Addiction Is Not A Matter of Will - The Craving Brain Part 2 of 2

Welcome to our Brothers in Conversation podcast, powered by Jesse and Shondell. Shondell, you are from Bed Stuy do or Die Brooklyn. That little town. That's a little town that's nothing like Hawthorne, Nevada, population 5,000 cats and dogs. Welcome to Brothers in Conversations. Shondell Newsom is not on this line because now it's actually sister and brother conversation.

Because I, Lisa Farrell, is standing in for Shonda.

Absolutely. And we are. This is part two. This is actually, before I get into part two, this is episode number 38, podcast number 38. And we're talking about the Craving brain. This is our notes from reading the book the Craving Brain. And this is part two of two. So let's jump right into that and continue to share. You were talking about the P. Rats, and there was a cliffhanger. The other cliffhanger was I said I would give them. Is I always wanted to understand why my mother would always borrow sort of, or take my money. As a kid growing up, I always wanted to be like other kids and get that hundred dollars in the bank. And I worked as a. As a. I was going to say busboy, but I did that later. I worked as a pin setter in Hawthorne, Nevada, setting pins at the bowling alley. Every time someone bowled one whole game, they paid me 15 cents. Can you imagine? It'd take a while to earn $100 if I was earning at that level. Well, every time I would get close, my mother would borrow my money, and then she'd go to the El Capitan, the local hotel casino there in Hawthorne, Nevada, and she would lose it. And she'd always. I would be crying when I go to give her the money, and she would tell me, you stop crying. You know, I'm gonna give you. I'll pay you back. And when payday would roll around, I'd go to my mother and I said, mother, can I get that $50 that you borrowed from me? $50? Who. Who bought you those shoes? Who bought you that shirt? She never, never paid it back. And I always wondered, why would a mother that says she loves her kid and I know she loves her kids. My mother loved all of her kids. Why would she do that? Well, it wasn't that she was attempting to do anything bad, but I couldn't figure out how that could happen when I discovered the craving brain and what causes addiction. Holy smokes. I got it.

And you let it go completely because.

There was nothing she was attempting to do to hurt me or anybody else. She didn't know how to. She didn't know about the nucleus accumbens. She didn't know about the craving.

And how old were you when you read this book?

I would have been, see, so 20. I'd say I probably was 40. Probably 40 years old when I read it.

So you I didn't understand her or let her off the hook until you read it at age 40.

I didn't butcher her out into the world, but internally, yes, I did not let her off the hook until 40 at age 40. And I thought, wow, I am so glad that I am not living a life with those sort of challenges.

Gotcha.

All right, let's jump into it.

Okay, so I will say P Rats Lab Studies for Breeding Alcohol Preferring rats Complexities of human behavior precludes a straightforward analysis of the influences that lead to addictive behavior. Lab rats have been bred to self administer all the drugs that have been abused by humans. In these experiments, the animals are allowed to drink from two different bottles, one containing the drug and the other containing water. Alcohol preferring rats, or known as PEA rats, could be bred voluntarily alcohol consumption by mating high alcohol consuming rats until there was a clear distinction between those bred to prefer alcohol and those bred to not to prefer alcohol. The NP rats the non preferring rats.

Okay, psychology between drinking and non drinking P rats. This selective breeding had provided the opportunity to study the biology of addictive behavior without the influence of environment. It allows for the study for the psychology between drinkers and non drinkers. Not only did the P rats prefer alcohol, meaning preferring rats, they worked harder to get it. This suggests somehow that alcohol rewarded them. Taste was not an issue. Research with the PEA rats suggests a role for lowered serotonin in certain parts of the brain. These studies were replicated for cocaine and opiates as well. When alcohol was given to the PEA rats, a greater level of dopamine was observed in the nucleus accumbens.

Okay, the role of Dopamine as it relates to drugs and alcohol While alcohol is known to react with different parts of the brain, dopamine plays the central role in acute reinforcing actions of alcohol and other drugs. The P rat's testing gives us two clues for the first time regarding dopamine and its role in assisting the addiction. The first clue was that the level of serotonin was low in the P rats and secondly, upon stimulation, the nucleus accumbens release more dopamine than the NP rats. This baseline levels of dopamine do not appear to play a role, nor does dopamine levels in other parts of the brain. The key observations provide the Biological configuration of the addictive landscape. If an individual is born with this terrain, the risk for addiction is great.

