Previous studies have suggested that deficits in prefrontal cortical function and consequential loss of inhibitory control promotes compulsive substance use [3-5].
The rationale is that compulsive behaviors and compulsive substance use create similar subjective experiences, follow the same clinical pattern, may derive from the same neural network, and respond to similar treatments.
The fact that Fitzgerald and Wallace both died tragically in their mid-forties due, in no small part, to compulsive substance abuse arising from irreconcilable psychocreative crosscurrents has my full attention, but not condemnation.
But although the conditions are manifested by behaviors that appear to be polar opposites substance avoidance (or abdiction, as some are beginning to call it) by the chemically intolerant, and compulsive substance use by the addicted there is evidence to suggest that, biologically, they may actually have much in common.
TBI appears to predispose survivors to psychiatric disorders including obsessive compulsive disorder, substance abuse, dysthymia, clinical depression, bipolar disorder, and anxiety disorders.
The Val66Met variant affects anatomy, cognition and behaviour in adults [7] and leads to memory impairment [5] and susceptibility to obsessive-compulsive, eating, substance abuse and mood disorders [6, 8 10].
There is a transition from voluntary use to involuntary compulsive use of substances of abuse (Schwabe et al., 2011).
Foods like Cinnabons and Starbucks' Strawberries & Crème Frappuccinos are, he maintains, like drugs: "Conditioned hypereating works the same way as other 'stimulus response' disorders in which reward is involved, such as compulsive gambling and substance abuse".
But in my decades of experience working with abuse victims, I have found that men spend years putting their emotions in a deep freeze or masking post-traumatic reactions with self-defeating behaviors like compulsive gambling and substance abuse.
There is something of the feeling of the compulsive gambler and substance abuser alike in the fluctuation between and intermingling of despair and ecstasy - the craving for one and dread of the other sucks you in and drives you on for more and more.
You may manifest anxiety in the form of not eating, eating too much, other compulsive behaviour (including substance abuse), insomnia and an inability to relax.
