Amber Hollingsworth explains that addicts sometimes mean hurtful things and sometimes don't. People in active addiction speak from intoxication, defensiveness, or desperation, each producing different kinds of statements: intoxication unfilters and magnifies feelings, defensiveness prompts reflexive lies to avoid accountability, desperation drives manipulation to get substances.
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Do addicts mean the hurtful things that they say? What makes them have no empathy? This is a question recently left by one of our viewers, and I'm thinking that there's more of you out there who are wondering the same thing. So I thought I would address it in this video. For those of you who are new here, my name is Amber Hollingsworth, and you're watching the YouTube channel put the shovel down. As in, you hit your bottom when you put your shovel down. There's no need to go any further. This channel is all about helping you understand the science and psychology of addiction so that you can get your life and your family back on track. We're all about empowerment and helping you to take your life back from addiction. So the answer to the question, do addicts mean the hurtful things that they say? The answer to that question is yes. No. Sometimes I know that's not very helpful. Right. So let's pull apart the pieces so that you understand when it's a yes, when it's a no, and when it's a sometimes. The key here is to understand that someone in an active addiction is usually coming from a place of either intoxication or desperation. And naturally, this has a huge impact on how the person is going to think, feel, and behave. So let's take those pieces one at a time. Let's start with intoxication. When someone is intoxicated, they may say things that they normally wouldn't say when they're their regular self. And I frequently get asked the question, especially when it comes to, like, alcohol, about whether or not people mean the things that they say when they're drunk. And the thing of it is, is that there's usually some truth in what they're saying, but it's highly distorted and magnified and dramatized, usually because, like I said, there's usually some grain of truth in a feeling of frustration or even a feeling of admiration. But because a person, when they're intoxicated, doesn't have the same emotional filter, it comes out all a mess. This is especially problematic when what the person is saying is very negative or mean or sometimes downright abus. And it's even more confusing when you know that this person in their regular self never says things like that, and you don't even have the feeling that they feel that way. And so when they're two different people and they're telling you two different things, it's super confusing. And you may be thinking to yourself, which one is the truth? To make matters even more complicated, Sometimes when people get intoxicated and they say the mean things on the back end after the fact, they'll be defensive about it when you question them about it and they'll say, well, I was just saying the truth, or well, you just don't like it when I'm truthful with you, or something like that. And that's coming from a place of defensiveness. This especially happens with people who tend to be, you know, pretty nice in their regular self. Maybe even people pleasing or conflict avoidant. They may hold a lot of things in and then they get intoxicated and they say a bunch of really mean, nasty things. Do they mean it? Maybe a little bit, but not exactly. Most of the time it's just unfiltered, unleashed negative emotion. And when you're intoxicated, especially when you're drinking and intoxicated, you tend to think about things that make you upset. And not only do you think about things that make you upset, but you ruminate on them. Because alcohol slows down your thinking so much that you get stuck on like one or two thoughts and just keeps going over and over and over and repeating it. And as you're ruminating on it, you're working yourself up, you're getting yourself more angry, you're reliving it, you're re traumatizing yourself. And then if you're talking about it out loud or confronting another person, there's just absolutely no filter on. So there's probably a little truth. But I wouldn't hold to it as the holy Grail because I'm telling you, it's definitely magnified when they're intoxicated. Now on the other hand, if someone is communicating to you really negative things, not when they're intoxicated, they're probably either coming from a defensive place where they're feeling backed into a corner because you're confronting them about something, they're either defending their actions or they're trying to say whatever they need to say to make you shut up and go away because they need to keep this addiction fueled. And, and just like the rest of us, we say things when we're defensive that aren't exactly true. Again, there's a little truth in there a lot of times, but most of the time when we're defensive, it really is just more of a reflex and a reaction to say whatever it's going to take to make you either hurt you back because you feel hurt because you're being confronted, or to make you shut up and go away and stop bringing this up. It is a defense tactic. It is not necessarily how the person really feels. And the other time when you get people that are communicating mean, negative things is through this sort of desperation, as in I am in withdrawal or I am, or you're standing in the way of me going out that door and getting high or getting drunk or whatever it is. And at that point, a person is just going to say and do whatever it takes to get you to go away. Most of the time in that circumstance, a person usually will start out being kind of nice. You know, they may trying to get out the door to go do whatever it is they're gonna do. And they may give you some excuse or some reason, or say something really pleasant. And when that doesn't work, they may up the ante a little bit. And if that still doesn't work, they may get downright mean and nasty and even to the point that they will outright pick a giant fight just to walk out the door and go use. That's one of the manipulation tactics that people with addictions use. Sometimes consciously and sometimes they're not really aware that they're doing it. But they definitely do that in any of these states, intoxicated, defensive or desperate, the person really isn't in their full frame of mind and their self. And just like you or I or anyone else, when we get in a bad state of mind, we say things that we don't necessarily mean, or we say it a harsher than we really mean, or we say it in a really unbalanced way. So if you want to know about whether or not they mean the truth, just ask yourself to do you always mean the truth when you say things, when you're upset or when you're defensive? Or is it somehow maybe a little true, but a lot distorted? That's the answer to the question, do they mean it? Yes. No, not really. Sometimes. Now, if you want to learn more about the whole picking a fight as a manipulation tactic, I want you to watch this video next because it is on that exact topic. In fact, I have a whole playlist about manipulation topics and I will link it up here for you.
