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Addiction traps the brain
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Addiction traps the brain Multi drug use is common and harder to fight. Addiction hijacks the brains' pleasure circuits and redirects activity to seeking the drugs needed for pleasure: Summary Addiction can develop despite a person's best intentions and in spite of their strength of character. Repeated drug use disrupts complex but well balanced systems in the human brain. Many people are addicted to more than one substance, complicating their efforts to recover. The human brain is an extraordinarily complex and fine-tuned communications network containing billions of specialized cells (neurons) that give origin to our thoughts, emotions, perceptions and drives. Often, a drug is taken the first time by choice to feel pleasure or to relieve depression or stress. But this notion of choice is short-lived. Why? Because repeated drug use disrupts well-balanced systems in the human brain in ways that persist, eventually replacing a person's normal needs and desires with a one-track mission to seek and use drugs. At this point, normal desires and motives will have a hard time competing with the desire to take a drug. How Does the Brain Become Addicted? Typically it happens like this: A person takes a drug of abuse, be it marijuana or cocaine or even alcohol, activating the same brain circuits as do behaviors linked to survival, such as eating, bonding and sex. The drug causes a surge in levels of a brain chemical called dopamine, which results in feelings of pleasure. The brain remembers this pleasure and wants it repeated. Just as food is linked to survival in day-to-day living, drugs begin to take on the same significance for the addict. The need to obtain and take drugs becomes more important than any other need, including truly vital behaviors like eating. The addict no longer seeks the drug for pleasure, but for relieving distress. Eventually, the drive to seek and use the drug is all that matters, despite devastating consequences. Finally, control and choice and everything that once held value in a person's life, such as family, job and community, are lost to the disease of addiction. What brain changes are responsible for such a dramatic shift? Research on addiction is helping us find out just how drugs change the way the brain works. These Reduced dopamine activity. We depend on our brain's ability to release dopamine in order to experience pleasure and to motivate our responses to the natural rewards of everyday life, such as the sight or smell of food. drugs produce very large and rapid dopamine surges and the brain responds by reducing normal dopamine activity. Eventually, the disrupted dopamine system renders the addict incapable of feeling any pleasure even from the drugs they seek to feed their addiction. Altered brain regions that control decisionmaking and judgment. drugs of abuse affect the regions of the brain that help us control our desires and emotions. The resulting lack of control leads addicted people to compulsively pursue drugs, even when the drugs have lost their power to reward. The disease of addiction can develop in people despite their best intentions or strength of character. drug addiction is insidious because it affects the very brain areas that people need to "think straight," apply good judgment and make good decisions for their lives. No one wants to grow up to be a drug addict, after all. Co - occurring Addictions: Compounding Complexities It is not unusual for an addicted person to be addicted to alcohol, nicotine and<b> illicit </font></b>drugs at the same time. Addiction to multiple substances raises the level of individual suffering and magnifies the associated costs to society. No matter what the addictive substance, they all have at least one thing in common - they disrupt the brain's reward pathway, the route to pleasure. What is the best way to treat people who are addicted to more than one drug? Medications. In some cases, medications developed for one addiction have proven useful for another. For example, naltrexone, which can help former heroin users remain abstinent by blocking the "high" associated with heroin, has been found to be effective in treating alcoholism. Behavioral therapy or other psychotherapy. Behavioral therapies do not need to be specific to one drug and can be adapted to address use of multiple or different drugs. It is the disease of addiction that the therapy addresses. Combined medications and behavioral therapy. Research shows that this combination, when available, works best. Multipronged approach. Treatment for multiple addictions should be delivered at the same time. This is especially true because there are always triggers, such as trauma, depression, or exposure to one drug or another, that can put the recovering addict at risk for relapse. In addition, treatment must consider all aspects of a person - their age, gender, life experiences - in order to best treat their drug addiction. Although the type of treatment may differ, it should always strive to address the entire person through a multipronged approach that tackles all co - occurring conditions at once. |
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