Does being on sub make you "not clean"?

by Admin

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Author: DurhamDoc

Posted: Thu Nov 10, 2011 9:55 am

tearj3rker wrote:

DurhamDoc wrote:
I see that a lot of people have said some variation of this, but I feel it is worth repeating. One of the primary components of addiction is the nearly psychotic thinking that goes along with it. In fact, I think it is THE primary component. Regardless of the substance or behavior, once someone crosses into active addiction, they begin to think only in terms of satisfying the thing that their brain tells them they need to survive.

It’s definitely crazy thinking in some form. Psychosis is when people hallucinate, hear voices, suffer delusions, paranoia. It’s associated with schizophrenia / schizoaffective, and sometimes bipolar disorder. While addiction is its own form of obsessive insanity, I think psychosis is a different thing completely. However, if we are hooked on marijuana / meth / cocaine / hallucinogens etc, those drugs can send some people into psychosis.

I totally agree that addiction is different from the DSM concept of psychosis. On the other hand, I do think that active addictive thinking is characteristized by a break from reality. While there may not be bizarre delusions, I think drug-seeking, sex-seeking, or whatever becomes a delusion in itself once the addictive pattern has taken hold. In fact, in my experience, an active addict can have just as much delusional thinking as someone with a classic psychotic disorder like the ones you described. Of course everyone’s experiences are different, these are just my observations.

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