Addiction

What is addiction? Dr. Stanton Peele has written a book entitled "Addiction-Proof Your Child." In it he lists six criteria which define an addictive experience.

"It is powerful and absorbs people's feelings and thoughts. It can be predictably and reliably produced. It provides people with essential sensations and emotions (such as feeling good about themselves or the absence of worry or pain). It produces these feelings only temporarily, for the duration of the experience. It ultimately degrades other involvements and satisfactions. Finally, since they are getting less from their lives when away from their addiction, people are forced increasingly to return to the addictive experience as their source of satisfaction."

Here are twelve basic values that Dr. Peele believes will insulate your children against addiction.

"A sense of purpose. Achievement and accomplishment (feeling that it is right and worthwhile for them to do things well). Caring about oneself (self esteem) - believing they have the power to gain praise and esteem through their own actions. Caring about others. Responsibility. Managing money and other assets. Awareness of one's self and one's environment. Adventure and excitement. Pleasure and fun. Social, political, religious and other commitments. Maturity: an ability to delay gratification, an awareness of others, a concern for the wider world. Efficacy - feeling competent, able (not attempting to get things magically: knowing that their efforts will produce rewards)."

Dr. Peele strongly recommends we give our children more opportunities for self-directed activities, because such activities contribute to virtually all of the values and abilities that combat addiction. Parents need to strike a balance between protectiveness and fostering independence. The ultimate goal of parents is that our children find meaning in life and seek positive activity and accomplishment. Our job is to encourage self-directed engagement, and they need to see us engaging in constuctive activities ourselves.

Dr. Peele believes the most important skill parents need in addiction-proofing our children is the ability to ask questions. He calls it motivational interviewing, or values clarification. The intention is to solidify your children's values in their own minds as a guide to their behavior.

I thought all of those concepts were good. Where I disagree with Dr. Peele is when he advocates for the decriminalization of drug abuse. For example, take meth abuse. A Rand Corporation study concluded that U.S. taxpayers are paying $23.4 billion a year in costs associated with methamphetamine abuse alone. Two-thirds of all ID thefts in Colorado are caused by methamphetamine users. More than 70% of all official child abuse cases involve drug abuse. To say drug abuse is a victimless crime is pure hogwash!

Colorado has more meth users than the state of New York! Why? Because of the supply route coming up from Mexico. Although women account for only 25% of abusers of other illegal drugs, they account for 50% of meth abusers. Most meth is now being produced in labs in Mexico, rather than motels and rural farmhouses in the U.S., as was the case a few years ago.