I’ve been researching for the past 2 days about addiction, recovery, and everything in between. I want to hear more. Tell or show me your research please!
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My life is on this app. I didn’t have time to do any research I’m afraid as I was to busy living it and learning on the job.
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Yep you’re right. I was too busy living it too. But now that I’m clean, I want to understand it more.
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I’ve learned so much knowledge and wisdom by looking into AA and the big book, and also Malcolm Gladwell and his theory on alcohol myopia. Reading around this forum has been my biggest access to knowledge and has led me to learn so much based on ppls experiences and their truth and pain, I found I can resonate more deeply and find some depth of understanding with what’s going on within myself.
I think researching into any recovery program and looking at the step-work involved and embracing all the given knowledge with an open, curious heart and mind is helpful on this journey to recovery and peace and Love 
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My research is mainly just my life for the past 36 years. My active addiction and now my sobriety. You might enjoy the book “In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts” by Dr. Gabor Matè. There’s a lot in there to chew on. Good luck💛
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Personal research and in-depth discussions with other alcoholics has lead me to determine that if you don’t pick up the first drink you can’t get drunk.
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What I know of biology and physics corroborates this theory 
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The Naked Mind and Alcohol Explained are 2 books I suggest you read if you haven’t already. They get into the nuts and bolts of how and why alcohol affects us. Understand the Devil and you diminish its power.
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I used this app. I looked up on old topics and read as much as I could.
I tried the naked mind but couldn’t get into it, to it just sounded like someone trying to make money. But I’ve tried selve help books before over the years and I have never finished any of them. The agenda of the author always got in the way for me.
At least on here the experiences were actual people saying how they dealt with sobriety.
I’ve also got a Big Book and have read and reread it.
It can be very easy to overthink this and then get all confused by what one finds.
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I go to meetings and etc. I have my own research through my own experience. I have my knowledge from my meetings. I guess you could say I’m just curious of other people’s research, knowledge, etc. Thanks everyone for giving me ideas and things to look at! I hope you all have a wonderful, sober day 
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Havnt found anyone who say they have the answers to drinking problems who are longer sober than i am, meeting made it easier for me to keep sober and stay sober ,im not into people who have just got sober and suddenly write a book or have a blog and seem to know all the answers . keep on trucking
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I used to have a really good article explaining possibly why some people get addicted to alcohol while others do not…but I have to go looking for it again. It was something about a chemical released in the brain (and not dopamine or anything like that) that happens faster for alcoholics than normies. This chemical doesn’t get cleared and when you get a certain amount of it it blocks a receptor and that is what causes the addiction. The idea is that EVERYONE will eventually get addicted but for alcoholics it just happens sooner for us.
I just can’t remember the chemical which would be REALLY helpful for my google search!!
I’ll post it if I find it.
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Thank y’all! I’m 9 months sober, my addiction was to pain pills. I’ve been researching addiction dealing with everything; pills, alcohol, herion, etc. So any information on anything is appreciated! I have learned a lot so far in my recovery but I’m an open-minded person. I like to read and research different things.
Behavior health research from companies I worked in. I work with schizophrenia, Down syndrome, intellectual disabilities and homeless populations.
In the end. We all have problems, I help with certain ones at work and I get help for my alcohol addiction here.
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YES. That was the compound. From the paper…(though to be fair, I don’t think this is a peer reviewed scientific paper)
When the normal adult drinker takes in alcohol, it’s very rapidly eliminated at the rate of about
one drink per hour. The body first converts the alcohol into something called acetaldehyde. This
is very toxic stuff, and if it were to build up inside us, we would get violently sick, and indeed we
would die. But Mother Nature helps us to get rid of acetaldehyde very quickly. She efficiently
changes it a couple of more times - into carbon dioxide and water - which is happily eliminated
through our kidneys and lungs. That’s what happens to normal drinkers. It also happens with
alcoholic drinkers, but they get what we call a P.S.
What Virginia discovered in Houston, which has been extensively confirmed since, is that
something additional happens in the alcoholic. In them, a very small amount of poisonous
acetaldehyde is not eliminated; instead it goes to the brain where, through a very complicated
biochemical process, it winds up as this THIQ. Researchers have found out fascinating things
about THIQ: First, THIQ is manufactured right in the brain, and it occurs only in the brain of the
alcoholic drinker; it doesn’t happen in the brain of the normal social drinker of alcohol. Second,
THIQ has been found to be highly addictive. It was tried in experimental use with animals during
the Second World War, when we were looking for a pain killer. However, it could not be used on
humans. It turned out to be much more addicting than morphine. So, scientists have to forget
about it, and they have left it all these years on some dusty shelf. The third fascinating item
about THIQ also has to do with addiction. There are, as you might know, certain kinds of rats
that cannot be made to drink alcohol. Put them in a cage with a very weak solution of vodka and
water, and they will refuse to touch it; they will literally die of thirst before they would drink the
alcohol. But, if you take the same kind of rat and put an unbelievably minute quantity of THIQ
into that rat’s brain - one quick injection - the animal will immediately go to the vodka and water.
In fact, he’ll be happier if you mix his drink with less and less water. So, we’ve taken a sober rat
that wouldn’t touch alcohol and turned him into an alcoholic. And all we needed was a tiny bit of
THIQ.
If this is actually true, this could be a genetic explaination of alcoholism…why it runs in families. maybe it isn’t learned behaviour but a genetic defect that prevents us from fully clearing the acetyladehyde and that genetic defect is passed to offspring.
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I learned a lot from audiobooks, but this page gives a great free overview:
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One key point that really helped me is the importance of novelty to learning & growth. Learning and addiction are two sides of the same coin. We can use the pleasure from novelty and adventure to get healthy sources of dopamine - and that I have found very important to my recovery.
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