Addictions - your experiences?

[shades of grey]

OCD at work.

On my till everything has its place.  If it is something I use regularly (stapler, till stamp) it has to be in its precisely aligned place.  If anyone borrows something from my till I miss it almost immediatly.  I get twitchy, then annoyed, then upset until it's returned.  People at work have learned that I cannot function unless everything on my till is where it should be.  If I go on holiday and someone else sits on my till they are warned in no uncertain circumstances that it must be as I left it before I get back, otherwise they will suffer my wrath.  And it is old school fire and brimstone wrath.  I don't even realise I'm doing it until I stop ranting, out of breath and emotionally drained.

Luckily it seems to be focused at work and I have very understanding co-workers.  I do get flashes of it at home but at the moment they seem to be under control.

[kakodi]

I don't know if this helps but ...

I only just recently quit smoking (as in 2 to 3 months ago). Often I'd quit for a while, but then eventually go back. Usually, it was stress that drove me back. I really honestly felt that I could not function as a normal person without the nicotine. Often, in my bouts of quitting, I'd seek some other substance to "fix" what I felt was broken. It is as Fyrchick stated, a lack of emotional coping skills. Before I recognized it was anything like that, I was constantly justifying the addiction, even to family members who were trying to shame me off the cigarettes.

For what it's worth, it was always to fix my ADD (attention deficit disorder). I was never put on drugs for it growing up, and I eventually turned to self medicating myself to fix my lapses in concentration, poor reflexes, and inability to control frustration. I can't remember the day it dawned on me that this is just who I was, and no amount of drugs would "fix" me or make me normal. I think it was more of a gradual process of making comparisons, and seeing my behaviours exhibited by others, that eventually led me to that conclusion. It wasn't a sudden light bulb turning on kind of a thing. It was just something I eventually knew. Even though it had been stated several times, knowing it in your head, and knowing it in your heart are two different things. The Willpower to quit and turn away for good comes from knowing it in the heart.

Again, don't know if that helps, but there you go.

[Snowleopard]

Don't know if this figures into addictions but I have OCD as SoG wrote.
Mine was not good - it wasn't just at work but everywhere.
If I did not go through the rituals I had I just felt (though I knew intellectually that this was NOT so) that
something bad would happen.  What really irked was those who told me to just get over it as though I had
asked for this problem.  I would do something like locking the door and as soon as I was done I'd have to do it
again though I knew I'd done it.  Drove me up a wall with frustration.
The problem was based in a hormone imbalance and when I got that fixed the OCD retreated.
Now I only get twinges when I'm under stress.

[Sir Huron Stone]

I used to tap constantly. It was just something i had to do. I didn't feel right if i wasn't tapping. I would just constantly tap my fingers, a pencil, anything. It got to the point where my teacher would snap at me immediately if i started tapping. Finally, i got into wrestling and i was always too tired to tap. But now, with wrestling over for the year, i've started tapping again. Not as bad, but i do annoy everyone in my classes. But i only tap when i have nothing to do or what we're talking about doesn't interest me.

[Haru]

I've had clinical depression pretty much since I was 12 or 13 years old (I'm 27 now and after excessive therapy last year where I was diagnosed for the first time I am better but still have to go a long way), and during that time I have developed an eating disorder, that I think would count as an addiction. I am not sure if that goes for every addiction (especially physical addictions), but my mind had replaced every single bad emotion with "hunger", so if I got sad, lonely, anxious, angry, you name it, I got hungry instead and the feeling got away when I had something to eat (after the "fix", if you will). I would keep snacks around to always have something to eat, because the hunger feeling was pretty close to unbearable. Not because I was actually hungry, but because I could not understand the emotion underneath and therefore I could not deal with it. I literally swallowed my anger. One of the worst things was that my mother often enough wanted to put me on a diet, which in return only made me more depressed.

[Nicodemus Carpenter]

Sorry to necro this thread, but I have a specific problem relating to this topic.

Without going into too much detail, a character has been using drugs as a means of controlling my protagonist for the past couple of years. With the events of the story, that supply will be cut off, and she'll have to contend with something approximating heroin withdrawal.  The addiction is important for later books in the series, but for now I need to know how to handle it.  In this first book, my protagonist is a young teen, and while her physiology is somewhat more robust than human normal, the general rules still apply. 