Wow. That, to me, is huge. Puberty and its effects on our landscape. One of the most powerful forces to landscape our terrains and alter our behavior are puberty. It is powerful that all cultures recognize it. Some cultures even sanctify it, Such as the Jewish bar mitzvah. It is a time of passage. Hormones challenge our bodies and minds. Estrogen and testosterone complete the system that produces the pain of longing. These hormones lower serotonin levels and alter the sensitivity of the nucleus accumbens. Our minds lust and our bodies ache. We are motivated to have sex to remove the pain. I didn't know it was painful.

No, I thought it was. Felt pretty good.

Well, no, that was. That was why you were into sex. But I'm talking about. I. I didn't know that. I felt that. I was seeking to remove pain for the desire for sex. Yeah. I thought it was just an urging and a pulling, but what the doctor is saying is our minds lust and our bodies ache. We are motivated to have sex to remove the pain.

Yeah, I've never thought of it that way myself either. Wow. Adolescence and the results of abstaining sexual desires are. Our culture says that we are not supposed to have sex until we're married. This creates a conflict in our minds. It would curtail the desire if we committed the sex act. Our brains are under constant internal stress as a result of the hormones. As a consequence, adolescence is a time where many addictive and compulsive behaviors begin. Bulimia, anorexia, often surface during these years.

Imagine what. How this could serve young people growing up as. As they begin in the adolescent stages and beyond. If they had this intelligence, if they have this information. Okay. Drinking, alcohol and smoking usually start during adolescence. It appears that our inherent terrain and how it affected. How it is affected by our hormones can produce a landscape predisposed to addictive behavior. Innate, inescapable processes that cannot be changed. All things are affected by their environments.

Landscape, behavior, and predisposition. Our landscape directs our behavior. If someone cuts us off in traffic, we react differently when we're tired and hungry versus when we're rested and satisfied.

You mean like when I was at Costco yesterday and I reacted. And we're playing this complaint free world game. We have to get 21 days in a row with no complaints. I was on day number three. How did I show up in traffic?

You had a bit of a tone and some language going on. There was a bit Of a complaint.

I think I was hungry and didn't know it. Go ahead.

So we may react with rage if we're tired. And we may react with calm if we're rested. Given the same incidents, it is our predisposition that culminates the behavior. Our environmentally and hormonally modified terrain, our landscape that directs the behavior.

Environment landscapes the brain, allowing us to adapt. From an evolutionary point of view, our ability to respond to identical sensory input in different ways is critical to survival. Imagine if every time you saw food you ate it. Or every time you saw a receptive sexual partner, you had to have sex right then and there. Our ability to get anything done would be avoiding any stimuli that would produce a response. This is almost impossible.

Nature solved this problem by giving our brains the capability of being altered. So the perception won't always lead to the same response. Our environment landscapes the brain and allows us to adapt. It increases our chance of survival.

The sensory world we inhabit have two parts. The fourth field, which reflects that which is brought to conscious attention. And the backfield, that which remains subconscious. Taken together, they form a field. It is the field we continually sense and perceive. This perception is then processed on our.

Landscapes, forefield and back. Field stimulus. We will respond to these things we are aware of. Such as if we get to see an attacker, it will frighten us on a conscious level. It also alters our physiology to allow us to engage, fight or flight. Clearly, in this case, we will respond to a more four field stimuli. But what evidence is there for responding back to backfield stimuli? Can things we are unaware of change? Change our behavior and physiology?

But I have a funny feeling that they can. Classic psychotherapeutic concepts suggest that subconscious thoughts about past events can affect behavior, somehow affecting the way we respond. Freudian theory suggests that it is only by bringing the subconscious to conscious awareness that the deleterious effects on our behavior can be addressed.

Forefield and BACKFIELD Landscapes the the brain we postulate that it is not only the past events which affect behavior, but the ongoing daily exchange with which the world we inhabit. The interaction affects the landscape and how we respond. Both forefield conscious perception and backfield subconscious perception can landscape the brain.

Pattern recognition process Nature has surrounded us with sights, sounds, tastes and smells. How is the brain to make sense of all of this? The answer is through a pattern recognition process. Pattern recognition is the way in which the brain matches sensory input in order to create a perception.

