Addiction 101 | Raj Mehta | TEDxUofM

My name is Raj and I am an

addiction

killer. So what does that mean? I am not a friend of

addiction

s. So before we continue, am I allowed to tell the truth? Because in this part of my life I get into trouble. for telling the truth about things, so let's talk about addiction and what it is, but the most important thing is that I do all kinds of things. I'm a former heroin addict who crawled through the streets of Detroit over broken glass to eventually graduate. U of M with a 4.0 I'm here to break some stigmas okay people can change and thank them and people can change and do this for many of the people who didn't make it so when talking about addiction let's be honest with each other and go through different terrain, but it's really important that we have a basically holistic view of what addiction is and here's our first slide: addiction is not just the individual thing of the individual like a pebble falling into a pond well , when that pebble falls into the pond, it cascades outward and that impact has direct effects on that person's family, their friends, and their school, and as it cascades, it begins to impact the county in the city ​​and begins to cascade.

Find out where it starts to affect the state, the nation and the world. The bottom line is that addiction is a two-way, reciprocal relationship with the environment. The AG does not abuse drugs or alcohol in a vacuum, he comes and goes and is bi The directional relationship influences all this we have, it is called contradictory messages. America is in a constant state of ambivalence, feeling two ways about addiction, for example, we say drugs are illegal, but they are very easy to get, just try going. On Silk Road drugs are illegal, but we have kids who abuse, then get caught and get in trouble, so we have all these things that come and go, all these mixed messages, let's give an example of that.

I watch television and the United States. People and all kinds of things are talked about on television and it is a medium that somehow reinforces what our values ​​are supposed to be, so I watch politicians on television and I'm not stupid, but I can't understand some of them. their statements and politicians will say the same. Children are our future in the future as our children, so I'm thinking about it in terms of Ok, that must be very important to you what you're talking about, so we start talking about, well, let's look at the actionable results of that.

Does anyone in this room know how many places there are to lock up children in children's prisons in Michigan? Do you have any idea if a child misbehaves and commits a crime or gets caught with drugs? How many places in Michigan can lock them in maximum security prisons? facilities, well there are 40, there are 40 places to lock children up, let me ask you an important question: how many places are there for rehab for hospitalized children under the age of 18 in Michigan? You're not going to like this place with a waiting list of about 30 days and some The thing about this in a forty to one ratio about how you feel about kids is that it makes sense for us to talk about this, it's A kind of ambivalence that we talked about about the United States is also very unique, otherwise only two countries in the entire world allow prescription drugs.

To advertise on television there are now many countries in this world, so think about it, only the United States and New Zealand allow big pharma to advertise prescription drugs on television. I call it a mixed message, so it makes sense, let's move on to the next slide and talk. about the disease of addiction, has anyone ever heard of addiction being referred to as a disease? You must have heard that at some point now, so let's try to find out what that really means according to the American Medical Association for anything to be a disease that you must comply with. two criteria and those criteria are very simple you must have symptoms and it must be treatable how many a person goes to their doctor receives the results of their blood tests the doctor says this is the deal you have high blood sugar levels sir , you have diabetes, think about how that person is going to respond to your doctor well well doctor how do I treat this disease how do I deal with this disease the doctor says it was very simple we are going to give you insulin so that the diabetes complies with the disease model because it has symptoms and it is treatable the symptoms are high blood sugar and it is treatable with insulin let's go one step further imagine if your friend comes up to you and says I have the flu the flu virus I am very sick today I can't go to class, what are some of the symptoms you will look for in that person while they are standing in front of you?

That will tell you whether this person has the flu or not. Someone had some basic flu symptoms in their mind, congestion, fever. runny nose vomiting right, this person has, you know, physical symptoms that are obvious, that he is sick and then I tell you the truth, let's go in the same direction with the disease of addiction, but think about it from a more sophisticated model so that a person with stage one cancer goes on stage and they say I have stage one cancer, you can't really be sure they are sick, another person comes on stage and says I have stage four cancer, it's pretty obvious that person is very sick , so for illustration.

From this idea I think of the stereotypical homeless drug addict alcoholic, the guy who goes around begging for money in exchange for more drugs and alcohol. What is different about that man physically? Well, think about it, let's be honest. He doesn't look so. the good stuff doesn't smell as good and doesn't dress as nice those are signs and symptoms this guy isn't doing very well let's look at this a little more if i'm homeless and i'm hooked on drugs and alcohol What am I thinking all day? How do I get more drugs? Where do I get more alcohol?

I have a fifth in my hand. What am I thinking, where is the next fifth coming from? I'm a heroin addict with a pocket full of heroin walking down the alley, what am I thinking? Where do I get more heroin? So over a period of time I have this obsession with the drug and the obsessions go untreated as your mind keeps ruminating over and over again which develops anxiety and anxiety which if left untreated will turn into depression like this. that here I am, a homeless drug addict with a drug obsession, a lot of anxiety and a lot of depression, but other than that, let's speculate together for a person to become homeless in America, must have burned a lot of bridges mom and dad must have told them right to their face we're done with you their friends and family the kids they grew up with said we're done with you the employer said we're done with you to get to that process to go to that rock bottom what must have happened in At some point that person must have made a lot of promises Imagine this I realized I have a drug problem I tell someone I have a drug problem I have an alcohol problem I promise to stop That person is looking right at them eyes and the worst part of the story is that at that moment I want to say that deep down I want to say that in my heart I really want to stop.

