ADDICTION QUOTES II
quotations about addiction
How a society views individuals who engage in addictive behaviors has an important influence on addiction and recovery from addiction. If addiction is seen as a moral failing, it will be condemned. If seen as a deficit in knowledge, it will be educated. If the addiction is viewed as an acceptable aberration, it will be tolerated. If the addiction is considered illegal, it will be prosecuted. If viewed as an illness, it will be treated. Social policies mirror these different views with strategies ranging from prohibition and criminalization to hospitalization and mandated treatment.
CARLO C. DICLEMENTE
Addiction and Change
Addiction is not a fact of life but a description about how we are choosing to live.
PAUL PEARSALL
The Last Self-Help Book You'll Ever Need
If addiction is primarily obsession and compulsion, then whenever you feel like you don't have a choice, you are in the radar of an addiction.
SHARON HERSH
The Last Addiction
Addiction skews choice -- but doesn't completely eliminate free will: After all, no one injects drugs in front of the police. This means that addicts can learn to take actions to improve our health.
MAIA SZALAVITZ
"Can you get over an addiction?", Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, August 14, 2016
An addiction to substances is a chronic illness. Let's be clear about that. It is not a moral failing. It is not just a matter of will power and "saying no." It is does not involve being "sent away" to rehab or residential where a miracle cure will be performed. Recovery from addiction is hard work. It is a lifelong pursuit that often entails failure, sometimes lots of failures. And it is liberating and life giving and full of joy. We say: Recovery is Beautiful. It's a second chance at happiness.
MICHAEL SCHOENHOFER
"Lima in Black and White: Addiction creeps up on many; there is help", The Lima News, February 4, 2016
Drug addiction rewires the brains of addicts overtime to only associate happiness with their substance abuse. The addiction becomes ingrained in their system and actually starts overtaking more rational thoughts, guiding the decisions of the addict. The release of large amounts of dopamine from substance abuse, which makes the user feel euphoric, becomes directly linked to their use. Over time, that connection strengthens, overpowering even the most basic of human instincts, like caring for a child.
STEVE BIRR
"How Opioid Abuse Is Rewriting The Brains Of Addicts", The Daily Caller, January 22, 2017
What you learn is that addiction is really a Band-Aid.... When you start digging through the layers, the addiction is on top but as you dig down and understand ... many of them have been traumatized at a young age and as they grow addiction becomes part of how they numb that pain.
OLIVIA MULLIN
attributed, "Healing Housing aims to ease women in addiction recovery back to healthy lives", Brentwood Home Page, January 22, 2017
Waiting to treat a disease instead of preventing it is like waiting for a snake to bite rather than recognizing and avoiding it. Addiction is recognized as a disease. Prevent it. Bad life choices are just like wading through tall grass without boots. The snake will bite. Learn and teach others about making good choices and wear the "good boots."
JOHN SANDERS
letter to the editor, "Prevent addiction instead of just treating it", Greenville Online, March 2, 2016
Addiction is a chronic illness, with genetic, environmental and social aspects that are similar in scope to illnesses such as diabetes or hypertension. Why should one be treated as a social and moral failure while the other is a medical issue? As the neurobiology and medical communities make very clear, addiction is a chronic disease, and its treatment needs to mirror that of other chronic diseases.
VIVEK KUMAR
"The Key to Addressing the Addiction Epidemic Begins with Science", The Jackson Laboratory, February 2, 2016
Addiction is a hopeless, dark place. I have great empathy for people trapped there.
ELIZABETH VARGAS
"Elizabeth Vargas opens up about alcohol addiction: 'I couldn't stop drinking for my children'", Fox News, September 8, 2016
Every form of addiction is bad, no matter whether the narcotic be alcohol or morphine or idealism.
CARL JUNG
Memories, Dreams, Reflections
Lets stop glamorizing addiction and what causes it, and instead promote, morality, self-control, abstinence if called for, and personal responsibility.
LESTER F. POLENZ
"Addiction is slavery", Mansfield News Journal, February 13, 2016
The face of addiction is changing. We are now seeing 16- to 20-year-olds, with their whole lives ahead of them, suffering from substance use disorders. More and more people of all ages and backgrounds, rich and poor, from the cities to the suburbs, are presenting with crippling addictions. This is a societal problem, and as such, it is crucial that we provide our neighbors, friends, family and loved ones with the proper treatment and care they need to get sober.
ROBERT J. BUDSOCK
"Progress on addiction treatment front", Asbury Park Press, February 26, 2016
A junky runs on junk time. When his junk is cut off, the clock runs down and stops. All he can do is hang on and wait for non-junk time to start.
WILLIAM BURROUGHS
Junkie
Addiction is not something we can simply take care of by applying the proper remedy, for it is in the very nature of addiction to feed on our attempts to master it.
GERALD G. MAY
Addiction and Grace
Addiction is a relationship--a pathological relationship in which ... obsession replaces people.
PATRICK CARNES
Out of the Shadows
Modern addiction is a means to an end -- a self-imposed medication that is an individual's desperate attempt to deal with unimaginable life circumstances. It's easy for some of us to sit behind our keyboards and condemn these addicts as "irresponsible junkies that need to suck it up and get a job," or, even worse, define the recent overdose tragedies as "natural selection." How, as a society, have we become so comfortable with these judgmental comments when dealing with such a tragic loss of life? How can we look at grieving parents and orphaned children and still say "Great, this lowlife got what he deserved"?
SCOTT GEHRING
"Today's drug addicts not using for fun", Cincinnati, September 7, 2016
None of us want to believe that addiction can touch us or those we love. No parent can tolerate the idea of harm coming to their children, much less the nightmare that is addiction.
JIM LAPIERRE
"Is Addiction Really a Disease?", Bangor Daily News, February 24, 2016
It is not heroin or cocaine that makes one an addict, it is the need to escape from a harsh reality. There are more television addicts, more baseball and football addicts, more movie addicts, and certainly more alcohol addicts in this country than there are narcotic addicts.
SHIRLEY CHISHOLM
testimony to House Select Committee on Crime, Sep. 17, 1969
If we can figure out at the age of five which kids are going to be addicts and which ones aren't, that tells us something fundamental about drug addiction .... [it] is a symptom, not a cause, of personal and social maladjustment.
JOHANN HARI
Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs