Addiction is not a disease.

[Cacotopia]

Well you are stonger than me, cause I don't want to deal with that malarkey ever again. I may go against my word if I have a child. Of course I will try to help them. But currently? nah. I been burned too many times.

I would like to help people but being nice unfortunately is also and open invitation to getting screwed over.

 

[PureX]

Well you are stonger than me, cause I don't want to deal with that malarkey ever again. I may go against my word if I have a child. Of course I will try to help them. But currently? nah. I been burned too many times.

I would like to help people but being nice unfortunately is also and open invitation to getting screwed over.

You have been poisoned by their behavior. And like it or not, now, that poison is in you, and it's your responsibility to deal with it so that it doesn't continue to harm you or cause you to harm others: to cause you not to trust in people, or not to get close with people, or to lose your compassion. And this would truly be a shame. Because you have already suffered enough from addiction.

 

[icehorse]

From the OP:

Here's the opening Salvo for the debate......

It would be nice if people stop referring to addictions as a disease, it's simply not the case, so stop calling it a disease.

There are a number of genetic traits that make life harder for some and easier for others. I would say that some people have something like "addictive personalities". I don't think these people have character flaws or are just lazy or anything like that. I think they got unlucky in the genetic lottery, and life will be harder for these folks than for folks without "addictive personalities".

That said, perhaps "disease" is also not quite the right term. So to me the genetic lottery is unfair, and we maybe need a term for those situations?

 

[Twilight Hue]

That said, perhaps "disease" is also not quite the right term. So to me the genetic lottery is unfair, and we maybe need a term for those situations?

I think that's what the academics and the experts are presently discussing.

 

[icehorse]

I guess you just might need to get screwed over a fair bit more, or have your valuables stolen, or your property damaged beyond repair, or perhaps have your life put in danger by these "poor lost souls" to better understand my complete lack of empathy.

They want help, you take them to a clinic, you get em cleaned up because you don't want your friend to die. Then after all that effort, you go check on em and they are barred out with barely a pulse on the floor. 2 days after leaving the in patient program.

Maybe you tried to get your once best friend a place to crash with promises that they are going to go to that out patient center and you go to the bathroom and your computer is gone and so are they.

Maybe you are picking your friend up to take him home and a stranger gets in the car with him and demands money, and there is a gun in his belt, cause your idiot friend bought drugs and said you would foot the bill. NO THANKS, I am personally done with addicts. They ****ed up. And I guess I was addicted to hope for them. I feel free from my addition to trying to empathize and help them.

Let's not forget all of that emotional and mental abuse they put you through while they were high, or when you tried to suggest they needed help and they wished death on you. Been there done that. I finally gave up, it's absolutely not worth it.

When you got through nearly 2 decades of trying to help only to have them hate you, spit in your face, or die on you, you come back to me. With that positive attitude.

I have had similar issues with addicts in my life. For me the rule is simple: if you're an addict, you declare it and declare yourself to be in recovery, or I will have nothing to do with you.

 

[Cacotopia]

You have been poisoned by their behavior. And like it or not, now, that poison is in you, and it's your responsibility to deal with it so that it doesn't continue to harm you or cause you to harm others: to cause you not to trust in people, or not to get close with people, or to lose your compassion. And this would truly be a shame. Because you have already suffered enough from addiction.

I did, in a way, but I am still tainted. I moved 12,000 miles away from the environment I was in that had me around addicts regularly. Now? I'm in the middle of rice farmland. if there are addicts I can't tell, and I also don't speak their language either.

Time needs to hurry up healing these wounds yo.

Some people in the past have tried to contact me, and, I do talk to the them, but aside from verbal/text support, I won't go beyond it, probably ever again unless it's my blood or child. It's way way easier behind a screen and half a world away. Distance is an amazing safety net. But I don't think I can help them beyond that.

 

[PureX]

I did, in a way, but I am still tainted. I moved 12,000 miles away from the environment I was in that had me around addicts regularly. Now? I'm in the middle of rice farmland. if there are addicts I can't tell, and I also don't speak their language either.

Time needs to hurry up healing these wounds yo.

Some people in the past have tried to contact me, and, I do talk to the them, but aside from verbal/text support, I won't go beyond it, probably ever again unless it's my blood or child. It's way way easier behind a screen and half a world away. Distance is an amazing safety net. But I don't think I can help them beyond that.

But you still need to deal with it within yourself, don't you think? To learn how not to be wounded by the insanity of others. So you don't have to run half way around the world to avoid them. And instead, can stand firm against it whenever you come across it.

 

[Cacotopia]

Well I am over here now, and financially committed to being here. I can help from a distance. And I am sure there will be addicts I run across here. I mean gambling here is a HUGE problem.