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What is the cause of Self Harming Addictions?
Many of us are heavily affected by addictions in our lives; indeed in many cases addictions completely control our lives and destiny. It is all too easy to criticize somebody who has let their addictions get out of control and maybe even ruin their lives, but is any one of us totally blameless when it comes to addictions that harm ourselves? When you start to consider what self-harming addictions people have, the question that readily springs to mind is "Why would people deliberately do something to harm themselves?" Well consider some self-harming addictions:
- Alcohol. Drinking in moderation is certainly enjoyable and indeed one or two glasses of red wine per day is supposed to be beneficial to a person's health, helping both digestion and relaxation, but binge drinking is surely not pleasurable is it? Being sick is extremely unpleasant and dealing with a vicious hangover isn't much fun. Yet for some reason a heavy drinker is said to be "one of the lads / girls" or considered to be so sociable. Heavy drinking results in bad and often aggressive behaviour and also seriously affects your finances.
- Smoking. This is a particularly difficult addiction to understand as every single packet of cigarettes / pouch of tobacco / packet of cigars carries dire health warnings which should be enough to frighten off anybody from smoking; in actual fact, these warnings are seemingly totally ignored by smokers and indeed are sometimes used as a joke, e.g. "Don't give me the packet that says 'smoking can affect your sexual health', but I'll take the one with the lung cancer warning". It's not as if smoking is easy to start with the problems of smoke in your eyes, coughing, throat problems, and the cost of it. It is understandably very difficult for people to give it up once they have been smoking for many years. Certainly smoking can help to calm your nerves, but is it worth losing your life early or having some major health problems?
- Gambling. I should imagine most people enjoy a small flutter, a lottery ticket, a night out at a Bingo hall, or the odd afternoon wasting £5 at the amusement arcades; I certainly enjoy all of these and there doesn't seem any harm in that at all. But big cities which are dedicated to massive amounts of gambling prove that there is a desire within some of us to gamble large fortunes or our entire wealth and security for a few hours of gambling. Yes the thrill of a major win would certainly be really good, but let's face it, heavy gambling is nearly always a mug's game.
- Hard Drugs. Many young people in particular, get into trouble with the law because of their need for a drug of some sort; it appears that drug taking is initially difficult to start and bad effects will be experienced for the first one or two times the drug is tried; even once you've got accustomed to the drug, it is all-to-common for the drug to start to seriously affect your brain and depression can often follow; also the cost of maintaining a drug habit can be very expensive and you can easily lose control of your own life.
- Anorexia and Bolemia. It is reasonably easy to understand why somebody might become anorexic in light of the way that magazines and the media generally promote being slim as being beautiful and / or sexy and once a person has got over the initial hunger stages, it probably gets easier to keep eating less and less, feeling that they are achieving a great deal with their self-discipline; but after a while the person's health starts to deteriorate rapidly and it can become very serious. Bolemia sounds like a good cheat's way to have your cake and eat it, and then throw up so you don't have the calories to worry about, but the acid from the vomit can rot your teeth and serious health problems can ensue.
There are probably many other self-harming addictions, but these highlight the question at the start of the article. Surely the answer can't be as simple as boredom can it?
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