Agreed, very harsh, but as far as I can tell her or his opinion is valid as the rest of ours are. We are an open forum, after all. Then again, I just got out the hospital after having part of my large intestine removed, and tripped ballz on iboga yesterday, and I'm still kinda feeling it, so take any advice I give here with the required grain of salt.
EDIT: Ahh, now I see the problem. PM coming you way. NO BICKERING ALOID here BLOKES! And I say it with respect for our forum here, our community. We don't need more bigots, we need more large minded peoples.
TPD - I hope you're okay!!! How long is recovery time for your surgery? I wasn't aware you were having issues - was this something that you've been betting for a while or was it sudden?
I totally agree with you, addiction is a disease and there is a medical code for that sort of problem. Just like you said, different from others, when we use drugs or drink, your brain will react differently and if you don't have the support, either from doctors or friends, supporting groups, etc, your mind will go back to day one after you have quit drinking or doing drugs. By 'rewiring' your brain you'll be powerless and your judgement will be affected regardless of the amount. You can manage it for a couple of weeks but there's no good ending from there.
I'm not a huge fan of AA as I have also mentioned before, although I do believe we need some sort of outside support with people who has gone through similar problems. Sharing is therapeutic and by venting your issues with a group that knows how you feel can make you feel a lot better, especially if you are having cravings or during times when depression has got a grand part of your days.
I didn't buy into the addiction as a disease until I was a late stage alcoholic. I always thought it was a mental health issue yes, but not a disease per se like mono etc. However, once you hit late stage it does absolutely have very real and extreme physical manifestations, and by that point the brain has been severely altered, which takes
an incredible amount of time to recover from, if recovery is possible as there is point where one has incurred to much damage.
It does technically fit the disease model, but I think it's imperative to catch it as early as possible, before one suffers physically. In early stages it should be treated as a mental health issue as I believe addiction is a symptom of mental health and not a stand alone health issue in itself. If there wasn't a mental component then we wouldn't use to our own detriment and /or possibly death.
By 'rewiring' your brain you'll be powerless and your judgement will be affected regardless of the amount. You can manage it for a couple of weeks but there's no good ending from there.
I agree. I think this is where "powerlessness" comes in. I think once somebody is in late stage addiction there is a lot of damage that hs been done and you no longer have the clarity or rationality to control yourself. In my experience, I didn't want to be addicted but I quite literally couldn't stop on my own. The biofeedback from withdrawal was telling my brain I was going to die if I didn't drink and that overrode rationale. Of course, this was late stage alcoholism, I didn't have those sensations early on. I knew that I wouldn't be able to quit on my own and the only thing I could do to break the cycle was to check into rehab.
I think many people don't agree with this because they haven't gotten to the later stages on addiction, and cannot relate so they assume it's an excuse. Unfortunately, there's not a lot of compassion for addicts in general, and sometimes in our own communities. The lack of compassion and "just quit" mentality is so damaging to addicts trying to get healthy as it just perpetuates the addiction cycle by implying that addiction is a moral failing.
There are underlying issues that need to be resolved in order to successfully achieve sobriety and often those take a backseat to the addiction that people get stuck in the stop start cycle of using because their only focus is quitting, meanwhile the pain from the mental health piece continues to build, self confidence decreases, and depression from continuous failing keeps the addict trapped.
I think addiction needs more acceptance and compassion from society in general. It's happened with obesity and the mechanisms of obesity are pretty similar to addiction with respect to underlying issues prompting over eating as a form of self medication. At any rate, not certain in will happen and time soon as there is such a stigma to addiction, and legal penalties a severe which just serve to perpetuate the stigma.