Perception is an interpretation of the pattern scene based on a set of rules. This perception is being molded by Our current landscape and a response is being generated. All responses begin with sensory input. Sensing leads to perception by a pattern recognition process. A plant is an example of a foreground pattern recognition. When we look at a plant, there are many scanning processes of the brain that take place. We are experiencing the message that this is a plant and at the subconscious level we are unaware of it. This response can have profound effects on us.

Exactly. Backfill pattern recognition is a relationship between the menstrual cycle and the lunar rhythm have recently been confirmed. The lunar rhythm is a backfill pattern. We experience backfill pattern recognition every day. When we leave a room to do a task, then forget what it is we were going to do most of the time, when we return to the room that we first had the thought in, we seem to remember the task. A pattern that we are unaware of produces a response. Just as a hungry dog salivates when he sees food, the response to a perception is modulated by our landscape.

Adapting to the inescapable stress leads to addictive behavior. If the pattern recognition process that causes anxiety, hopelessness, despair produce stress and are short lived, we can manage. However, if the stress is prolonged and change can't occur, the individual, in order to survive, must then adapt. It is the brain's ability to reduce the consequences of the stress, yet remain alert to the solutions that improves the chances of survival. It is this process that alters the landscape and predisposes us to the addictive behavior.

Bringing four fill pattern recognition to the backfill. As a stressful pattern is perceived and passes through the landscape, it produces a response. If the response provides a way to change the stress, the landscape returns to its baseline state. If we can't change the stress, we adapt to the four field pattern recognition.

We become injured to garbage on the street, noise in our environment, overcrowding on the subway. This all becomes backfield. The process of adaptation to bringing four field pattern recognition to the backfield has profound implications in addictive behavior. Our response to stress and its effects on us have been well documented. Whether we're hungry or cold, worried about our debts or concerned of a loved one, we are under stress.

Think about that. Concerned of a loved one. When you think about that, why would the concern of a loved one create so much stress for us? Speak personally for yourself.

Well, if you think if you were supposed to be home at 2 o' clock and I didn't hear from you and it's five o', clock, then I'm growing concerned for my loved one because it's out of character for you not to be number one on time, punctual, or call me and let me know where you are.

Are you calling me Rain Man?

I didn't say that. So that's where you would be concerned about a loved one.

Actually, that's a very, very, very, very good point. And here's why. Think about this. And most people listening to this program or watching this, I want you, if you are listening or watching this program, follow us on this and go with this to Lisa's example. Most people, the longer term, the absence of the person that was supposed to be on at a particular time, let's say 5 o' clock and it's 8 or 9 o' clock, and you haven't heard from them, 10, 11 o', clock, or. What our minds typically do is we go quickly to the negative. And the longer term, the gap of time that the person was supposed to be there that you haven't heard from them is the more gloom and doom that you're feeling or peril that has happened. You think they were in a car accident or someone attacked them or something very tragic happened. Our minds tend to go there instead of, well, she probably just decided to go play racquetball and then after that met up with her girlfriends. And you don't go to the positive, happy side. Why do you think that is?

Because, number one, it's out of character and out of your behavior and out of the way we would treat one another.

Right. But why do we go so quickly to the negative and be fearful of something tragic or bad has happened when we have no information to support that?

Because it's very out of character for me not to call you. Because that's the deal. If you love somebody and you care about somebody and something's not normal, you pick up the phone and call them so that they don't have this undue worry and they're scared and what's going on.

Right. When it does happen like that, it creates acute stress.

Right?

Right. So let's keep going. The effects of acute stress. The great pioneering work of Hans Selye, a Canadian physician and researcher, showed that acute stress produced an alarm reaction that caused a rise in substance. Now, this one's going to take a minute for me to pronounce Caliglucortoidecoidsocorticoids. That's what it is. These substances reduce the effect of stress on the body and increase the body's ability to respond to a novel or stressful situation.

The glucocorticoids. Glucocorticoids glucocorticoids and dopamine. As it relates to prolonged stress, glucocorticoids increase the sensitivity of the nucleus accumbens to release dopamine. When this occurs, we are more likely to be motivated by the stimuli around us. It increases our ability to respond to perceived solutions. However, if the stress is prolonged and inescapable, the levels of glucocorticoids diminish and never return to their pre stress baseline.

