Depression
Addicted to Fat
Jun 18th
Eating The Pain Away
Like many pleasurable behaviors—including sex and drug use—eating can trigger the release of dopamine, a feel-good chemical in the brain. This chemical reward, in turn, increases the likelihood that the action will eventually become habitual through positive reinforcement conditioning. If this reward is activated by overeating, these neurochemical patterns can make the behavior tough to shake—a result seen in many human cases.
Paul Kenny, an associate professor in the Department of Molecular Therapeutics at The Scripps Research Institute in Jupiter, Fla., says, “Most people who are overweight would say, ‘I would like to control my weight and my eating,’ but they find it very hard to control their feeding behavior.”
Many studies have drawn the connection between excessive food intake and addiction in both animal models and humans. Many scientists have observed a similar map of dopamine receptors in the brains of many obese people as in those hooked on cocaine or alcohol. This new type research adds a more accepted understanding of just how food can modify the brain—and shows that differences in the brain from the outset can predispose an individual for overeating. It is widely accepted that after someone dependent on a substance stops using it, however, it often takes time for depleted dopamine receptors to return to baseline levels. For example, in mice addicted to cocaine, it can take two days to regain normalized levels however, obese rats in the overeating studies took two weeks to regain their baseline density of receptors. This research goes to show that overeating is a very difficult addiction to break because the withdrawl timeline is far longer and more ingrained than even that of a drug addict.
The sticky part about studying food addiction is that, unlike cocaine or alcohol, humans can’t exactly drop it—cold turkey or not. You can’t really quit food . And humans are hardwired, thanks to eons of evolutionary selection, to seek high-calorie foods to keep us going through lean times. But with subsistence hunting, gathering and farming now little more than a niche lifestyle choice in wealthy nations, a brain set up to reward super-rich calorie snacks is more of a hazard than a help. It is not easy to eat healthy in modern times. ”Real food” is more expensive than processed sadly. It is almost as though our society has set up drug dealers on every corner and asks those predisposed to have a food addiction to stay away. It is not hopeless though, if you have an overeating disorder there is help.
The Dark Side of Sex…
Jun 15th
Can't Stop?
Sexual addiction is best described as a progressive intimacy disorder characterized by compulsive sexual thoughts and acts.
Like all addictions, its negative impact on the addict and on family members increases as the disorder progresses. Over time, the addict usually has to intensify the addictive behavior to achieve the same results. Contrary to popular belief, sex addicts are not all sex offenders, and vice-versa. The National Council on Sexual Addiction and Compulsivity has defined sexual addiction as “engaging in persistent and escalating patterns of sexual behavior acted out despite increasing negative consequences to self and others.” In other words, a sex addict will continue to engage in certain sexual behaviors despite facing potential health risks, financial problems, shattered relationships or even arrest.
The same compulsive behavior that characterizes other addictions also is typical of sex addiction. But these other addictions, including drug, alcohol and gambling dependency, involve substances or activities with no necessary relationship to our survival. For example, we can live normal and happy lives without ever gambling, taking illicit drugs or drinking alcohol. Even the most genetically vulnerable person will function well without ever being exposed to, or provoked by, these addictive activities. Sexual activity is different. Like eating, having sex is necessary for human survival.
There are many co-occurring disorders that go hand in hand with sex addiction. For example, Alcohol and drugs are used to cover the guilt and shame of the inability to stop the “sexual behaviors” which in turn lead to the same demoralizing behavior which begins a vicious cycle. Drugs alter libido, enhancing it early in drug addiction and inhibiting it later. There is a pattern in cocaine addiction of selling sexual favors for cocaine. As the cost of drug addiction increases, the drug addict usually can’t afford the drug from ordinary job income, and must resort to (either/or) stealing, drug dealing or prostitution to support their habit. Many drugs cause blackouts or amnesia during the drug using experience, and if sex is coupled with that drug using experience then the details of the sexual experience may not be remembered.
Sex addiction is very real and there is help for this disease. It is not hopeless. More and more the public is coming forward with their issues and seeking a better life and a permanent solution.
It’s Harder If You Start Young
Jun 11th
Young and Loaded
A NIDA-funded study has demonstrated that the relapse rate for heroin addicts increases with time and that the probability of long-term abstinence depends on the age of first drug use. Those who start daily heroin use at a younger age are more likely to relapse than those who start later. Heroin is not the only type of drug that has ill effects if consumed at a young age.
