I knew closely several opiod addicted people and had myself addicted to nicotine. Physical withdrawal symptoms is only a small part of the problem in both cases. Although I tend to agree with you on this part:
withdrawal doesn’t create pain, but simply amplifies and turns attention to small pains and discomforts that are already there, but normal people just don’t notice or get used to ignoring
You really can thoughen up and endure days to weeks of the physical withdraval, but then you have to deal with the months to years of the psychological addiction.
Opiod addiction is like a short circuit in motivation: Normally, when some problem bothers you, you are motivated to solve it. Opioids give an illusion of all problems disappearing, and teach people this flawed behavioral pattern: Instead of solving the actual problem, just take a dose. And this becomes a vicious cycle: addicted person spends all money on drugs, it produces more problems and more urge to solve them with taking more drugs. Planning horizon reduces to hours. Some prefer to steal money to get a doze even knowing that they will be caught the same day.
Thanks for the input! If addiction is more because of psychological pain (“problems that bother you”) than direct physical pain, could the same approach work but with mental pleasures/distractions from pain instead, like games, toys or organized social activities? Edit: And coping methods to avoid/decrease mental and social discomfort, which can include but are not limited to just therapy or communication, but could be things like new job/friends or prioritizing things in life differently. I read that some people trying to fight addiction get overwhelmed by having to get everything together at once, or being expected to just quit and function like normal immediately. If they were supported to have fun/play and feel better first in healthier ways, could it be more helpful?
Of course. And this is what many good rehabilitation programs do.
But the mere distraction is again, only a temporary solution. Patients need to relearn healthy behavioral patterns, otherwise they may fall back eventually.
Games are good in that sense that they provide a quick feedback loop. You had a problem and quickly solved it without a drug.
I knew closely several opiod addicted people and had myself addicted to nicotine. Physical withdrawal symptoms is only a small part of the problem in both cases. Although I tend to agree with you on this part:
You really can thoughen up and endure days to weeks of the physical withdraval, but then you have to deal with the months to years of the psychological addiction.
Opiod addiction is like a short circuit in motivation: Normally, when some problem bothers you, you are motivated to solve it. Opioids give an illusion of all problems disappearing, and teach people this flawed behavioral pattern: Instead of solving the actual problem, just take a dose. And this becomes a vicious cycle: addicted person spends all money on drugs, it produces more problems and more urge to solve them with taking more drugs. Planning horizon reduces to hours. Some prefer to steal money to get a doze even knowing that they will be caught the same day.
Thanks for the input! If addiction is more because of psychological pain (“problems that bother you”) than direct physical pain, could the same approach work but with mental pleasures/distractions from pain instead, like games, toys or organized social activities?
Edit: And coping methods to avoid/decrease mental and social discomfort, which can include but are not limited to just therapy or communication, but could be things like new job/friends or prioritizing things in life differently. I read that some people trying to fight addiction get overwhelmed by having to get everything together at once, or being expected to just quit and function like normal immediately. If they were supported to have fun/play and feel better first in healthier ways, could it be more helpful?
Of course. And this is what many good rehabilitation programs do.
But the mere distraction is again, only a temporary solution. Patients need to relearn healthy behavioral patterns, otherwise they may fall back eventually.
Games are good in that sense that they provide a quick feedback loop. You had a problem and quickly solved it without a drug.