Alcohol Treatment Centre

Why do people become addicted to alcohol?

In the overwhelming majority of cases, those of us who go on to develop an alcohol dependency started drinking during our adolescence. At that time in our development, figuring out who we are, where we fit in and ultimately what ‘tribe’ we belong to is paramount. However, if we struggle with underlying mental health issues, low self-esteem, trauma, or any other complex emotion, it alienates us from others. While many of us had friends and an active social life, we felt afraid and insecure, battling a harsh and often brutal inner critic. Neurochemically, this means that we lacked certain feel-good neurochemicals that would have enabled us to feel like we were enough. 

But then, we started drinking alcohol. Its intoxicating effects increased the number of those ‘feel-good’ neurochemicals. As a result, alcohol made us feel ‘normal’, which gave us access to those essential feelings of belonging and connection. Not yet able to comprehend the consequences of our actions, all our brain knew to tell us was this is great; when we drink, we can function like other people. But unfortunately, these neural pathways that form during our adolescence become ingrained and the prolonged alcohol abuse, which is often manageable to some extent in the beginning, creates changes in the brain that open the doorways to dependency.

Then, we go through a difficult period in our life, where we find ourselves extra anxious or stressed. That heightened anxiety creates a ‘wired but tired’ state of mind, which leads us to rely more heavily on the sedating effects of alcohol i.e. those two glasses in the evening now becomes four. This then creates a neurological reinforcement, as the brain begins to associate alcohol consumption with temporary relief from stress, anxiety symptoms, and emotional pain. Over time, these neural pathways become more ingrained, making it even harder to break the cycle of dependency.

However, as that neuropathway strengthens, so too do the side-effects of alcohol abuse. Now on five or six glasses a night, we are waking up extra-exhausted as alcohol negatively impacts our sleep, and that exhaustion is causing our anxiety symptoms to heighten even more. So, we rely more and more on the evening sedation; now starting earlier and drinking until later. As a result, we start to feel a sense of secrecy or shame surrounding our drinking habits. Shame can create emotional walls between our loved ones and us, further deepening our sense of isolation and our reliance on alcohol to feel better. We may begin to feel misunderstood, afraid, or out of control, all of which affect not only how we perceive ourselves but also how we interact with others. These emotional shifts, in turn, make us even more reliant on alcohol to manage our distress. We then find ourselves trapped in a cycle whereby the only time we feel ‘calm’ is when we have a drink. But as our drinking escalates, the stress and anxiety escalates with it; so not only do we only feel calm when we drink, but we feel extra-awful when we don’t. So then, we find ourselves waking up in panic and hungover, knowing we have an important meeting coming up and we need to feel, well, calm for it. So, we reach for the bottle at 9am and on and on the cycle goes, trapping us in it further and further. 

Situations like this happen every day to so many of us. If you are trapped in that cycle, or a similar cycle right now, please know it is not your fault. Trying to manage overwhelming levels of anxiety, pain, and stress does not make you a bad person. Breaking free from the cycle of alcohol addiction can feel impossible, but there is hope and there is help.