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Suffering from addiction is no laughing matter. It destroys lives very rapidly and can lead to life destroying situation very quickly. When an addiction of more than one substance takes hold on the addict, however, the issues associated with addiction and dependence amplify exponentially.

Many people believe that you can be addicted only to one substance at a time. This is unfortunately not true, as polysubstance dependence is a very real thing. The name of it does give away quite an obvious fact, it is difficult to be classified as addicted to multiple substances, but it certainly is very easy to become dependant on more than one drug. This has been disputed in the recent years, as the rehabilitation and continuous research in the addiction field has led many to believe that it is indeed possible to be addicted to more than one substance. Why the different opinions? Let us first touch on what is widely accepted and raises little arguments – polysubstance dependence.

Addiction Is Not A Monogamous Mistress

To fully understand what polysubstance dependence is, one must first understand what is the difference between dependence and an addiction.

Addiction is a mental disease that rules the addict’s brain chemistry and sends its owner impulses to use a drug that has been introduced into the bloodstream for a prolonged period of time. Over this time, the brain is tricked into thinking that this chemical is a good thing thus making the brain encourage its continued use. It rewrites its dopamine distribution rules and makes it think that the drug it has slowly become addicted to is somehow paramount to survival and well-being. Sadly the polar opposite is true, it damages the addict’s brain in a terrible way that is difficult to mitigate, nevermind fully reverse.

Dependence is part of the addiction that is fully physiological and while closely tied to mental addiction can be battled with a careful detoxification plan which leads to sobriety. The addict is not out of the woods yet, as all that detox does is cleans the organism of addiction causing substance and its immediate short term effects.

Any addict will tell you that detox while quite intense, is usually the easy part of addiction recovery, contrary to how taxing and uncomfortable it is to undergo it. Detox is a world of contrasts – most drug dependence is curbed by careful and regulated medication intake to alleviate the withdrawal effects while the organism is forced to re-learn that lack of the drug is not a life-threatening thing.

Everyone has had a few too many at some point and felt terrible the day after. This is your body re-adjusting to lack of alcohol in your bloodstream. Detox, depending on many variables like time of dependence, type of drug and basic human physiology is like that hangover, just multiplied by ten and lasts anything from a few days to a month.

So where is the argument?

Addiction and dependence while two different things go hand in hand. Those who argue against addiction to more than one substance point out that it does not matter how many drugs you are addicted to once addicted it covers them all. They argue that if you are drowning in seawater, it does not matter if there is any fresh water in it, you are drowning regardless.

On the other hand, many argue that addiction to multiple substances is a very real thing and should not be confused to polysubstance dependence which as we covered earlier, is relatively easy to treat, if not very comfortable or enjoyable to the patient. They argue that since an addiction is a mental disease that is constantly triggered by bigger and smaller things to remind of the time when drug use was a priority and a bodily necessity, it means that addiction to multiple drugs mean double the amount of triggers and reminders, which make it multiple times more difficult to battle during the recovery phase.

Many drugs go hand-in-hand with others. The amount of cocaine and heroin addicts that are also raging alcoholics is staggering. Since both of these drugs were often consumed at the same time, the smell of an opened beer can be an instant trigger to do a rail of coke or give your smack dealer a call.

 

In the end, that is essentially one of the biggest issues with polysubstance dependence – while not technically recognized as an addiction it poses insurmountable obstacles and exponentially growing opportunities of relapse to the addict when he is on his path to recovery.

Never too late, yet the longer drugs have had the time to ravage the physiology and mental capacities of an unfortunate addict, the harder that climb back out of the abyss will be.

Alcohol – the most popular and widely accepted recreational drug in the 21st century. The manufacture and sales of wines, spirits and beers is a $300 billion industry. No wonder governments are in no rush to outlaw it and effectively curb their own taxed income. Should they, though?

As one of the oldest recreational drugs in human history, alcohol is not strictly bad for you. As with most things, if consumed in moderation and care, they have proven to reduce the risk of heart disease and stroke. We know that humanity first started consuming alcohol around 8000 B.C., which coincides with the birth of agriculture. Alcohol does occur naturally, but can not be harvested in large quantities and would take more effort and time than to grow the ingredients and ferment or distil them ourselves, in carefully regulated environments ensuring the best yield and quality.

Why does a substance that many ancient civilizations considered to be a gift from the gods and treated with respect and reverie, has been killing over four million people a year?

Instant Gratification

We live in a time when all it takes to get a drink is to visit your local grocery store. Age of instant gratification. There are even alcohol delivery options available in some cities! Too much of a good thing can be extremely detrimental, especially if said thing helps us be less shy around opposite sex, make us feel more charismatic and overall have more fun. Until your liver gives out and you die a slow and painful death.

