Drug Abuse

Individuals use drugs for a variety of factors – mostly, though, to numb the pain of everyday life so they do not have to face it.  Eventually drug use turns to drug abuse and finally to drug addiction.  Most men and women use the two terms interchangeably, but the truth is there is a distinction between drug abuse and drug addiction.

Drug abuse is the use of illegal drugs or the inappropriate use of legal drugs.  Folks who abuse drugs are using them to obtain a specific feeling – a “high” – that they can’t get from other substances.  Frequently drug abuse is recreational with the drugs being employed to loosen a individual up and make them feel like they fit in with the crowd.

Drug addiction, on the other hand, is the uncontrollable use of drugs and the inability to stop using drugs in spite of health or social consequences.  Men and women with a drug addiction are physically and emotionally unable to stop utilizing drugs.  Their bodies have grow to be employed to having the drug in the system, and stopping the drug use brings about usually painful physical and psychological symptoms.

Drug addiction does start with drug abuse when an individual makes a conscious selection to use drugs, but addiction is not just “a lot of drug use.” Recent scientific analysis supplies overwhelming evidence that not only do drugs interfere with normal brain functioning creating powerful feelings of pleasure, but they also have lengthy-term effects on brain metabolism and activity.

At some point, changes happen in the brain that can turn drug abuse into addiction, a chronic, relapsing illness. Those addicted to drugs suffer from a compulsive drug craving and usage and cannot quit by themselves. Treatment is required to end this compulsive behavior.

Numerous people view drug abuse and addiction as strictly a social problem. Parents, teens, older adults, and other members of the community tend to characterize folks who take drugs as morally weak or as having criminal tendencies. They think that drug abusers and addicts must be able to stop taking drugs if they are willing to change their behavior.  This just isn’t true.

People from all walks of life abuse drugs and grow to be addicted.  We can begin combating these issues if we educate ourselves and each other about drug abuse and drug addiction.  It is an ever-growing epidemic that doesn’t have to take hold of men and women or society.  Drug abuse and drug addiction can be stopped, but only if we start with education.