The spiralling stages of addiction

The entry into addiction and the climb out.

Addiction has come in different stages and at different times in my life. It started with a trauma, something I believe we can all relate to. My drug of choice went from sexual to substance and back again, almost mimicking the same cycle throughout my life.

Drug relief feels good; it covers up the pain of trauma and leaves it behind momentarily. It makes you feel whole in a way that life couldn’t. The problem is it’s not just a one-time relief. You start to go back repeatedly, wanting more and more from it each time. You begin to have an increased reliance on the addiction and, by default, start messing up in life even more. The more mistakes, the more ways you look to numb them and the more people you draw into your downward spiral. It’s true what they say, hurt people hurt people.

Loneliness is the next stage. You start to alienate yourself to make your drug use more acceptable.

There comes the point of loneliness where you try and figure out: why?
Not so much ‘why me?’ but ‘why am I like this? When did it start? Can I pinpoint the start of this downward spiral?’

You start to shape the beginning of your trauma story, and it becomes your only story. Maybe you’ll read a book or two, perhaps a podcast. Something will make you feel not alone enough to start talking to a therapist or going to (Alcoholics Anonymous) AA until the realisation comes that you only have one choice: take responsibility for your actions.

Then starts the beginning of a new journey and a new realisation, maybe you have more than one addiction. Again, this is my journey, so I can’t speak for everyone — but this can happen more than once.

I got sober, relapsed, got sober, hurt people, relapsed and got sober. I hit rock bottom and spent years unravelling all the bullocks with sober eyes, feeling resentful that I was the way I was.

Slowly, you build yourself up again and start seeing the beauty in life’s small things. You start your spiritual journey, and although it’s still painful and slow, it feels right. You realise that you were nowhere near as cured as you thought, and you’re open to even more change than you thought possible.

You see the clear links in your personality, your history, why you are the way you are, and you begin to set yourself up to win. Then, gratitude starts flooding in — you survived. You made it. Life might still be challenging, but there’s excitement there.