Why do some become addicted to opioids and others do not?

As an addiction professional and licensed mental health professional, I have worked with hundreds of individuals who have suffered from various addictive disorders. I have been entrenched in their stories and their closest confident, as times. One thing I have always strived to do for my clients is to create a safe space, without judgement, for clients to share their deepest most vulnerable thoughts pertaining to their addiction and why they use. When I worked in a clinic specifically for individuals with opioid use disorder, I encountered plenty different folks. Some being your stereotypical homeless individuals to your average working class husband/father, to your highly ambitious mother running her own business. After the many stories, you start to see correlations and how they all connect to one another. Though each individual is unique, they were not dealing with a unique problem. Actually, it was much more common than they realized. There’s a lot of stigma surrounding opioid use. Surprisingly enough, MOST of my clients who became addicted to opioids began with an injury. They had gone through a surgery or experienced some serious debilitating pain that was impossible to cope with. They were prescribed pain medication. They used it consistently and then noticed one day when they ran out, they became very ill, while experiencing symptoms such as: shaking, tremors, cold sweats, vomiting, upset stomach and fever. The shocking part came when such individuals were not seeking to become addicted. The only problem they were numbing was their physical pain because let’s face it, we want a remedy for pain. Few are willing to embrace pain and feel it completely. Some individuals realized the problem and required weening off of medications. Some, however, experienced such dependency that the easiest way out was purchasing medications off the street and later graduating to smoking and injecting Heroin. But what separates someone from being able to take prescribed opioid medications without being physically dependent? Let’s say you have a family of 5: Mother, father, 3 kids. The mother has been abusing various substances since she was 15. The father is a high functioning work-aholic and alcoholic during his evenings and days off. 2/3 siblings develop a substance use disorder. If genetics rule all, then all children would have developed substance use disorders, which scientifically, this is not the case. If we look at environmental factors such as, early exposure to substance abuse(within the family or social circle), poor support system, limited parental guidance/supervision, exposure to abuse and trauma, then the environmental factors will create susceptibility to substance abuse. In cases where there is a family history of substance abuse (notice substance ABUSE, not substance use) and exposure to environmental risk factors, the chances of individuals developing substance use disorders are predictable.

However, you still have the wild card that even though one may have family history or substance abuse and exposure to risk factors, they do not develop a substance use disorder. This individual will drink but not want the entire bottle. They don’t feel the need to keep going. They are actually not attracted to drunken behaviors and hangovers. This individual may be prescribed opioids or Benzodiazepines and never feel the impulse to keep taking more. With that being said, what protects this individual for ending up like their siblings or parents? What protective factor has science not identified?

This is the great debate in the field of substance abuse. There has not been definitive research to answer this question, although many have theorized.

Some professionals say the answer is resiliency. That certain individuals develop a resiliency and instead of developing a substance use disorder, they turn their negative experiences into fuel to create a better and more positive experience in their future. Is resiliency biological? Is it psychological? Or is this strength something that comes from within a human’s soul? What role does our soul, our own spirituality, play when it comes to susceptibility to addiction?

Please share what you think in the comments below!

Jacqueline in Now Offering Online Therapy Services!

“I was having issues matching with a therapist and just finding someone that was a right fit for me. I even considered to cancel my subscription early and find another company to try, but then Jacqueline was matched with me and now after just 2 sessions with her, I can confidently say I am so very pleased she was sent my way. Not only is she professional, knowledgeable, gentle and kind, proactive with advice and exercises, but she shows so much compassion, empathy and care. I really feel heard by her and genuinely, as a human, she gets it. Relatable, honest, real and also asks great thought provoking questions that have you open up different doors inside you that might have been closed or forgotten. She also checks on me during the week to see how I’m handling things. Very much appreciated ! Thank you so much Jacqueline”.

