The Isolation of Addiction | Breakthrough

The similarities with all kinds of addiction is you get that first good feeling from using something, and your brain just remembers the good part. Whether there's a negative—I, oh, I didn't have any money after that, I didn't, I mis-rent or whatever—your brain really quickly forgets that.

Then it turns into just this obsession. Like, that it's really the only thing that matters. I shot up like right over there earlier; that's like where I got H—like halfway down that block. I look at it like it's a strip mine. At first, you know, I have these relationships, and they're fruitful, and I'm getting stuff out of them.

Then I will burn these bridges and strip away these relationships with people until there's nothing left. Then it's just like, screw—you know, screw it, whatever, you know, on to the next one. All you want to do is the drug thing. I can't stress enough it's the obsession; that's all there. That's all that matters, man. It's the only thing that makes any sense.

Then life is still happening to you as this is going on. You're not really consciously thinking about, well, you know, I don't—I don't make this phone call. I'm not going to call him tomorrow, and then you're not going to talk to them for six months, and that—that's going to change how that person feels about you. You're not worried about that, and you expect the next time you talk to someone, it's just to be like you talked to them yesterday.

With a lot of people, it's not like that, and I think that's a problem with getting clean too.

"Hi, good afternoon. I have an appointment to see Dr. Camlet."

Okay, you get clean, and you're like, oh, I'm just going to get detoxed, and things going to be fine. But you get out, and everything builds up—all the real-life stuff—because you just haven't been dealing with it.

The worst thing is really the shame in it all. I mean, you feel shameful that you've screwed so many people over. You feel shameful that your parents don't want to talk to you anymore, really, and that a lot of people resent you, and you can feel it. And it hurts. [Music]