Can you get addicted to anything?
When Russell Brand left sex addiction rehab, it wasn’t because he’d graduated with honors.
(Insert eyeroll-worthy “Magnum Cum Loudly” pun here.)
He left, as he’d go onto explain in interviews, because sex rehab is really not much different than one you visit for drugs or alcohol; addiction is addiction. The proclivity toward any manifestation of it comes from the same place. And you can get addicted to pretty much anything. If you do something to excess in such a way that it’s detrimental to your life physically, spiritually, or psychologically – then that’s an addiction. So, yes. Whether it’s women, beanie babies, or bags of smack – you can get addicted to pretty much anything.
(Otherwise all’a these and probably at least a few unlisted fellowships wouldn’t exist.)
I had my own experience with it this week.
After getting bitten by a Lyme ridden tick and suffering a rash so itchy that I think it bore down into my soul, I finally went to the doc. And she gave me this pill called “Hydroxyzine” – which is basically Benadryl… if Benadryl went to boot camp, came back, and then clocked you in the face with its fist so that you passed out by 7 in the evening. (Really. Couldn’t keep my eyes open.) My feelings about this? Utter confusion and super charged cognitive dissonance. On the one hand, it was nice to wake up sans the usual panic attack and without gasping for air for the first time in almost two years. It was nice to feel like I didn’t have to remind myself to breathe in those moments before giving into sleep. It was a nice departure from my usual cerebral assault from which I’m never free. But – that last one – was coupled with a terror and hatred. My mind might be a sadistic bastard, but it’s overactivity center is also the place from whence all of my creativity and curiosity and passion come. And the second I felt that slipping away into some foggy gutter, I knew something wasn’t right. Especially when I took the pill again the next night. After getting zero work done, cutting one of my runs short, and yelling at my dog so loud that she shat on the floor (sorry, Minnie.) I already didn’t like this person I was becoming; but by night three, I was sure I was in danger of losing myself for good… when I turned on (hides face shamefully in palm)… a Nicholas Sparks flick. And cried. And then cried about the fact that I was crying: “This isn’t me! I don’t DO this!”
Right about now, you might be thinking “this doesn’t fit into the ‘addicted to anything’ genre” – because it’s not a non-drug like my jogging addiction (thrice a day) my ex-boyfriend’s gaming addiction (constant), or something like Mr. Brand’s addiction to “the ol’ in-out” (dunno; I generally defer asking people about their freak frequency – but you’ll get a good idea if you read Booky Wook 2). So, let’s pause for a moment and acknowledge that – yes – from Skyrim to skirt chasing, studies seem to show anything can be addictive – if you’re an addict. Any new cure for the unbearable intrinsic misery that chronically haunts you can feel like a missing jigsaw piece to which you’re entitled for suffering said pain.
But the reason for my prescription bottle anecdote shines a spotlight on something relevant and important for anyone in recovery: the info on the bottle. Because while I’d go on to look up this med and see the readout insist it was not addictive, I knew that my experience ran counter to what they were telling me. It’s like I could feel the gears of my grey matter winding to a low roar, then whimper, and eventually the only audible sound was that of a flat line. And, sure enough, when I opted to jettison the drug and just deal with the unbearable skin tickling phantoms haunting my hands and feet, it was like going through a light version of opium withdrawal. (Which I also feel when I skip a jog felt that one time I skipped a jog. About a year ago.) But it was worth it to get the shiz outta my system.
And I’m grateful for that little experience.
It was a perfect arm’s-length revisit to another angle of the same terrible prison I never plan to return to.
That’s the nice thing about working any kind of all-encompassing program while you’re trying to recover. If it’s any good, it forces you toward perpetually honest introspection so that you’re granted an invaluable awareness during times like these. Any new experience is an experiment. For example, when you’re given a med and don’t like it, you can take mental notes on the experience regarding how your mind and body’s responding. Maybe it’s too familiar. Maybe things around you you’ve worked so hard for are beginning to suffer again. Maybe if you can acknowledge that, you can stop before you start justifying why you should keep popping soporific pills long after a rash is gone. (And, yes, this also goes for willfully giving yourself a nether rash if you realize you’re overdoing the sextracurricular activities that land you in derriere detox.)
In the end, labels of any kind don’t always have your best interest in mind – whether it’s the kind of addict you are or what you can or can’t get addicted to. We spent too much time in active addiction letting outside forces tell us how to feel. But we don’t have to live like that anymore.
’cause nobody but you can discern what’s truly addictive or not.