-Actual Better Help Client Review, 2022

Change Your Mind, Change You Life:

What it really takes to change and be your best self

One of the most fulfilling aspects of “Manifestation” is the ability to go back in time and reflect. I will use the word “Manifestation” often in this post, but I would like to break it down and share what that word means to me.

Manifestation is something that can be both positive and negative. Manifestation is the outward appearance that reflects our inner world. Our inner world is our thoughts, beliefs and feelings. Before we experience anything in our reality, we have already experienced it within our mind, first. This can be true for our greatest fears and our greatest dreams. Some may think, this means whatever I think, it comes true—-that’s not the case. We have millions of thoughts. According to a study completed by Dr.Poppenk and Julie Tseng, humans think over 6,000 thoughts in just one day! This brings me back to the CONTENT of our thoughts and this requires awareness. This requires mindfulness. This requires stopping in the moment and recognizing the content of our thoughts (Too simple? There’s POWER in simplicity). In regards to cognition, I like to think of our thoughts as hundreds of cars driving down many different highways, crisscrossing about through our mind throughout our day. Just because we think something, does that make it true? Just because we think something else, does that mean we believe it? I’m sure if we acted on every single thought that popped into our minds, that humanity would be a stumbling, insecure, inconsistent mess.

We don’t listen to every thought. We CHOOSE the thoughts we listen to. Let’s go back to my car analogy; the car of thought. Mindfulness and awareness is being able, in the moment, to observe and see the car (thought) drive by in our mind and ask ourselves, do we want to get in that car? Does my inner belief system align with this “car”, or am I just going to allow the car to pass by? This is an especially crucial process for individuals who struggle with depression and anxiety. Do we invest our energy into thoughts of constant worry, fear and depressed thinking, or are we choosing to get in to another car (yes, I know it’s hard)?

What does this have to do with manifesting?

Manifesting is choosing the thoughts we want to think so we can experience the idea come to life in our reality. Sometimes there is no effort involved. Sometimes something comes in to our life, good or bad, and we think to ourselves, “How did my mother know I have been wanting ______ forever…I never told anyone” or “Ugh, this is EXACTLY what I was fearful of happening”.

Just because we think something, doesn’t mean it will happen. We are actually given time to decide, is this really what I want to manifest in my life? Do I align with this? Do I feel good about this? Or do I feel I have zero control over this?

I have manifested some pretty scary negative things/events/people in my lifetime, but the moment I discovered the POWER I have to CHOOSE the thoughts I listen to, everything changed. My biggest manifestations have been ones that I struggled to believe in. Ones that were surrounded by fear and limitations (so I thought).

My first one was overcoming the fear of childbirth in order to have my 2nd child, Sailor Rae, at home..in an RV…in an inflatable pool. I had SO many fears! I knew the possibilities of what could go wrong. Every time I experienced a fearful thought, I would get out my journal and write about my childbirth experience as if it had already happened. I wrote my desires, not my fears. I made a cognitive and physical choice to write down how I wanted my story to go.

“I am at peace”

“I have joy”

“I am giving birth to a healthy baby girl”

“I am strong and am able to withstand the pains of childbirth”

“My child comes to me effortlessly”

On September 13th, 2016, I went into labor at 12am and Sailor Rae was birthed by 5:30am without complications and without medication. I had done it! I had proved to myself that I can have my deepest desires within my heart and I could have peace during the process.

In 2017 I started my divorce process with my ex-husband. Mind you, I hadn’t worked in years. I had nothing to my name, no money. I had become so co-dependent (yes, CODEPENDENT) on my ex-husband, that I didn’t even drive! I relied on him for EVERYTHING because I was so fearful of living, of making my own decisions, of finding my own way. What if I fuck it up? I couldn’t bare the thought.

