is it a disease?

I have always argued that it is not.

I have been stoic in the fact that I make choices at times, often taking the easiest route. The most hedonistic route. The familiar route. Because a new route is hard. Change – for the new and improved – is hard, if not to start, then certainly to maintain.

Yet, having overcome (in relative terms) a major obstacle, in my final, successful, divorce from Mary-Jane, I find myself simply addicted to something else. Like a swinging pendulum alcohol has always had a somewhat inverse affect on my life with weed – I’m either getting high or getting drunk. But this post is not about alcohol.

The same withdrawal signs, the disaffection, the stuck in a rut framework, the I can’t control my behaviour during, the chronic need to continue, to say fuck it and make bad decisions. They’re not all listed, but if you opened a DSM and listed negative behaviours associated with addiction, I’m right up there to the tee.

This is the paradox. I am aware. I know what is happening. I know why its happening.

And I know how to fix it. But I don’t.

I won’t.

I cant?

Is my psuedo-knowledge of neuroscience accurate, in that I am just falling into old synaptic routes? The dopamine highs. Am I fulfilling a void of connection in my life with this activity? Both seem so, however I am no expert, even on myself. I am desperate. That’s a fact. It’s a mentality which is certain to lead to wrong decisions.

The only way I know how to change things is to exercise. Focus on taking my breath away through exhaustion. I know it’s helping my brain on a neurological level, and psychologically I find it easier to overcome the compulsive need to chase. I become more in the moment.

Start again I must. Start again tomorrow I must. Start from experience, not the beginning. But somehow, I need to remember all the lessons I have learnt.