What is going on in my brain? What is the chemical mechanism? Why cant I just tell my brain to stop craving the substance? Why is the addiction removing all of my inhibitions?
This is hell.
In: Biology
The “reward center” of the brain is dopamine, a chemical that makes us feel good. You get it when you eat, when you fuck, and a million other things, too. Your brain is micro-dosing this shit ALL DAY, and it sends a clear signal…
“do that again. We like that.”
Lots of drugs completely hijack this system and create dopamine responses your caveman brain could never have imagined, and the brain completely shifts gears…
“Okay, eating and fucking feel pretty good, but THAT was amazing. Do that again. We like that.”
And so you do it again and again, but here’s the next piece:
The brain gets used to having more dopamine floating around. Normal things like eating and fucking can’t really compete. They just don’t make the *impact* that the drug did.
Remember your old life? There are a lot of little ups and downs, and you feel generally happy?
This is your new life. You start using the drugs not for parties but just to give yourself a few ups and downs through the day.
You need it to feel normal.
Every month you need *more of it* to feel normal.
One of these days you’ll get the dosage wrong, and you’ll die.
i know this isn’t a very good eli5 comment, but the wikipedia page for addiction goes into fascinating detail about everything
Addictios suck… The problem lies within your brain releasing dopamine (a reward hormone) each time you feel that high after going after your addictiin. This does not necessarily need to be a substance. A certain activity can also lead to addiction (sport, sex, or even pain).
A possible way to break the cicle is to trick your brain to reward itself by NOT falling to your addiction and to slowly re-programm it to release dopamine after not giving in.
Extreme example: Instead of smoking a cigarette, go for a run. Even if it is only a short run around the block. Be prou of yourself and nexr time you run the sam run but a little bit faster. Then, you run two times around the block, and so on. Your brain will learn to release dopamine after a successfull run. And don’t be hard on yourself if on a day you run less or slower. Be proud to yourself that you went running instead of smoking a cigarette. Even that will release a bit of dopamine.
Your brain is wired to like things that help you survive, to chose them, for survival. Substances make your brain think they are needed for survival. Now your brain thinks it needs them to not die, that is very powerful neurologically and evolutionarily speaking. You need to find a way to teach your brain that substances are actually a cause for alarm, not survival. That is way “hitting bottom” can lead addicts to no longer crave a substance, the brain begins to associate them with pain as opposed to comfort and safety.
You have neurotransmitters in your brain that exchange signal molecules. These regulate your mood and emotions. The molecule fits into the designated hole, and your brain fires off a signal that makes you feel happy or whatever. Sometimes a hole is filled, sometimes it is not, so sometimes you feel happy and sometimes you don’t.
Imagine you have ten radios and ten electrical sockets. You plug a radio into a socket and you hear some music. You think this is pleasant. But what happens if you plug all ten radios into all ten sockets? Now you have the most amazing rock and roll experience ever.
That’s what the addictive chemical is doing. It’s plugging all of those holes, so every transmitter is firing all the time.
The problem is, over time your brain starts to think this is normal. You have ten radios plugged in, and you forgot what it was like to only have one radio. You forgot that listening to one radio at a time was *normal.*
Eventually you stop taking the substance. Those holes are no longer filled. Those signals are no longer transmitting. Your brain starts screaming, “Why is it so quiet? What happened to all the signals? Why do I only have one radio when I used to have all ten?” It assumes something must be wrong. So your brain makes you feel like crap, because it has to re-adjust to the fact that it no longer gets to have all ten radios going all the time.
Most of the other answers have hit your chemical side of the question well, so I’ll just point out that our brains are horrible at *not thinking* about something. If you’re trying to quit smoking, you need to consciously think about not smoking so that you don’t light one up out of habit. But thinking about not having one is the just going to cause you to think about cigarettes more. You can’t really do a good job of willing yourself to just *not think* about cigarettes.
Try to not think about a pink elephant for example. I can just about guarantee that even though I told you not to think about it, you thought about a pink elephant. Even now when trying not to think about it knowing I’ve pointed this out, it will become harder and harder not to think about a pink elephant.
Same thin happens when you try to not think about smoking, drinking, or whatever else you’re addicted to.
[I like this animated video about addiction – it provides a good visual demonstration of Kiwi’s journey through addiction. ](https://youtu.be/HUngLgGRJpo?feature=shared)
These are all good answers. In addition, do you have unresolved trauma? A lot of addicts do. I do and it kept me in active addiction for decades, until I was ready and able to face the past and start healing from it. We do recover. I believe in your ability to fight back and chose to live.
Lots of good explanations… for the dopamine I found personally that Prozac worked like a bomb and is super cheap in generic form …
For the habit :.. sometimes replacing it with another healthier habit can work like exercise, gaming , or learning a new skill …
Therapy also helps …
When you do something you like, the brain releases a chemical called “Dopamine”- in this example, lets say that they are coins.
Your brain has dopamine receptors and in this example- lets say they are washing machines.
Normally, it would take $1.25 to run the washing machine. This can be an example of your day-to-day releasing of dopamine with normal activities.
If you start doing drugs or in this case- running the washing machine more often the person who owns the machine may think; “hey, we can run this for $2.00 instead of $1.25”
Now it costs $2.00 to run the machine. It takes more money to run the same cycle. That’s the same thinking your brain goes through.
You release a lot of dopamine for a set period of time- your brain’s receptors now think this is normal and tell the receptors to bind less to dopamine, requiring more dopamine to feel the same.
Thats the chemical response to it.
There is a psychological response to addiction as well but I’m not super well versed in that. For example, weed is chemically not addictive but people can get hooked on the high and we get stoners who get high every day.
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