Why can't an addict just stop using?

imbabura I have been working in the field of

addict

ion for over 30 years and what I want to do this afternoon is try to help you answer a question that most of you have asked, maybe you didn't say it out loud, maybe Yeah. He did, but most family members of

addict

s, most people who care about the Attic alcoholic at some point in the progression of the addiction, and I'll remind you of this several times, addiction is always progressive, it always gets worse. at some point in that progression. The friend's family member will begin to ask themselves a very reasonable question and the question is simply this, why don't you

stop

?

It means a very reasonable question that you asked the wife sees her husband drinking, I mean, there is no question in his Drinking is affecting the marriage, but maybe it is also affecting his job, ca

using

him work problems, legal problems or problems. of health. I mean, anyone could clearly see that her drinking is ca

using

multiple problems, not so much for her but for him, and yet he continues to drink. It doesn't make any sense to her, her husband comes home at lunchtime unexpectedly. He has two daughters, ages 2 and 4, who play in the front yard at first.

These girls don't see him, so he

just

sits in the car with the doors ajar and is waiting. His wife passes by and leaves for five minutes, she hasn't left the door yet, so he gets out of the car and walks towards the house. His girls see him coming running and daddy, daddy, you hug your girls and he asked the four-year-old, where is your mother? and she shrugged. How odd. She puts him in the car, locks him up and enters the house. Hollard is sure that his wife, if she doesn't respond, goes upstairs, yells at him upstairs, but there is no response, she goes downstairs. screaming in the backyard, that has a terrible restriction, no response, now he is getting very worried, he runs back to the house to go to his car, grab his phone to call 911 and when he crosses the threshold of the front door, goes to class behind the front door. and there on the couch behind the front door his wife is sleeping the next thing he sees are the pills on the floor next to her he grabs her by the shirt Shh she as loud as she can her eyes open he screams at her you promised me you wouldn't would you do more of this you gave me your word I'm not going to put up with this I'm over this I think he'd take that bottle of pills he shakes it in his face he tells him if you ever take another one of these stupid pills I'll leave you I'm going to pick up those two girls at the car with me and you will never see him again he takes the bottle storms outside the house he gets into his car he takes his daughters to his mother's house and returns to work he leaves his wife there devastated she has never felt so humiliated in her life she's not crying she's sobbing sobbing sobbing sobbing forty-five minutes pass she finally starts to pull herself together and in addition to being in touch with the shame and shame that she feels she gets in touch with a little bit of anger he can't do that you know I'm her mother there is no way he can take my girl away from me she gets up she goes up the stairs she walks in and goes into the closet she goes in the laundry basket she throws up the dirty clothes she gives him another hot air bottle of hydrocodone and takes two T minutes ago her husband told her I will guide you and I will take the girls with me.

He did it and she knows what he meant. If you take more pills and she takes two, that is illogical, it is irrational and that is the type of behavior with which family members face each other day after day, why don't you

stop

doing it? Well, it's normal when it comes to irrational people. behavior to try to rationalize it and family members do that, you know, maybe it's this job, maybe it's this stress, maybe it's all the housework and childcare, they start looking for reasons and then as they continue to look for reasons, and nothing. Does it make any sense, believe it or not, more often than you think, the family member starts to think well, maybe it's me, maybe it's my fault, I know it's true because in 1978 I was addicted to pills. the pain.

I have been addicted for about a year. I

just

stopped taking them for a while and then they started taking them again and they stopped taking them for a while and started taking this is a Saturday morning. I have been taking it. I have been taking it since Monday. I was going to work and my wife stopped taking it. I stood at the door and she looked me in the eyes and said: you're taking those pills again, right? Do you know what I said? No, I'm so disappointed in either of them, you'd even ask me that question.

I wasn't going to take those pills anymore, so I kept my house, I said the surgery was half a day. I got home at 12:30 walking through a sliding glass door, she was in her chair in a small family room and the first thing I saw was a jar. of pills in her hand that she had cleverly hidden and a utility room behind the garage she will never find it here where she found it there they were every time this happened before she asked me about taking pills she accused me of taking pills I would lie To her I couldn't lie to him anymore.

Every time it happened, she criticized me, you know, she yelled at me and yelled at me, so when I saw the pills bought, that's what I was ready for, but my eyes went away from the pills. I went up to his face instead of seeing that angry look I was prepared for my wall was up instead of seeing that look I saw tears running down his face well his mother had been sick and my first thought was that something happened I said well it's your mom She said mom, she says, I just figured this out this morning, let's do what you're talking about, she said, I know when you take these pills you know I can look at you and I know you lied to me, but I can look at you and I know.

When you're taking these pills and I know you didn't take this before we got married tell me what I'm doing wrong I know you must be disappointed in me This happened in 1978 I know you must be disappointed in me Tell me what you want me to do I'll do anything This very bright young woman The only logical reasons he could think of for taking these pills and risking my job, risking my license, risking my life, was that it had to be his fault and that's a true story. and she's not the only one, you know, spouses often face this, almost always parents, do you know that when we have a young person who comes in for addiction treatment, invariably the parent will say what would be wrong and I understand that I am a father, what do I have? three adult children and when one of our children starts having problems our first response is my precious bosses, where are they wrong?

Would you believe that sometimes kids think it's their fault that we had this parent in treatment for the son who isn't 17? I was a smart guy. athletic came to the family workshop and told me dr. Brewer, do you think about being the starting quarterback? My dad would have come to my games instead of drinking with his friends. Do you think he was ashamed of me because I was the backup quarterback? What might surprise my family members in this room because you've probably never heard of it? I know I've never seen it, almost always at some point in the progression and I remember that addiction is progressive, almost always at some point in that progression the alcoholic or the addict will reach the point where they will tell themselves why and it will stop.

I never said that. I would say things like, "You think I'm a drug addict. I'm a doctor. Doctors don't get addicted to drugs. I've gone to medical school. Have you gone to medical school? I take these pills when I have headaches." back". I'm not a drug addict, don't you remember? You know, last month when I stopped taking drugs for two weeks. Drugged eyes can't stop doing drugs as those words came out of my mouth into the depths of my soul. I was asking the same thing she was asking. because I got to the point where I didn't want to take pills anymore, honestly, I didn't want to take it anymore, but I couldn't seem to stop anything else in my life that I had set out to do.

I made it, I mean, I decide I want to be a doctor and my father had a disability. I had to work two jobs. I went to high school for two medical school jobs, but I really wanted to be a doctor. That is what I want. what to do I set out to really want to stop taking these pills and I couldn't seem to do it and I didn't understand why now to be fair when I started taking pills I didn't want to stop the first time taking pills in 1978 I had back surgery when I was 19 years old and sometimes I had some pain in my back.

Hello, I was going through a particularly difficult time and I went to the doctor who operated on me back then, they didn't do MRIs or CT scans. What he did was examine me and said, I don't think you have another ruptured disc. I think she has scar tissue, so she gave me some exercises to do and then she wrote a prescription notebook and Patti wrote me some pain pills and said the pain gets really bad, can you take one of these pills, well, I They filled the prescription on Medscape, you didn't think about it for a month, you didn't even think about it, I woke up with the money in the morning, my back was killing me I was actually having trouble moving it hurt so much I had a busy day at the office that day there's no way I couldn't go oh I think a pain pill so I wouldn't take a pain pill boy ready for work doctor work 45 minutes later I discovered living better through chemistry when that pain pill hit my brain made me feel like I had never felt before that made me feel great I bought you early your fork had energy you were able to relieve the pain but that still wasn't the case you know, I felt great I was in a good mood all day I was kind with the patient even kind to the nurses who were not at home I was kind to my wife this is great this is wonderful I got up the next day and came back down here, but my back didn't hurt.

I didn't think about taking another pain pill. A couple more weeks passed, maybe a month later. The same situation. I got up in the morning on a Monday we had had. It was already a busy weekend, I'll take another pain pill, you know what happened, the same thing eased the pain, but it also gave me this energy in this year for you that I've never had before over the course of the next few months. , some days. I'd wake up and my back would hurt a little, so I'd take a pain pill, of course, and some days I'd wake up and my back wouldn't really hurt, but guess what I'd say to myself: I can't afford my back. . for her today I'm very busy I have a lot to do I'm a busy doctor so I would take pills for the pain in my back it wouldn't hurt but over time like I did with you to take the pills they didn't seem to work well enough as I took more and more and more and more until finally six months later I was down here all the time what wasn't working didn't make me feel good anymore I was in this dysphoric world The whole time I was trying to get back to normal, what was it like trying to get high?

