Addiction can take over a relationship, just as if it moved into the house, kicked the couple out of their bed, ate up all the food in the refrigerator, and didn’t let them leave. It starts by taking over your partner. You think it’s your wife speaking when she says she can’t go to aContinue reading “Discerning the Person from the Addiction”
Tag Archives: Addiction
The Shrink’s Links: Terry
Bringing you the best of mental health every week. You may think you know George McGovern. Maybe not, maybe you’re too young to know the Democratic presidential nominee who challenged Nixon in 1972 and lost abysmally. Politically, he was my generation’s Bernie Sanders. Long after his presidential bid, he wrote a book, Terry: My Daughter’sContinue reading “The Shrink’s Links: Terry”
Addiction Wants it All
The trouble starts when you accommodate the wrong thing. Partners deserve accommodations. Reasonable compromise is at the heart of friendship, much less love. It’s better to give than to receive. You scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours. There is no greater love than to lay down your life. If your girlfriend had the flu,Continue reading “Addiction Wants it All”
Are you a Partner or a Hostage?
Let’s sort this out: Partners have choices. Hostages have to do what they’re told. Partners can leave and speak. Hostages are bound and gagged. Partners share power. Hostages have no power. Partners compromise. Hostages adjust. Partners are trusted. Hostages are checked up on. Partners are loved. Hostages are blackmailed. Partners’ boundaries are observed. Hostages’ boundariesContinue reading “Are you a Partner or a Hostage?”
When Addiction Takes Over a Relationship
Even when people are firing on all cylinders, relationships can be tricky. When your partner is addicted, they can be impossible. Addiction takes a relationship into a dangerous territory where clarity turns gray and selfishness rules the day; where individuals disappear and are replaced by need; where spouses are objectified, resented, and manipulated; where weddingContinue reading “When Addiction Takes Over a Relationship”
Some Things You May Not Know About Substance Abuse: What keeps you addicted
Chemistry First there’s the chemical. That calm feeling you get from Percocet is just too good to give up. The sickness you feel when you are in withdrawal is just too bad to bear. Genes get rewritten when you use cocaine often enough, so that nothing but cocaine can make you happy. Your brain cellsContinue reading “Some Things You May Not Know About Substance Abuse: What keeps you addicted”
Some Things You May Not Know About Substance Abuse: You can’t stop cravings from knocking at the door, but you don’t have to answer
You could stop using whatever it is that is destroying you and you will still think about it from time to time. You’ll have dreams of using. A beer truck might roll by and you’ll feel thirsty. That old life will seem good every now and then. You could have some very good reasons toContinue reading “Some Things You May Not Know About Substance Abuse: You can’t stop cravings from knocking at the door, but you don’t have to answer”
Some Things You May Not Know About Substance Abuse, Part 20: Those who care the most about you will be the last to believe in your recovery
If you’re an addict in recovery, you may have already noticed this. Those who are closest to you are the last to believe you’re changing. Your wife, your husband, mother, father, children, close friends, don’t get as excited as you do when you celebrate one week clean, one month clean, or one year clean. They’veContinue reading “Some Things You May Not Know About Substance Abuse, Part 20: Those who care the most about you will be the last to believe in your recovery”
Some Things You May Not Know About Substance Abuse, Part 18: You don’t know what you can do
You could learn a lot about addiction and recovery by watching the Wizard of Oz. I’m not referring to the scene where Dorothy and her friends pass out in a field of poppies. That’s the only outright drug reference I can recall. I’m talking about the way Dorothy and her friends are traipsing all overContinue reading “Some Things You May Not Know About Substance Abuse, Part 18: You don’t know what you can do”
Some Things You May Not Know About Substance Abuse, Part 17: Recovery is easier than you think
All this reading about substance abuse and recovery may have given you the wrong impression. You may think that it’s hard to stop using drugs. Maybe it is, but nearly everyone who has experienced both addiction and recovery say the same thing: recovery is far easier than addiction. You’re accustomed to all the work itContinue reading “Some Things You May Not Know About Substance Abuse, Part 17: Recovery is easier than you think”
Keith Wilson - Counseling 