Chronic Stress and alteration of our landscape despite appearing to adapt to its environment, the nucleus accumbens, that structure through which survival responses are generated, remains sensitized. This allows for heightened action on a moment's notice. For example, you're a smoker and the phone rings, it is your boss on the line. The conversation produces anxiety. Dopamine is raised in the nucleus accumbens and and you respond by lighting up a cigarette. Chronic stress and the consequent alteration of our landscape occur when the pattern recognition process is inescapable.

Okay, Causes of chronic inescapable stress Suburban housewives who feel as though they have lost their purpose in life when their children leave home as well as women trapped in welfare without the skills necessary to obtain employment experience chronic inescapable stress. Lack of control is inescapable stress. Anxiety, dishonor, chronic illness, a bad marriage are all examples of inescapable stress. A childhood with abusive parents is inescapable stress. An addiction in a self perpetuating way is inescapable stress.

Relationship between P Rats, Estrogen and hormones Data from animal studies suggest that chronic stress lowers serotonin levels. Let me read that again. Data from animal studies suggest that chronic stress lowers serotonin levels. This landscape, a combination of low serotonin and a sensitized nucleus accumbens is identical to both that found in P rats that mean rats preferring alcohol and the one produced as a consequence of estrogen and hormones.

The occurrence the occurrence of inescapable stress. Inescapable stress occurs in inner cities in present day Russia and wartime combatants.

Now this actually brings us to a conclusion of our note from the Craven Brain, but let's have a little bit of a dialogue on this. First off, I want to say if you're intrigued by all this, this isn't all of the book, but these are some of the key points that we gain in terms of taking notes in the book. So there's even more in the book. It's just amazing. So as we bring this podcast to a close, what are your thoughts about what we've shared in terms of sharing our notes with our audience.

I think that if you are predisposed to this with the 1/3 of the people that come from alcoholic parents or the lineage of alcoholics in the line, that it's going to be even more challenging for you to overcome it. Because in essence, we said earlier, you got to want to.

Right? Or even if it's not alcoholics, it could be drugs, it could be sex, it could be food, anything. As Dr. Ronald Rudin says, a Kaholic is a Koholic, whether it's foodaholic, alcoholic, whatever, any of those things. I did a little bit of research I want to share with you too, to help close this out. And I'm just going to read a little bit of this, if you're okay with that. See, what should you know about behavioral addictions and this research? You can look on the Internet and find different things. That doesn't mean it's always perfect or right, but it's informational. Although even experts disagree about whether behavioral addictions are real addictions. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 5th Edition, explicitly included behaviors in the addictions category, gambling disorder, and is the only officially recognized behavioral addiction. I was shocked to see that outside the world of professional psychiatry and psychology, the media has taken on and embraced the concepts of behavioral addiction, such as sex addiction and shopping addiction, as well as activities that are not included in the discussion about addiction, such as self injury or cutting type of thing and multiple plastic surgeries. Fascinating. Behavioral addictions, also called process addictions, follow the same pattern as substance based addiction or addictions. And they result in problems in many areas of the individual's life. That makes sense, doesn't it?

Yeah.

Behavioral addictions have similar effects to substance addictions on relationships, which are often neglected in favor of the addictive behavior. Undermining trust and putting pressure on partners and other family members to cover up and make up for difficulties arising from the addictions. What do you think about that?

I have witnessed that with people throughout my life.

Right. That's something I never really even thought about it that way. We almost feel like we have to cover for them, you know, because we want to protect them. We want people to not. We think we're protecting them, we're not. If it's a sexaholic alcoholic, a gambleholic, a drugaholic, and that they rampantly do that quite often or most of the time, we're not protecting anything.

Does it come from shame or guilt or not wanting to admit the truth of what the matter really is the.

Person with the addiction or the person.

Trying to protect them with the story that's covering up?

No. I think it comes from. Could be wrong because I don't know. I'm not in that role. I think it comes from the desire to want the best and betterment for that person. And want the world to see them better. Then they're really showing up. I think you want that for them. I think that desire of wanting them to be better and recover and be okay and live a decent life. So you come up with these stories and stuff that really may or may not be true or likely aren't. In your desire to help.

Right.

Do something because you can't. What can you do? I think it's our effort to do something for them. I mean, many, many cover stories for my mother. Until I come to the point. This is her addiction.

Right.

