The problem with labels

raeolia · Joined: 15 Mar 2008 Posts: 15 Location: Wisconsin

The problem with labels

I’m called an addict. So that’s the end of it. I stopped being an individual person. I’m packaged now and stamped “ADDICT” and the rules of the text book apply, despite all of my idiosyncrasies, uniqueness’s, feelings, thoughts and beliefs. My thoughts on my experience and what I am going through and have gone through with an addiction to drugs means nothing. Everyone else knows better because of that text book! According to them, all addicts do this or that and all addicts feel this way or that and all addicts are in denial when they think and believe something contrary to the book. All addicts lie and can’t be trusted even when they get over their addiction. At least that’s what my spouse and others, including the doctors, believe to their own deception.

I’m told I’m no different then other addicts…that they all feel they are different from other addicts because they are special and their story is unique. And you know something? They are different, they are special and their story is unique!! But don’t expect your spouse, family, friends or doctor to believe that and don’t expect them to give any credibility to your thoughts or words. You are a package, sealed up and stamped! You are a text book. You can’t be trusted the rest of your life! Even when you are as honest as a person can possibly be, it’s got to be a lie.

I’ll be the first to admit that I’m chemically dependent on Opiates. How can I not be after being on them for a long period of time? That does not mean I’m an addict or addicted to them. In my mine there are two kinds of addiction. One is the physical addiction and that is when there is chemical missing from a person’s make up…call it a screwed up gene…and they need a chemical to fill that spot. That would make a person predisposed to needing a specific chemical.

Then there is the psychological addiction. Over time or because of an “instant” gratification, the person learns to identify an action or behavior with a feeling that they need. The attraction to this feeling is so strong that they can not stop doing what it takes to produce it…thus the psychological addiction.
My addiction is not to Opiates. It was, but that’s just another page in my life book. My addiction is this: I’m addicted to filling this emptiness…this big painful hole I have in me…this hole in my sole. I used infatuation and when that wore out I’d find another romance…someone else to be infatuated with. I equate that to taking another pill. I used sex to fill that emptiness or was I using it to distract myself from the pain of that emptiness? I don’t know. All I know is the pain wasn’t as bad and the emptiness was not so empty. I’ve used all sorts of things and Opiates was just one of them. But don’t try to tell this to anyone…they won’t believe you.
Raeolia