I wasn't trying to feel good. I just wanted to feel normal every morning. I woke up on the last day. I was taking these. Stupid pills that I'm not going to take anymore, this is the last day, but you know, I have a couple left over in case my back tomorrow the dog takes it the next morning, I have to choose those two pills and go to the pharmacy every days. be life I got to the point where I honestly didn't want to take it and couldn't stop. Not everyone is like me. I basically started taking drugs because I like the way they made me feel, many, many people are treated.

Over the years, due to addiction, I started drinking or using drugs to relieve pain, not the kind of pain I had, the physical pain I would have all the time, but maybe some severe physical pain, like a group of migraines or spinal stenosis pain. They feel extreme unbearable pain all the time and start using drugs, including alcohol, including alcohol to cure that pain, but most commonly, people who start using drugs because of emotional pain do not start drinking or using. drugs to get high. start drinking and using drugs to try not to suffer so much. An example would be if you lose someone who is important to you, someone dies if that has ever happened to you and most of you know a father, a grandfather, a brother and then someone.

God forbid a child someone who is a part of your life certainly was taken away from you you know what it feels like it feels like a part of you has been ripped away honestly it feels like you have a hole inside and that hole is the absence of it emotional connection with that person who is gone, but you wake up in the morning and that hole is there and the pain is there and maybe there is some anger and maybe even some guilt is there and it is there all day and you you go to bed at night and hopefully, maybe in the morning I'll feel better, you wake up the next morning, it's still there, a lot of people started using drugs, they start drinking because they are in intense emotional pain and they find that the drug takes away that pain, but you know, the next day, during the pain, again it has to be the loss of someone through death, it could be the loss of someone through mental illness andThey understand the sound, they just receive it, so they release chemicals and these chemicals are called neurotransmitters and these neurotransmitters are released and activate the next neuron, which stimulates an electrical charge.

They rise to activate the cell bodies in the processing cells. auditory processing cells those are cells that interpret the sound but they don't remember anything so they were these neurotransmitters that go and activate the memory cells and this is instantaneous at this moment my brain is telling me what to say your brain is listening, understanding and remembering some of what I say and those are all calls controlled by the neurotransmitters in my brain and the neurotransmitters in your brain. Dero transmitters control everything we do, so, mad, they are neurotransmitters, yeah, well, I'm so hungry. I have to have someone who is in your old transmitters when you remember a memory that are neurotransmitters, emotions or neurotransmitters, there were dozens of different neurotransmitters and some neurotransmitters have multiple purposes.

Neurotransmitters involved in memory are also involved in long-term memory and emotional control. Your long-term memory, so the neurotransmitters involved in emotions are also involved. In long-term memory, I doubt there's anyone here old enough to remember it, but when Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas, someone there let me know that he was in ninth grade, you know, ninth grade, and I remember that the My science teacher's name was Mr. . long and announced that the president was dead. I remember that day. I mean, I remember the white war. I remember his name. I remember where I sat in his room.

I remember you know where his room was in the school cot. I don't remember. Any other great teacher, but I remember, we call the emotions that I experience neurotransmitters that are released with that announcement, semen in those memories. How many of you remember what you were doing when you heard the collapse of the War Trade Center? Everyone, do you remember what you had for breakfast last Thursday and are there usually one or two that you see when you are involved in an activity that causes you a strong emotion? You will always remember that it doesn't have to be sorrow if you have children.

You remember the first time you heard that you held your child and made eye contact with your child. You will carry that memory here. A serious and intense emotional response. You will cement those memories and that's it. controlled by neurotransmitters neurotransmitters control compulsivity we know that's the case mainly because of some research done by God the bankrupt side you know what he was trying to do he was trying to figure out why morphine was a pain in the 1960s 1960s he was Trying to find out why walking from your leaf pain, doctors started using morphine in the 1860s for a hundred years, doctors prescribed morphine, darvon and Demerol and how all these drugs were prescribed to relieve the pain, but no one knew how they worked, do you believe what dr.