Ancient Babylonians did not have access to alcohol the same way we do. It took skilled craftsmen a long time to gather the ingredients, prepare the tools and apparatus required to produce it and even longer time and effort to distribute it to people nearby. An average Babylonian never even tried alcohol, it was so exclusive and expensive that only the brewmaster himself and his closest friends and family got to enjoy this elixir.

You, however, just need to open a fridge and you have a cold beer in your hand. Modern logistics and industrialization have allowed alcohol to become the widespread phenomenon it is today. And with it, comparably cheap prices and ease of access.

Choices.

Human beings parse information and make decisions and choices on a daily basis. Using their prefrontal lobe of their brain they decide if it would be a good idea to approach a desirable mate or pick a fight with a person much less desirable. Introduce alcohol to that process and these decisions seem much more straight forward and easier to make. Alcohol is mostly consumed due to its inhibition and inner barrier removal properties. A few drinks in you suddenly have no issues with doing that karaoke song in front of all those strangers, it is just singing after all. Embarrassing yourself in front of a crowd is least of your worries while drunk, most often it can make the user aggressive and brave. Sadly, alcohol and bravery do not go well together, as it also impairs not only judgment of the user but also his motor skills, equilibrium, and vision.

Alcohol is infamous for being the source of poor decisions. The more alcohol is consumed the worse it gets. Sadly, alcohol is also a highly addictive substance and millions of people die of alcoholism and its corresponding symptoms every year.

Alcohol hyperstimulates the midbrain of its user. It draws most of the blood that would usually be distributed evenly. It handicaps the prefrontal lobe, the center of decisions, values, and critical thinking. Decisions are made based purely on instant gratification, once dear values are discarded and ability to rational thinking slowly dims. The longer a user is abusing alcohol, the more intense these drawbacks become and more time is required for the human brain to stabilize its own natural chemistry.

The so-called high-functioning alcoholics, while being addicted to the substance can still maintain relationships and keep their job. They are a rare kind of alcoholic. While being more able than most, they still put their own health at risk of liver scarring or cirrhosis, stroke and respiratory arrest.

Those who are not so strong succumb to a downward spiral of unfortunate and self-impaired results. Loss of care for friends and family, inability to hold meaningful relationships, inability to maintain a job and in extreme cases total disregard for one’s own hygiene and well-being.

 

Alcohol affects our choices. There is no way around it. The very first and most important choice is whether or not to use it at all. Its potential small dose benefits are not worth the potential life threatening addiction. For long lasting alcoholics a rehabilitation course of carefully monitored detoxification procedures is required to regain any semblance of their life and their ability to make significant decisions.

Every addiction case is different. It has been repeated over and over again, so it is no secret. It also happens to be true because addiction as a disease is mostly in the addict’s head. We all have our personalities, things that make us unique. The way we react to certain stimuli, anger, fear, excitement or affection. Addiction piggy-backs on the most important and personality defining organ we each have – the brain. No two minds are the same, even identical twins have broadly varying opinions on an equally broad list of things.

This complicates addiction treatment because as radically different as people can be, so can their addiction and its manifestation. Further still, there are many different approaches to addicts recovery based on the severity of their addiction.

Weekend warriors.
There are those who have a vice. They use a drug, but use it responsibly and without the need to “top up”. They perhaps look at it as a treat or something to do on special occasions. They may succumb to its use only on weekends, knowing all too well, that if used mid-week would disturb their actual life and cause problems in work and personal life. Simple AA meetings and group therapy are all that is required to remind the addict, that their choice of recreational drug is a slippery slope that leads only to misery and despair. So far their responsible use has staved off this rapid decline, but for how long?

Careless abusers.
Not all addiction issues are the same. There are those who can not be classified as fully addicted to alcohol, for example. The person in question does not have alcohol dependency and does not feel the need to consume alcohol on a daily basis. Instead, he has no control those rare times he does get a drink. A non-stop three-day binge ensues every time the patient has a drink and then it could be months until next episode. It would be rather useless to check such a patient in an inpatient rehabilitation center. There is no alcohol dependency to combat, so detoxification course is unnecessary as well. Furthermore, there are no cravings or ingrained need to consume, so a safe haven from such thoughts and stimuli is also rarely necessary for such a patient. An intensive outpatient rehabilitation course or is usually the best approach for people like this. A safe place to talk about things that go through the person’s head when he has had a few, to find out the root and stem of the cause that drives him to drink uncontrollably and binge for days on end. The defining factor here is that the patient is fully aware of his episodes and decides to ignore the warnings. They know they will have a fight with their spouse or be unable to perform their parental or work duties and responsibilities and yet they binge anyway. This is a very dangerous behavior and needs to be interfered with as soon as possible and kept on a short leash. The intensive outpatient program is more hands-on and requires a significant will to successfully become clean and usually require a minimum of three or four meetings a week.