I won't do this again tomorrow if If I kept making promises to you and I really meant them and I kept breaking those promises, how would I feel about myself? Does anybody have an idea? Well, I have lower self-esteem, I have lower self-confidence, I have lower self-efficacy and, like, I'm starting to feel very bad about myself. I have high levels of anxiety. High levels of depression. What do you think I'm going to do all day to make those feelings go away? It makes sense, so let's talk about the social signs of the disease. addiction we talk about crying moms we talk about legal signs of addiction the police intervene on all kinds of drug charges we talk about the financial symptoms of addiction and even the spiritual ones turning good men into bank robbers turning good women into prostitutes watching the flu is very easy to treat it only has physical symptoms, addiction is very difficult to treat, it has physical symptoms, mental symptoms, legal symptoms, financial symptoms and spiritual symptoms, they all occur simultaneously, but the main symptom of addiction is the inability to get high successfully.

No, I'm not challenging anyone on this. space to go out and try to use heroin successfully that's not what I'm saying, what I'm trying to indicate is that when a person has a drug or alcohol problem they start to have problems when they use it, for example, if when they abuse drugs and alcohol your liver starts to fail you are not doing it right if when you use drugs and alcohol you start having mental health problems you are probably an addict if when you get high your mom starts crying your wife starts crying your brother starts cry, you probably have an addiction problem, if when you take drugs, the police keep showing up, there could be a problem there, and if when you take drugs, you start to break your spiritual values, your morals, your belief system, there could be a problem What's happening is that it makes sense, so we talk on a micro level about this inability to get high successfully and this is basically called addiction, it's a biopsychosocial disease that is underpinned by damage and dysfunction in the brain's reward feedback loop, essentially. that precious piece of the most valuable real estate in the world, the mind has been hijacked and I can illustrate this with the three C's: the cravings they try to control and the consequences.

Addicts have intense cravings for drugs and alcohol. If you want to know what those cravings feel like, I can do that. I give you an experiment, please take Oxitec pants and swallow the whole box and then use your willpower to not go to the bathroom for two days. This is what cravings feel like for an addict or alcoholic. We talk about those intense cravings, those urges, and how powerful they are. The second C is related to trying to control their consumption at some point when a person abuses drugs and alcohol, they want to try to consume less with different people, not use that drug over and over again and their failed control influences the whole. stigma and damage to the psyche the final C are the consequences when addicts who have used drugs and alcohol experience serious consequences over a period of time and those consequences can include death and long-term incarceration.

That makes sense, since we have 2.2 million people in the United States. in jail or prison, that's more than any other country in the world, that is, more than China and India combined, and 75% fewer people are alcoholics and addicts and everyone knows that the United States is 5% of the world's population, but we can assume that 40% of the world's illegal drugs think about that 5% consume them 40% The United States is 5% of the world's population that we consume 99% of the vicodin produced in the world Wow, that's amazing, let's talk about policies and things that really influence and promote addiction, is everyone in this room aware of that? being caught with zero to 50 grams of any controlled substance is a felony, so powder residue on a cocaine mirror is a felony, carrying an adderall and your pocket doesn't belong to you, that's a felony, carrying an addendum that doesn't belong to you as a felony charge, so let's call it was a hypothetical scenario as a Sodom U of M student and I'm walking around and I haven't been studying for my test and I kind of blew the test, one of my friends says to me, hello Raj.

You have a lot. You have 24 hours of study. How are you going to do that? Well, I'm going to take some Adderall, so I swallow a couple of Adderall. I keep one in my pocket for good luck. Well, I've finished my work. and take my exam and the next day I want to celebrate with a beer sound drinking a beer on campus and suddenly the campus police show up and say, "Hey young man, what's that in your pocket? Don't worry, officer , that's just an Adderall that my friend gave me for my test now I have a felony charge so I have a felony conviction in case you don't know that with a felony charge and a felony conviction you can't even working at McDonald's you can't even get a student loan and now I'm ready for this language, going down the ladder to the stigma and despair of addiction is that to make sense we talk about things and when I bring up the idea that addiction at a macro level it is a systemic failure it is a failure in the institutions, organizations and policies that drive and promote addiction over and over again there is a famous story about the starfish on the shore a mother and her daughter came to the beach and They saw thousands of starfish being washed ashore and they began to look at this and the daughter also saw it and they began to observe how a starfish began to die, the logo began to pick up the starfish one by one and throw them back into the water, mom is looking at this and rolling her eyes.

She says honey, it doesn't matter, there are so many starfish there, it doesn't have any consequences and Dar looks at her mom and she says, well mom, I said once they come back,You go on, I'm saying it matters to the individual, it matters to their family, but now we have to stem the tide, we have to stem the tide that is rising, so instead of looking at addiction from this criminal model instead of looking at addiction From the lens of crime, let's start looking at addiction through the lens of a mental health issue. as a mental health disorder is that having sense fortune favors the bold thanks for your time