Snyder well discovered the Arcturus neurons in the brain and they control emotions and appetites. There are neurons in the brain to control pain. We actually give someone a shot of morphine and it activates those neurons. He called them opiate receptors, so there are neurons in the brain. They control pain relief, well, you got to thinking, what was the point of that? I mean, when God created man, he put neurons there that wouldn't be used for thousands of years, man discovers, you know the poppy plant well, that's possible, but why? He concluded that there must be a chemical in the brain that resembles the transformation.

He discovered the neurotransmitter in Kathleen and Kathleen is the neurotransmitter present in the opiate receptors that is produced in the pituitary gland which is at the base of the brain, so when you suffer pain, these cells are released in Kaplan and activate the receptor LP and the only reason morphine works is because it has a similar structure to carefully used, that's why narcotics work, they mimic the body's own natural neural chemical, that's how they work and it's a blessing, You know? Imagine if we didn't have morphine, it relieved the pain. What if we didn't have anesthetics?

You know that anesthetics are called neurotransmitters in the brain. The doctor says Bob. You have three blocked vessels around your heart. We need to do emergency murder surgery today. I have, we can't wait until tomorrow, we have to do it today. You could die of a massive heart attack tonight and there's nothing we can do about it. Bob, I want to operate on you now. The bad news is that the truck had not arrived today. so we don't really have anything to put you to sleep with, but it's okay because we have some leather straps, you know, and we could just take you down, that's right, try to be there, yeah, I'm going to take a sharp knife and cut.

Your chest, if it's going to hurt a little, but you know we can't have a choice, so let's take a chainsaw. We don't use those hands anymore. You'll probably get these power saws now. your chest plate with blood spray because the sting is still spreading between the good and why talk, look, you know, the guys see well, take another scalpel and when you cut the films and the leg veins around your heart, cursing the stainless steel wire, is getting cold. You've got it nice and tight, it'll take eight or ten hours, but you'll be good as new Bob Bob, I can't lie to you, it'll hurt, but you'll all have a heart attack, yeah, that's a year, can you imagine that? anyone is going to let you do open heart surgery unless they put you to sleep and you know, give you someone who you wake up because of the pain, you know it's time to go, it's my time to go, you know it's Well, doctor, you know it's 24 hours.

Well, you know, narcotic anesthetics allow you to do things that we couldn't imagine a hundred years ago, two years ago, but also what we discovered in the last hundred years is not for everyone, not even for most people. Well, for some people when they start using a narcotic. feel good like I did or leave pain like many, many people do when you start using a narcotic over time not even the first toast the second dose maybe not even the hundredth those but we repeat doses a narcotic your brain learns a new way guess what it does the brain starts producing less carefully this brain basically says well you get it from somewhere else so I don't have to produce its movement this has to happen immediately there were repeated doses over time for some people, not all but for some people repeated doses of dark conical events cause the brain to feel sad.

Kaplan the brain says you need more narcotic listen carefully you need more narcotic gas pill press with your dad he is compulsive you take a pill your brain says another pill another pill your brain says you need another pill the same thing happens with other drugs alcohol is a lot more complicated when people drink alcohol what the body does is turn it into ch3 ch2 OHS alcohol your body turns it into liver turns it into acetaldehyde and then it turns into a steel coil and there are more steps involved and eventually it turns into carbon dioxide. carbon and water, so when someone consumes alcohol, the way their body gets rid of the alcohol is by transforming it into carbon dioxide that we exhale from the water during the day off. that's how your body gets high, if you had, it's everyone, some people, not most people, but some people, usually after years of drinking the body starts to develop a new pathway.

It's a silicon essence with a neurotransmitter called dopamine, hence my chemical called tetra Hydra perp. -rolling we will call it th P for short, it is not easy, but eh P, so what I am saying is that in the genetic alcoholic generally a few years of adolescent classification could be months, even in people over 70 and 80 years old, It could happen in six months or a year, but for most adults, after years of drinking, the body learns a new pathway, so when they consume alcohol, some of the alcohol is converted to CHP, why is it so important?

