, it was the beginning of the DEA and the “Controlled Substances” legislations. Again, although well meaning, this effectively drove addicted patients underground, and the black market for opiates began.

One of the more controversial issues in addiction medicine is the practice of opiate replacement therapy, or ORT. It is important to understand the history of ORT if we are to begin to understand how it should or should not be used.

Relapse is a fact of addiction. Sobriety is something of a miracle when you think of all the forces that operate against being clean and sober. Yet sobriety happens.

Understanding automatic behavior frees us to do the next right thing by staying in the present rather than worrying about the future or being shamed or guilty about the past.