Long-term studies of high school students and their patterns of drug use show that very few young people use other illegal drugs without first trying marijuana. For example, the risk of using cocaine is much greater for those who have tried marijuana than for those who have never tried it. Using marijuana puts children and teens in contact with people who are users and sellers of other drugs. So there is more of a risk that a marijuana user will be exposed to and urged to try more drugs. To better determine this risk, scientists are examining the possibility that long-term marijuana use may create changes in the brain that make a person more at risk of becoming addicted to other drugs, such as alcohol or cocaine. Therefore, if during the crucial developmental stages there are chemicals added to the brain chemistry evoking feelings of happiness, belonging, and/or excitement; the brain will be more likely to consistently resort to those methods (drugs) in order to experience those emotions due to the lack of practice in experiencing those feelings organically.
Want vs. Consequences
Jun 1st
Relapse
Relapse prevention is crucial to an addict’s recovery. Relapse, although it doesn’t have to be, is a prominent feature of addiction, and one of the most painful. Most people who struggle with addiction will have one or more relapses – the return to drug use after a drug-free period – during their ongoing attempts to recover. This can be extremely frustrating for patients and for families, as they have already experienced great pain. Even more interesting, researchers could prevent these relapses by treating rats with a molecule that blocks glutamate signals, suggesting that this chemical might be investigated as a new treatment to prevent relapse in former cocaine-addicts. “Since wanting a drug is more directly connected to relapse [than liking it], glutamate could prove a promising target for new drug developments designed to treat cocaine addiction,” Vorel says. “Considering all the social and economic aspects of drug abuse, pharmacological intervention alone may not solve the burden. But it could help cocaine abusers which number 1.8 million in the U.S. alone.”
Relapse happens with all addictive drugs not just cocaine there are multiple – and often interactive – factors can increase the likelihood of relapse. These are some of the commonly cited precursors:
- drug-related “reminder” cues (sights, sounds, smells, drug thoughts or drug dreams) tightly linked to use of the preferred drug(s) can trigger craving and drug seeking
- negative mood states or stress
- positive mood states or celebrations
- sampling the drug itself, even in very small amounts
The motivation to seek a drug, once triggered, can feel overwhelming and sometimes leads to very poor decision making: the user will pursue the drug, despite potentially disastrous future negative consequences (and many past negative consequences). The most confusing part about relapse for someone who is not an addict, is that decision to relapse is made from a sober state of mind. The importance of a strong program and a defined support group is the foundation upon which a better decision process can be made.
Brain-imaging is aiding the medical field to understand the paradox of the decision to pursue a drug reward despite knowing the consequences. For example, very recent imaging research shows that visual drug cues as short as 33 milliseconds can activate the ancient reward (“go”) circuitry, and that this process does not require conscious processing – it can begin outside awareness. By the time the motivation does reach awareness the reward circuit has a strong head start. This head start means the area of the brain is responsible for weighing the consequences of a decision and for helping to “stop” the drug thoughts is already behind in the process and without a sufficient block or contrary action the addict is well on their way to relapse.
Memories and Addiction
May 29th
snails/meth
A research study done drug addiction recently headed by Barbara Sorg from Washington State University expressed how some addictive drugs produce memories that are hard to forget, and that can even cause addicts to relapse. The scientists described the discovery in the Journal of Experimental Biology. Having seen this drug-enhanced or “pathological” memory-making in action produced with the snails in the experiment, the scientists now want to know what is changing within an individual brain cell. Scientists suggests that by disrupting the recollection of a drug-associated memory—a person one abuses drugs with, a place that one uses drugs at, for example—a therapeutic means may be able to break the connection between cues in the environment and the need for drugs. Sometimes these cues can be quite close to home—a family member or loved one. There are many scientist at the National Institute of Drug Abuse in Bethesda, Md hard at work to try to find medications to supplement therapy and having a program to follow. With no approved medications on the market to specifically treat cocaine addiction, most treatment regimens rely of behavioral therapy. Often these therapies involve exposing addicts to cues that they associate with drug use—however without being under the influence of an illicit substance. Once a recovered addict encounters these cues back in the real world though, they often relapse. Everitt suggests using an NMDA-type glutamate receptor blocker in the clinic could improve that treatment. Essentially scientists are researching methods to use a chemical that blocks the creation of memories, scientists have prevented rats from using cocaine and shown the strength of drug induced memories in snails after they had used meth. The hope is that doctors will one day be able to give humans some version of the chemical and stop addiction in its tracks. However until these medications are thoroughly tested and approved by the FDA there is one method that works and has worked without fail and that is abstinence as well as adhering to a program of a spiritual nature. The day that science and spirituality meet will be a time when more lives can be saved from the clenches of addiction. The marriage between the two schools of thought will allow those who have a harder time finding the spirituality still find the treatment that they need and a different perspective.