Lifeless zombies.
The last rung on this ladder of addiction is the one rehabilitation centers are made for. The truly addicted and dependant. It follows in the same steps as the case mentioned earlier, yet consumption and use has become a problem in personal life. It is causing rifts in relationships, problems at work and neglected responsibilities. The need to use is constant and more often than not is satisfied, albeit for a very short time, on a daily basis. The addict in this stage is stuck in a vicious cycle where his addiction and drug or alcohol abuse is creating problems and these problems are driving the addict to use even more just to escape them for a little while longer. Burying their heads in the sand they keep using until there are no more relationships to mend or no more life to piece back together, essentially turning the user into a lifeless zombie with no reason to live. A lethal overdose is not far away. This kind of situation is no time to play coy and hold back. A full two-month minimum inpatient rehabilitation course is a must. First, their physiological dependence is tackled through a rigorous detoxification program and then come the counseling and re-learning a long list of life-skills that will help the addict remain on their path to full recovery. Inpatient rehab ensures that the patient is isolated from negative influence and the factors that drove him to use in the first place. The course itself may be only a few months, but the battle will take a lifetime of self-restraint and control, achieved by a wide range of practices and techniques, yoga and mindfulness program to name a few.

 

Whatever your stage of addiction, time is of the essence. Every hit has a greater and greater chance to bring you over the edge of no return, not on your own anyway. Do not hesitate to seek help because the only thing worse than ignoring an ever-approaching addiction is to try and fight it on your own, losing the battle and giving up on possible recovery for good.

Addiction. A scary word for most, those who have never encountered it. People are afraid of things they don’t know, things they do not understand. Honestly, to say that anyone fully understands addiction would be a fallacy if not a blatant lie. Addictions and their varieties are as different as people that are plagued by them. Most people get to know what an addiction really is only when they succumb to it themselves or witness it firsthand in their own family or in a circle of close friends. Lucky ones learn what it is, come to terms with it and tackle it head on. Procrastination kills when it comes to addiction. Then there are those who will fight tooth and claw but in the wrong direction. Instead of admitting to themselves their shortcomings and channeling that energy and determination towards becoming clean, they often deny the existence of the problem while staring it directly in the face.

There are many different obstacles an addict has to overcome during their voyage towards recovery. As varied as people can be with their own dreams, fears, plans for future or lack thereof. Most of these obstacles and addict build up themselves. It is a battle that is mostly fought inside the addict’s head. To call an addict clean one must do much more than just get him physiologically clean and free of substance dependency. He must also be shown a great many ugly truths. What could they be? Let us have a glimpse at few of them.

Lack of commitment.

At first, most addicts do not believe that their problem is that big. They think it is blown out of proportion and if by some miracle they are convinced to check in rehab they do not do it for themselves but rather someone else. Usually family members or friends.

How many times have you finished your homework back in the day, not because you wanted to strengthen your knowledge in a school subject, but just to make your mother shut up about it, all that whining made you mad, did it not? It was easier just to get it over and done with, usually with lackluster results, but it counted and she could finally get off your back.

We are not children anymore. It is time to take responsibility for ourselves and our actions. Recovery is a commitment for life, to switch from self-destructive behavior into a learning experience.

Not their fault.

Speaking of responsibility. Many simply can not face the ugly truth that they are responsible for the situation they are in. They would rather blame God, their landlord, spouse or even their parents – all in a desperate bid to avoid looking in the mirror.

Blaming others for their own problems is much easier than dealing with them yourself because that would take strength and courage, an ounce of self-respect and some backbone. Most addicts lack in this department – if they were strong, courageous and have any respect for themselves and grew a backbone at some point, they would not be addicted. It is a vicious loop – the very qualities that the addict lacks lead them to become addicted as well as resist most attempts at conscious need to become clean.

Reluctancy to make changes.

You can wash your feet till they bleed, but as soon as you put on your old dirty boots they will get soiled again. Most addicts do not understand or rather don’t want to admit that they are a product of their environment. To become clean an addict must commit to drastic and often unpleasant lifestyle changes. If bad relationship is a contributing factor to your addiction it must be resolved or put behind you. If you are deeply depressed and unhappy in your current job, it does not matter how long you will spend in a rehab, you will sooner or later relapse and be back to square one. To start on the path to recovery some proverbial bridges must be burned because given the chance you will return to addiction. You may be clean and serene when you finish your rehabilitation course, but as soon as you return to the environment that drove you to use of addictive substances, it will happen again, it is just a matter of time.

 

To be brutally honest with yourself is probably the most required thing on your path to recovery as an addict. Take responsibility for your actions (or inaction), step away from the contagious factors that contribute to your drug abuse, double down and recognize that you must do this for the benefit of yourself first and foremost. These things don’t come easy, but the best things in life are rarely easy. Luckily, there are many options to become clean, countless people willing to help and assist on your journey. Family, friends and educated professionals in various types or rehabilitation. All for your benefit. Step up, admit and commit today – procrastination kills.