The Roots of Addiction

Painful Childhood Experiences Create a Risk of Future Addiction

Addiction is an attempt to solve the graver problem of unbearable psychic pain. To understand addiction we need to understand that human pain can come from childhood experiences. The more adversity an individual experiences in childhood the higher their risk of resorting to addictive behaviour to sooth their pain, even temporarily. Addiction (alcohol, drugs, shopping, Internet, etc.) is an attempt to seek something from the outside that the individual is not able to generate from within.

The Brain’s Ability to Deal with Stress Develops Optimally in Supportive Secure Environments

Childhood experience is significant because the circuitry that modulates the brain's reward chemicals is underdeveloped in traumatized children. Infant discomfort is a response to parental discomfort. It is also important to note that although addiction is often multigenerational and runs in families it has nothing to do with genetics but is caused by emotional patterns and behaviours that give rise to the same pain and hence, the same desire to escape from it.

Featuring:
Gabor Maté

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[drewartturbine]

Thank you for sharing the wisdom of this insightful thinker.   It is this sort of holistic thinking, addressing both the immediate and obvious problem, and it's deeper roots, that gives me a lot of hope.  

[andreas]

What he says is like a warm blanket you know, someone sees what messed with you as a kid and explains to you your behavior and that youre not born with deterministic features, rather than punishment and forced-corrections.

[xXfsasXx]

This is great but I've heard conflicting arguments regarding the genetic issues.

[plantefitch]

Why those first five years are so very very very important. Also why many teenage pregnancy leads to painful future outcomes for children. ( Not "always"-- but often, the environment is chaotic and unstable--- if not traumatic. )

[dalejackson]

I do agree with what you are saying, however this is also a generational thing right now, definitely a certain age group being affected by addictions. Most people you talk to have some form of childhood trauma or it wasn’t easy growing up, however, not all of us are addicted like the staggering numbers now! Why do you think that is?

[gerardjones]

Half the addicts say they were stressed as kids, the other half said they had great childhood, it's got nothing to do with childhood.

[krakorakazar]

While I agree that early childhood plays a intense role in developing a person into who they end up to be, what makes Dr. Mate so sure that that is the only cause of people to turn to addictions. He says genetics don't play a role but how can that be definitively pointed out, when he says it runs in families (from a different cause).

[BushyHairedStranger]

Anyone here have any Landmark Forum experience? Have information, personal experience to extend as Im trying to decipher if its snake oil salesmen trip or actually worthwhile

[gerardjones]

Go to an AA meeting and ask, they are the experts. Doctors have no experience or solution.

[sharahernandez]

not true. there is absolutely a genetic component. look at the lacota where there is no such thing as a social drinker.