Family Shame/Abandonment = Addiction

I was just listening to "America's Drug War" on NPR. One of the unanswerable questions posed in the story was, "Why do certain people become addicted while others don't?" I believe in large part that most addiction comes from severe abandonment and shaming in childhood. Most likely, this shaming/abandonment results in a negative altering of brain chemistry that makes an individual vulnerable to using mind-altering drugs in an effort to escape these very painful feelings.I believe that culturally, because most parents are imperfect (and because most family and political systems are to a degree founded on shame-based philosophies), all of us have some vulnerability to addiction. I don't think there will ever be any victory in the so-called "drug war" until we can all learn to nurture one another and ourselves better. Here's to hoping that will happen!

Chris Hendrickson
San Diego, CA

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