What else does our addiction tell us? Actually, lots of things:



My addiction tells me that I can have just one more. One more drink, one more drug, and that I can get away with it without going off the deep end. This is a lie, plain and simple, and every addict secretly knows it in their heart of hearts. The issue here is that the person comes to a point in their life where they really do not care any longer, or they really believe that the next time they pick up a drug things will be different. Of course, it is never any different when we pick back up again, it is always the same and usually worse. We become really messed up and take way more drugs or alcohol than we had intended to originally.

My addiction tells me that my using days were not really all that bad. Another lie, this one based on our brain's tendency to remember only the good times and block out the bad stuff. This is part of our survival instinct, in fact. We will literally forget about all the pain and misery that came along with drinking and using drugs, and only remember the good times we had, which were few and far between. This kind of thought process is really tricky and it can cause us to go back to drinking and drugging if we do not put a stop to it.

My addiction tells me that I should be alone. Our addiction prefers us to isolate from others because then it has a better chance of talking us into trying just one drink or drug. When we connect with others in recovery we become stronger in our sobriety and we are more likely to resist the idea of relapse. So our addiction wants us to be alone, but we can defeat this problem by using a peer group in recovery that looks out for us when we are in times of need such as these.

My addiction tells me that I am a victim, and that I should feel sorry for myself. This is a dangerous mindset for an addict to have, because when we are feeling sorry for ourselves, it becomes easier to justify a drink or a drug. We have to realize that we are not a victim, and that we can take positive action in order to change our life and do something different. We don't have to get down on ourselves and pretend that the whole world is against us. We are strong people and we can find support if we are willing to seek it out. Feeling down or sad about our self is not a good reason to return to our drugs or our drinking.