thoughts about addiction, esp. love / infatuation

I do a lot of reading, and when I find a passage or quote that resonates with me I highlight it and copy it so I can discuss it with my therapist. In light of my recent behaviors, I was very interested in this excerpt. Let's see if any of you guys get anything out of it. ..An addiction is a habitual response and a source of gratification or security. It is a way of coping with internal feelings and external pressures that provides the addict with predictable gratifications, but that has concomitant costs. Eventually these costs may outweigh the subjective benefits the addiction offers the individual... addiction - the single-minded grasping of a magic-seeming object or involvement; the loss of control, perspective, and priorities - is not limited to drug and alcohol addictions. When a person becomes addicted, it is not to a chemical but to an experience. Anything that a person finds sufficiently consuming and that seems to remedy deficiencies in the person's life can serve as an addiction. The addictive potential of a substance or other involvement lies primarily in the meaning it has for a person. A person is vulnerable to addiction when that person feels a lack of satisfaction in life, an absence of intimacy or strong connections to other people, a lack of self-confidence or compelling interests, or a loss of hope... The "hook" of the addiction - the thing that keeps people coming back to it - is that it gives people feelings and gratifying sensations that they are not able to get in other ways. It may block out sensations of pain, uncertainty, or discomfort. It may create powerfully distracting sensations that focus and absorb attention. It may enable a person to forget, or feel "okay" about, insurmountable problems. It may provide artificial, temporary feelings of security or calm, of self-worth or accomplishment, of power or control, of intimacy or belonging... Whatever the subjective benefits of an addiction or the values that drive an addiction, the person pays a price for the addictive involvement. Addictions make people less aware of and less able to respond to other people, events, and activities. Thus, the addictive experience reinforces and exacerbates the problems the person wanted so badly to get away from in the first place... This growing disengagement from the realities of life sets the person up for the trauma of withdrawal. When the addictive experience is removed, the person is deprived of what has become his or her primary source of comfort and reassurance. Simultaneously, the person "crash-lands" back onto an inhospitable world, a world from which the person has been using the addiction to escape. Compared with these existential torments, the purely physical dislocations of withdrawal are, even for most heroin addicts, not particularly debilitating. ...if one puts all withdrawal on a scale, probably the worst of all occurs in the case of failed love relationships. From: "The Truth About Addiction and Recovery" by Stanton Peele, Ph.D & Archie Brodsky, 1991, pg 42

That is deep stuff, Jen! Do you suppose I am addicted to this board? Joy

Way Too deep for me!! Put into easy terms & I might get more out of it. Marilyn, the Bearlady

Hi Jen, As a relationship therapist, thi****s the nail on the head! The addiction to food creates an altered experience that works for a short while, then we need more! That is why post-surgery can be so difficult. It didn't take away our need to numb, fill-up, reduce anxiety etc. Each day will always be a challenge--because the thrill of escape (even with negative consequences) is like a drug to our brain! Terry

Jen, One of my biggest gripes about this whole surgery and recovery process is that the surgeons have plenty of suggestions and support on how to stop eating, but they don't offer much advice on how to replace that coping mechanism with another one. We all have coping mechanisms and I feel that they are necessary. We who are members of the addiction club tend to take our coping mechanisms to an extreme. Food has always been my coping mechanism of choice. My father and brother choose to drink. One of my sisters shops and the other one eats like me. The only reason I didn't weigh 600 pounds instead of 286 was that I also threw myself into home remodeling. I swear that if I had gone through one more traumatic breakup, I would have had to add a second floor. As it is, in the last 5 years, I've gutted and remodeled one of the bathrooms, laid hard wood floors, ripped out walls and tiled or painted anything that didn't get up and move. These days I'm crafting these ridiculous beaded glass Christmas ornaments. They're my Zen ornaments. I actually relax making these ridiculous things and everyone I know is getting a freakin' ornament for Christmas. Connie

Connie, would you kindly come live with us for 2 weeks -- our bathroom really needs gutting and redesign...and sign me up for one of those ornaments, I can't think of a better trinket for my Christmas tree this year than to hang a piece of you! Reenie

Connie, I would so totally love one of your ornaments. I am so thankful that you are around, and Reenie, and Mike, and all the rest of the great people on this board. It really is the best ever and I thank God for the board and our members. Jen

Jen, Jen, Jen, you are ALWAYS exactly where I need you when I need you. If this is true, that we are vulnerable to additive behaviors when we are experiencing "...lack of satisfaction in life, an absence of intimacy or strong connections to other people, a lack of self-confidence or compelling interests, or a loss of hope... " than I am right now, today, at this moment, a walking, talking invitation for those behaviors to reclaim my life. In fact, I had a very bad eating day yesterday, just grazed and nashed my way through probably 3,000 calories from about 2:30 in the afternoon until I went to bed, sick to my pouch and exhausted from the behavior and associated negative feelings. I'm focusing lately on relapse prevention for WLS patients and really trying very hard to find the answers. I think I'm very close...but no matter how close you are to being saved from a cliff, the fact is one tiny step backwards means all is lost. Thanks for this. This is the sort of thing we MUST wrestle with and deal with if we are to prevent relapsing into the way we behaved that turned us into incredibly obese people. Reenie

Hi Jen; This is pretty heavy-duty analysis, but it certainly rings true for me. One of my biggest problems in dealing with this post-op life is that I tend to revert to my "Drug of Choice" when things are going bad for me. Of course my drug of choice is food which as you know is both readily available and necessary in small doses. Finding a substitute that doesn't involve another addiction (gambling, drugs, alcohol to name just a few) is not very easy for me. I've been trying to exercise and putter more in my workshop when I feel stressed, but they don't always work. That's why you good people on this board are so important to help get me back on track when I go astray. I think that I may look for this book. It looks like heavy reading, but it may have a few answers. By the way, Connie....if you run out of places to store all of those ornaments, My Christmas tree would love one too!!! Mike