Because if you look at milk or the structure of the T, you will find that it is almost ridiculous, identical to morphine. What I'm saying is that when the alcoholic drinks alcohol, his body produces a substance similar to the Hall hopper opiates, so after a month without drinking, he says, "I'm only going to have a drink once." the body learns a youthful path it never forgets it never forgets the liver produces THP and the brain produces the blessing Kaplan the brain says you know the drink you speak well and children we need another drink that is compulsivity it is controlled by the neuronal chemistry of the brain with cocaine I mentioned the neurotransmitter dopamine when I talked about our holism, it is especially involved in cocaine and methamphetamine addiction when people use cocaine over time they have decreased production of dopamine dopamine is the reward neural tendencies you know if you get an a in the test that makes you feel good makes you feel good because your brain releases dopamine to reward you for getting an A then suddenly you get hard you get a raise at the job you have it makes you feel good maybe in college your body releases dopamine to rewarding yourself for achieving your career or for working hard is a neurotransmitter involved in your reward the neurotransmitter involved in cocaine addiction the euphoria of people who use cocaine initially comes from a drastic increase in the amount of dopamine in the brain that's what it comes from that euphoria but for some people over time what happens is that cocaine use causes less being what causes more cocaine what causes less dopamine neurotransmitter disease the good news is when people recover when they get clean without exception For each of them, over time, the body chemistry normalizes, it always has the ability to do so, so when people become sober, the brain chemistry begins to return to normal and as that happens, to Sometimes it takes weeks, sometimes months, even six months, but longer.

When the brain chemistry normalizes, you know what happens, the compulsion to use the drug goes away, he doesn't stay there all the time, you know, he wouldn't get treatment on July 23, 1979, the day after his 30th birthday. taking a pill every second of every day, can you imagine living the rest of your life? I want you to do something every second every day that you can't do anymore 25% of people who interfere with addiction have committed suicide or have thought about suicide and I know that one of the reasons is financial and family problems, but I could make up one of the reasons is that I can't live like this.

I can't live the rest of my life. I want you to do something every day. Can't. do more and I was about to leave the treatment the guy called motorcycle age stopped me he had a long ponytail like he had a leather vest bare chest hairier chest I had ever seen hairy chest like this tattoos always bodies t79 I had left the heroin moved to Atlanta got involved DNA said you won't believe us I just can't stand this says you know it turns white says yes I got to the point I know what tell me when I get off drugs I want to use every moment, baby, now it's gone.

I have wanted to do drugs for two years. I've seen some, remember people come and go, they come in, they get cleaned up, they get happy, they come out and try again, they don't make it. He says I know that if I go out and try again I will do it again with all my heart I didn't know anything about neural chemistry the motorcycle transmitted to you as long as I don't do it anymore I won't go to do it but I will do it once again I will stop him. I knew that dr. Bob and Bill Debbie knew nothing about neural chemistry.

You know, they came up with the motto for that colic. One drink is too many and a thousand is never enough. That is why recovery is guaranteed for everyone, brain chemistry is normalized and lost. your desire to do drugs, but six months later, a year later, that got twenty once, 20 years later, you say to yourself, well, you know I can drink now, it's been a whole year, you know you don't I'm selling, I don't. I don't get agitated about I can have a drink, yeah, if you convince yourself you can do it one more time, that's what happens.

No addict uses again to get hooked again. Nobody ever does it. I used to do it once again. That's what it can. I don't appreciate all of you being here, you know, I know it's a lot to ask for the family, we come for three days and we make other arrangements for your family and you know from your job and stuff, but I think it's very, very important not to only addicts but family members understand this disease and most people think that addiction is a lack of willpower like a lack of morality, you know, addicts do bad things when they only use drugs, steal , they lie, you know, but they are not.

Bad people, you know, the disease makes addicts do things they wouldn't otherwise do, whether it's the disease. Addie's not stupid, they don't lack willpower, they're not evil,They have a disease and I think it's important that everyone Start trying to decipher all that so that you can understand what behavior it is that I'll give you observed in the past. Why did he do that? This it is. Thanks for being here.