What I'm looking for are specific details about how much such a serious withdrawal would hamper someone mentally, emotionally, and physically over the course of a week or two.  Getting more drugs is not a viable option, so she won't be having to battle temptation or anything, just the unavoidable symptoms.  Her normal routine tends to include scrambles across rooftops at night, and sneaking into and out of places that most people consider inaccessible.  What I'm trying to figure out is whether this will simply be more difficult, or flat out impossible.

[Sir Huron Stone]

It'll be flat out impossible. I've seen people going through heroin withdrawl, and they just don't function. Vomiting, tremors, headaches, it's just not possible.

[Nicodemus Carpenter]

Exactly. I've seen the same thing, but I've also heard some stories about addicts that manage to stay at their jobs during the process.  I don't know if that was due to different constitutions, different levels of addiction, methadone therapy, or just plain lies.

[OpticChaos]

there are medications and things that can help you deal with withdrawal but if your going cold turkey on an actual hardcore addiction, it will stop you dead.

I'm assuming that your character is going cold turkey so to make it true to life you need them to be literally writhing in pain almost constantly for a few weeks.

[Fyrchick]

Withdrawing cold from a hardcore drinking problem can actually give you brain damage. Seizures are common, as are electrolyte imbalances which will bring heart rate issues, change in mentation (confusion and hallucination) and muscle cramping/coordination problems. It tends to last longer than other addictions because of the time it takes the body to process it out. There is also sleeplessness and hyperactivity that tends to come with meth/cocaine/stimulant withdrawal. But these have a very short half-life, which means a shorter withdrawal. Appetite effects are also bad, since the liver is connected to the digestive system. Drinkers tend to get pancreatitis as well, which can be debilitating by itself.

Medication addictions can also have some of the same withdrawal, but tend to last less than a week- if the person can last. People who do doctor/clinic supervised withdrawal have access to other resources to ease some of the symptoms.

Either way, its like having the hangover, the flu, and maybe feeling ike you got hit by a bus all at once- for at least a week.

[Snowleopard]

Sorry to necro this thread, but I have a specific problem relating to this topic.

Without going into too much detail, a character has been using drugs as a means of controlling my protagonist for the past couple of years. With the events of the story, that supply will be cut off, and she'll have to contend with something approximating heroin withdrawal.  The addiction is important for later books in the series, but for now I need to know how to handle it.  In this first book, my protagonist is a young teen, and while her physiology is somewhat more robust than human normal, the general rules still apply.  

What I'm looking for are specific details about how much such a serious withdrawal would hamper someone mentally, emotionally, and physically over the course of a week or two.  Getting more drugs is not a viable option, so she won't be having to battle temptation or anything, just the unavoidable symptoms.  Her normal routine tends to include scrambles across rooftops at night, and sneaking into and out of places that most people consider inaccessible.  What I'm trying to figure out is whether this will simply be more difficult, or flat out impossible.

The author Laurie King - who writes a Sherlock Holmes series showed his young female protagonist undergoing withdrawal - I think it was from cocaine.  I'll check and see what the book title is.
I've always heard that heroin is bad in that you get a physical addiction to it which is why withdrawal is an absolute hell.  Cocaine on the other hand, along with the physical, is a psychological addiction.

It's the Laurie King - Sherlock Holmes/Mary Russell series and the book, I believe, is "A Monstrous Regiment of Women."  It's the second in the series.  Note - if you're a Sherlock Holmes purist you probably won't like this series but I find them quite enjoyable.

[Sir Huron Stone]

I talked with a buddy of mine-he used to be addicted to heroin-and he said that when he went through withdrawl-he did it cold turkey after his daughter wanted to know when she could try-it is absolute hell. He still siezes up when someone smells like heroin or shows it too him. He's terrified of the stuff now.

[Nicodemus Carpenter]

You guys are amazing, thanks. You gave me exactly what I needed.

[Murphy's Stunt Double]

My character, Niles Harcourt, is a pill-popper. He digs Vicodin and X, acid and heroin. He's wealthy, charming, and incredibly high-profile. The end result is that his CEO father has a standing account with LAPD to keep his ass out of jail. To say he struggles with addiction isn't quite right - it's more like he revels in it.

...

But it's the urges I needed perspective on. And you guys have helped me with that admirably. Thanks again.

My recommendation: Go to a few Narcotics Anonymous meetings and listen. You have the credentials to be a member if you want to be, and it's completely ok to acknowledge that you're "just there to listen" when your turn comes to speak. Just be honorable about it and don't break the anonymity of anyone you see there in any way.

Good luck.