Overheard in Recovery: Fake

In a discussion about the bio-chemical issues that underlie addictions we were discussing how the mood-altering chemicals that people use mimic actual natural neurotransmitters. Someone said,

Yeah, they're fake chemicals that lead to confusion.

I was immediately transported back to a statement a psychiatrist once said to me when discussing addiction:

Confusion is always a sign of the disease at work.

I always understood and accepted that. It made a lot of sense. In the past 21 years of hanging around in this recovery field I have seen it happen in myself as well as others. Confusion, as opposed to trying to make a decision with several options, is a way of keeping one from being conscious, aware, of the real possibilities. Instead false choices seem to take over.

It was only when I heard the line about fake chemicals that I recognized at least some of the reason for that. The "addicted brain" has been hijacked by fakes. The chemicals that mimic the natural chemicals are part of that. But that leads the brain to live in a state of confusion. What's real? What's fake? These alien chemicals look sort of like the real thing. They act sort of like the real thing. They even fit into the neuro-receptors like the real thing.

But they aren't the real thing. Confusion begins to set in. Even though the pleasure centers of the brain like them, they are still "artificial", alien. Confusion grows. Meanwhile the brain's chemistry changes some more. The natural chemicals are forced out. The receptors change. Confusion takes over.

Voila- addiction. And confusion.