Rightfully so, I know where all of this came from. So many SCARY things happened to me as a child. It seemed like everything I did, my pure existence, was punished. I always received negative outcomes. So much so that I expected things to not work out. I expected BAD things to happen! That is surely no way to live, but I didn’t know any better because that was the reality I had experienced for many years. So when things started to go right, I was really thrown back! Ummmm, how long is this going to last for? I would almost feel like, I didn’t deserve good things and if I had them, they wouldn’t last long. I was mentally prepared to continue to suffer internally. I had been punished for so long, my thoughts only knew how to punish me. I was far from a positive human. I struggled with deep depression as a child, even professionally diagnosed. I felt no HOPE, no point to living. I would daydream about Heaven because in my mind, that is the one place I knew I could go to and find true happiness and bliss. I longed for it.

Okay, back to manifesting.

When I started my divorce process, I knew I would have to level up in MASSIVE ways. My life would need to completely change. I knew what was coming—yet I had nothing.

I got out a notepad and I literally, physically and cognitively DESIGNED my new life. I wrote out the job I needed, how much it would pay, what the benefits were, how many hours I would work and all the physical items I would need to survive. I wrote down a place to live, how much the rent would be and what it looked like. I wrote out how I felt working and providing for myself. I needed to FEEL this reality so I could bring it to life. Failure was not an option. Homelessness was not an option. I had to address every fear, every insecurity and every limiting belief that told me I would fail.

The affirmations I used to change my truth looked like this:

“I am an asset. I am worthy of compensation and will help people. Because I am massively compensated, I can afford to help others and be generous”

“It is my purpose to heal the minds of others and therefore allow every individual to achieve their greatest purpose (mind you, I was not a counselor yet. I didn’t have counseling education apart from my psychology degree and I didn’t even fathom obtaining a counseling license)”.

“I am here on purpose, my work is needed”

“I want to be proof that you can live a life you love, making money doing what you love and not succumb to anything that doesn’t serve your soul”

I continued to write my affirmations (many more than these) until I believed them. This was an extremely difficult exercise for me to do because these thoughts were just TOO nice for me to think about myself. To think I have a purpose, to think I can do good in this world for myself and for others and to think I could possibly succeed! What a daunting thought to someone who was taught: you are nothing, you having nothing to offer anyone, you are ugly, you are talentless, you are trapped, you have no choice. I had to completely clean house, internally and externally.

I have not arrived to my goal, but I can say in just 5 years of practicing changing my thoughts and intentionally focusing on what I want for myself and my life, things have taken a DRAMATIC shift. I still experience worry, but I rarely experience the darkness I had as a child. I have achieved every goal I wrote down in my journal. I was able to get a job when I was going through my divorce. I found a roommate so I could afford to live. I went back to school to level up my income and graduated. As painful and traumatic as divorce can be and was, it was a necessary event to get my ass to level up, take charge of my life, stop relying on others, and live with a higher purpose.

Life is SO far from perfect, but we have a lot more power than we are aware of. Our life is our responsibility and what we make of it—no one else.

If you are unhappy or unfulfilled where you are at, manifest something better and greater. We have to do the work, spiritually and physically.

FAITH (belief) + ACTION (inspired) + unknown amount of time=MANIFESTED DESIRE

Faith doesn’t mean religion. In this context, it means believing that what you desire is indeed, possible. Not only are we called to believe in ourselves and others, we are called to take action, to do our part.

Example: I want a college fund for my kids.

Faith = I know this is doable

Action= Create a plan to take out $$$ every month and put in a separate account

Time= Everything takes time, we can’t control that part

Manifestation = 20 years later I have saved enough to put my kids through school without student loan debt

Is it magical? It may feel that way when it happens, but it’s actually more scientific than magical and it’s called the Law of Attraction.

If you would like to learn more about the Law of Attraction and need specific steps on where to start and how to change your reality for the best, see my free (super free, no strings attached) Abundance Academy and get started! (hint, this is your inspired action to changing your life)

See link below:

https://downtoearthcounseling.org/2021/10/26/the-abundance-academy/

Spiritual Beliefs that Will Rock Your World!

