Hidden Addiction

What do you think it is possible to be addicted to?  When you ask most people that question, their immediate responses are drugs and alcohol as these are perhaps the two things we associate most with the concept of addiction.  Ask people to go beyond these initial responses and think outside the box and the answers you will get are a little more varied but still they tend to follow a similar vein.  Food in particular is often given as a further response with a particular focus on sugar or on junk food in general.

Using the medical definition, in this case provided by the National Health Service [NHS] here in the UK: "Addiction is defined as not having control over doing, taking or using something to the point where it could be harmful to you" [src]

That definition is rather wide-ranging and can apply to any number of things.  It's also important to note at this point, the definition above makes no stipulation whatsoever as to whether or not the thing you are addicted to is perceived as being something negative, only that it could be harmful to you.  That is important to note as it opens up a wide range of things you can be addicted to that you would not normally associate as being something negative.  Take for instance exercise, something which is generally considered to be beneficial and encouraged, even this can be harmful to you when done in excess.  Runner's Addiction for example is a condition whereby a person who runs does so in excess.  There's an excellent article on Runner's World by Nicole Radziszewski that discusses this condition and how to identify it. 

The idea that anything beneficial is immune from being addictive, or that anything which is addictive but perceived as positive are things which are "safe" and pose no harm to us is a very problematic mindset.  The crux of this whole issue is that ultimately everything must be done in moderation, no matter how good or bad you may perceive something to be, doing it in excess will likely be the worst thing you could do.  More than this, the idea that something has to be considered addictive in the first place before you take the risk of becoming addicted as a serious concern is also problematic.  There are many things that people have become addicted to which others often laugh at, or ridicule the idea that you could be addicted to them - these mindsets ultimately miss the entire point of addiction, that it is the personality, and the physiological response of the individual that determines whether something is addictive, not the substance or act in and of itself - in other words, you can be addicted to literally anything because the source is your body, not what you are exposing it to.

That conclusion can be something very difficult to accept at first, especially when most common addictions share the same trigger, for example opioid drugs are widely considered to be addictive, but the assertion that everyone who takes those drugs will become addicted to them is clearly one that is made in error and is not the intention of the warnings that come with those drugs.  The intention of the warnings comes from the recognition that those drugs generally evoke a pleasurable experience and that most people when exposed to a reliable source of pleasure will eventually become addicted to it.  Further to this is the reality that addiction is not an issue of willpower alone, as stated above, there is a physiological response within the body and that response will vary from individual to individual and its intensity will generally be the deciding factor in whether or not people are able to overcome their addiction once it develops.

This all posits that addiction is something you would not want to entertain and would like to overcome but the reality is that most people have one or more things they are addicted to but they make no effort whatsoever to overcome.  Caffeine is a prime example, most people who regularly consume it will recognise they are addicted to it, whether they dwell on that fact or not is beside the point here.  What is relevant however is that most people who have recognised their addiction will at some point have attempted to go without it to see if they could do it, and withdrawal is a bitch, as I have discussed in past posts and on my other blog.  Most people when they go through withdrawal will make a judgement call as to whether they want to push through or not.  The widespread continued consumption of caffeine in and of itself demonstrates that the latter is the choice most people end up making, accepting their addiction and simply choosing to live with it.  Therein lies another problem with the whole concept of addiction, as we return to the definition provided by the NHS, there is no stipulation added that you must be unable to live a relatively normal life before it can be considered an addiction - in fact if you read the source I linked to above one of the main ways in which the NHS highlights the impact on your life an addiction can have is the strain of managing that addiction, that word 'managing' is very important to point out.

Managing Addiction brings us to one final concept which it is important to address, addicts can be considered either low or high functioning.  A high functioning addict is someone who is addicted to something but able to lead a life that is almost completely void of the traditional negative connotations of addiction, whilst a low functioning addict is someone whose addiction prevents them from doing almost anything normal.  There is a stigma surrounding addiction that warps the impression of the condition to be one where the validity of that addiction is attached to the level of functioning the individual attains, i.e. if an individual is low functioning then their addiction is "valid" and if they are high functioning then their addiction is "invalid" and dismissed entirely with incredulity at the suggestion.

All of this begs the question, if it is possible to be a high functioning addict and live an almost entirely normal life, how can you actually know if you are addicted to something without trying to go without it to see if withdrawal occurs?