Cravings
The first challenge for any addict wishing to kick his addiction is overcoming the mental and physical cravings for drugs or alcohol. Cravings are strong, uncontrollable urges to use drugs or alcohol that drive the addict to once again use addictive substances.
To get an idea of what drug cravings are like, think of a time when you went for a long time without eating a meal and you were really hungry. Hunger is a mental and physical sensation that is triggered when the body needs food for nutrients and energy.
The craving for food, driven at a physical level, stimulates memories of eating food, which is followed by a strong desire or compulsion to consume food. Usually when a person is very hungry, they will think about their favorite foods; if they get hungry enough, they can sometimes even smell and taste certain foods.
If a person goes long enough without food, compelling thoughts of eating plus a growling stomach and shakiness due to not having eaten will become so great, making the person so uncomfortable, that they will drop whatever it is they are doing and arrange to get food and eat it. As soon as the food is consumed, the hunger pangs stop and the person feels good about satisfying their hunger.
A drug craving is similar, but the desire to use drugs is much stronger and more intense. An addict who is craving drugs will feel like life itself is dependent on getting and taking their preferred drug. They will do and say almost anything to get the drug to handle their intense cravings. Once they satisfy the craving, they feel relief until the drug wears off and the craving returns.
Some withdrawal symptoms and cravings are caused by poor nutrition and the vitamin depletion that follows substance abuse. When a body lacks certain nutrients, it cannot make some substances it needs for health and energy, causing a person to feel tired and moody. Depletion of certain vitamins and minerals can also cause shakiness and pain. Withdrawal symptoms and cravings may also result from the toxins (substances the body sees as poisons) that accumulate after repeated drug use. These toxins stress many of the body’s systems, resulting in fatigue, aches, pains and unclear thinking. The addicted person has learned to medicate their mental or physical problems with drugs; they will continue to use drugs as a solution whenever they feel poorly. Therefore attempting to handle addiction with more drugs only makes the problem worse.
Storage of Drug Residues in the Body
Today it is fairly common for many companies and federal agencies to drug test their employees. Through a common urinalysis test, it can be determined if the employee has taken any one of several drugs. This test of a person’s urine not only detects if they have taken drugs, it also detects what type of drugs were taken. Drug tests detect the presence of any drugs or their metabolites. Metabolites are the products left behind in the body when it has broken down a substance so it can be eliminated. Drug metabolites are like fingerprints of the drug that was taken. Cocaine produces a cocaine metabolite, opiates produce an opiate metabolite, alcohol produces an alcohol metabolite and so on.
Most drugs and alcohol are metabolized, or broken down, in the liver but all tissues in the body will break down drugs or other foreign substances for elimination. Drugs and metabolites leave the body through urine, feces and sweat but they are not fully eliminated. Since drugs dissolve better in oil than water, they have a natural affinity for fats. Therefore any drug residues or metabolites that are not eliminated have a natural attraction to fat cells and so tend to be stored in one’s fat.
As an example, the active chemical in marijuana, THC, is so fat-soluble that, when consumed, most of it rapidly leaves the bloodstream and lodges in the fatty tissues of the body. From there, it slowly moves back into the bloodstream over a period of weeks or even longer.
Only recently have scientists discovered that fat is actually a vital organ that produces hormones that affect our moods, energy levels and immunity. Chronic uses of drugs or alcohol have been shown to disrupt this function. This disruption is one of the factors that cause cravings, as the body attempts to correct the disturbance by craving what it lacks or a similar substance, such as the drugs that originally caused the disruption.
In the late 1970s, American author and humanitarian L. Ron Hubbard made the revolutionary discovery that drug metabolites and other toxins that were stored in the fat cells had the continuing effect of locking addicts in their addictions, and that eliminating these stored deposits was a key to full recovery. He went on to develop a fast and simple method of extracting those deposits, resulting in improved mental and physical health. This discovery was a critical step forward in the effort to resolve drug cravings.
Stored Drugs and Drug Memories
Each time a person consumes drugs or alcohol, they retain a complete recorded memory of that life experience. Whether they were happy or sad or had a good time or a bad time, all emotions, feelings and sensations that were present at the time the drug or alcohol was consumed are filed away in the person’s memory. Even if the person blacks out, the experience is still recorded in the mind. In the case of those addicted to opiates, alcohol, tranquilizers or any other addictive drugs, they will accumulate a series of memories that contain the pain and discomfort associated with drug withdrawal.
The body will metabolize (change energy sources into energy) and burn fat cells any time a person undergoes a situation in life that causes their heart rate to speed up. Stress can do this, as can strenuous exercise or intense emotion. Most of us experience these kinds of stressful situations on a fairly regular basis.
When an addict’s body metabolizes fat, if the fat cells contain metabolites from past alcohol and drug use, those metabolites will activate back into the person’s bloodstream as the fat cells burn.
Keep in mind that each type of drug produces its own metabolite. Therefore, if alcohol metabolites were stored in the fat, once those fat cells are metabolized, the body will be reminded of alcohol at a physical level. If the person has taken cocaine, then cocaine metabolites will be released into the bloodstream and remind the body of earlier cocaine use.
The effect of these metabolites being present in the bloodstream will trigger recorded memories of drugrelated experiences and discomforts from the past. The person will remember feeling and thinking like they did in the past when they were under the influence of the drug or alcohol. Or they will remember experiencing the pain and discomfort that occurred when they were coming down from the drug. They are prone to use drugs or alcohol again at these times.
|