Beliefs…we all have them! But what do we know about them? Our beliefs shape who we are. It is our entire thought system. We cannot be or do or imagine anything that is not within our thought system. That’s where limiting beliefs come into play. Limiting beliefs LIMIT our ability to believe things that could be true and life changing. Here are some examples:

I can’t do that

I’ll never get what I want

I’ll always be stuck

I’m not capable of success, it’s for those people over there. The people with perfect lives. The people who had adequate support and love as a child.

Limiting beliefs that are not for our highest good, keep us from reaching our potential. Even if we had all the gifts in the world and all the talent, it will all die with us if we do not believe we can actually use these gifts. It’s like a beautiful violin that stays in a case in the corner of a room in the basement of a house. If only someone would come and open her up so she could sing her sweet soft song.

You are untapped. You haven’t begun to meet your potential and it’s not because of anyone else.

It all starts within.

But maybe we don’t realize we are holding ourselves back.

We need to recognize by practicing mindfulness, by being in the moment, by becoming aware of our thoughts and stepping outside of them as if we are watching a movie.

Learn to point out when you catch yourself speaking something negative and “limiting”.

Remember, we can only grow as far as our belief system allows us.  

The Abundance Academy

What am I talking about when I reference, “manifestation”?

I am talking about HOW we can practice the Law of Attraction in our own lives and create positive change by changing our thoughts and attracting more of the experiences we want into our lives and less of what we don’t want.

For example:

Don’t think about a purple elephant?

What do you see? Heck, all I see is a purple elephant!

We can’t tell ourselves to STOP thinking about things we don’t want to think about. We have to REPLACE the thought we don’t want, with the thought we do want. For example: Think about a yellow giraffe. Now, I have forgotten all about the purple elephant and so has my mind because we simply replaced it!

Our thoughts are incredibly POWERFUL-both positive and negative, however, which ever we put more ENERGY into, tends to take the driver’s seat.

Watch The Abundance Academy to learn how to practice this skill and create the positive change in your life you have been wishing to see!

Module 1:

Thank you for manifesting with me today!

Love The Path of Least Resistance

Love… It means something different to each person who practices it. It is a word either easily thrown around or never used. For some they enjoy giving it away, for some it is locked behind bars for fear of being exposed. When we say we love someone what are we truly saying? Can we say we love one another in the depths of despair or only when we experience joy? Joy and love are siblings, so very close to one another. Where you find joy you’ll find love. It is easy to love the loveable. It is easy to love when things are good and perfect. It is easy to give when we are receiving. But the true test of love is this…

Can we still love when it is not easy?

Can we still love when circumstances or behavior are unlovable?

Can we still love without expecting something in return?

For if we only love during perfect conditions, can we still call it love?

Love in all its fullness and perfection has no conditions. It doesn’t love sometimes or when times are favorable. It loves always. It continues to give more of what the unlovable need the most, MORE love. For what reward is there in love… To GIVE means to receive.

Sometimes loving when we don’t FEEL like it means digging deep into our inner most core. To dig so deep and see the other just as we are, a soul, a being in need of love. The cure for bad behavior isn’t control, it is love. It is recognizing your wholeness and the other person’s. It is recognizing that you are no better nor worse than them. But that you essentially are ONE. And that whatever you do to them, you have done to yourself.

Today’s assignment is to chose a situation in your life In which you do not see or feel love. Open your mind and ask the Universe, God, whatever, to SHOW you love. Be honest. Confess that you do not see love but that you are WILLING to see love, to see the LIGHT in the person or circumstance. Every time a negative thought comes back bring your attention back. Restore your focus to love. Choose to see love. Focus on the good that person brings into your life, instead of the things you don’t like. If you honestly cannot see good, secretly and privately bless this person… As the blessing will return back to you and you will be blessed and restored. By offering love, we receive love. By restoring healing, we are then healed. Through this circle of giving and receiving of love, we are made whole.

Be blessed this day and choose love