I made up all kind of COVID I didn't tell anybody that my mother was taking my money. I didn't tell a soul. I told people how great my mother was. So that's really good. Even if you can't find a service specializing in behavioral addiction, a psychiatrist or psychologist will still be able to help you change your problematic behaviors, improve your relationships and cope without the addiction. So, types of addiction, addictive behavior. Although most of these addictions are not recognized by the DSM 5. And that will go back to, let's see. Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. That's what they're talking about there. The leading diagnostic guide for the mental health profession. Many healthcare providers believe these are distressing conditions which can be treated. And some behavioral addictions are more common than others, including gambling addictions, sex addictions, Internet addictions, shopping addictions, video game addictions. Let me share your thoughts about what I've shared so far about some of these addictions.

Well, the Internet addiction could be, you know, pornography.

Oh, yeah. And that's down on the list. Down at the bottom. Yeah.

And then video games, food addiction, exercise addiction, work addiction.

Right.

I've been guilty of that.

I think I've had a little bit of that in me.

Tattoo addiction. No, that wouldn't be something for no. Love addiction. Yeah, I could be addicted to you sometimes.

Oh, that's too funny. Thank you for that.

Lastly, porn addiction.

Isn't the work addiction kind of tricky? Because when you own your own company, own your own business, you have to do everything from emptying the garbage to accepting the checks and everything in between. It takes so much. I'm not taking things away from people that Work in corporate America takes a lot to work in small businesses, medium sized business, big business. But when you're the entrepreneur and you own your own business, you are doing literally almost everything.

And that's why it's important to have boundaries and know when to put it down. Because you could literally be working and.

Also 24, 7 and also to your point, to know when to purchase some of those services so you're not doing it all. Tell them how when it came to making our videos, how you had. How long it took you to get me to stop making the videos.

Yeah, because you had to put it down, you had to rest. And it. Sometimes you've just got to learn what tasks need to be delegated and what don't make sense anymore. And that was one of those tasks that you needed to delegate. And you know, not that we're going to hire a team of people, but we have virtual assistants to help us do other activities that just don't make sense for us to do.

Yeah, but if you hadn't come along, I'd still be doing way, way, way too much in our business and not necessarily being the best editor. There are other people that do only that, that do only video editing, that do only copywriting and so forth and so on. You gotta trust you can still bring the core of the magic. But we've gotta, to your point, learn to trust other professionals and bring them along for the ride so we can do more with less.

Exactly. Which goes back to the point of being a work addict.

Well said. Signs of behavioral ADDICTIONS Understanding the addictive process and the danger signs can help you to tell the difference between addictive behavior, problematic behavior that's non and addiction and normal behavior that's non, problematic or healthy. So red flags. Include this and we'll close. Red flags include spending the majority of your time engaging in the behavior, thinking about or arranging to engage in the behavior or recovering from the effects.

Becoming dependent on the behavior as a way to cope with emotions and to feel normal.

Okay. These are signs of behavioral addiction. Continuing despite physical and or mental harm.

Having trouble cutting back despite wanting to stop.

Neglecting work, school or family to engage in the behavior more often.

Experiencing symptoms of withdrawal, for example, depression, irritability when trying to stop, and minimizing.

Or hiding the extent of the problem. So we put this together. I'll speak for myself, you speak for you. We put this podcast together in this program for. For the love of so many people that are battling so much, especially during these Covid times, during these pandemic times, people were battling all of this before the pandemic, before COVID before any of that.

And speaking of today is January 1st. Maybe people are, you know, doing a New Year's resolution to, if you're into that, right. To be better and to change their habits and maybe get help or.

That's a good point. And even if you're not doing a resolution, if you're not the resolution type, a lot of people are, if you're not, it's a new year. Why not turn over a new leaf? Just because. Why not start digging in and understanding where you need to put your energies and what you need to uplevel? Not necessarily always goal setting, but if you're not a goal setting kind of person, what do you want to do to increase the quality of your life? We put this together because we wanted to put something that might be a little bit controversial out there, but we have family members and we have loved ones and we have friends, and we have former colleagues and bosses and so forth that have suffered from different levels of things that cause caused addictions that put a damper on their lives.

Absolutely.

So this was intended to help people do something very, very positive by gaining some intelligence from the Craving Brain, the book by Dr. Ronald Rudin that we've gained so much value from.

Absolutely.

Close us out, Lisa.

Well, at the end of the day, it's all about how you leave them feel.