How Does Addictive Thinking Develop?

Chemical dependency is a complex disease that may result from a complex mix of physical, psychological, and social factors.
A good convincing theory was presented in an article by Dr. David Sedlak who describes addictive thinking as a person's inability to, make consistently healthy decisions in his or her own behalf.
He points out that this is not a moral failure of a person's willpower, but rather a disease of the will and an inability to use the will. (AA members use the expression, self will run riot.) Dr Sedlak stresses that this unique thinking disorder does not affect other kinds of reasoning. Therefore a person who develops a thinking disorder may be intelligent, intuitive, persuasive, and capable of valid philosophical and scientific reasoning.
The peculiarity of addictive thinking, he says, is the inability to reason with oneself. This symptom can apply to several emotional and behavioral problems, but is invariably found in addiction, alcoholism, compulsive gambling, sexual addiction, eating disorders, nicotine addiction and codependency.

How does this inability to reason with oneself develop? According to Dr Sedlak, the ability to reason with oneself requires certain factors.

• First a person must have adequate facts about reality.
• Second, a person must have certain values and principles as grounds for making certain choices. These can be from the home or culturally bound. For instance a young man growing up in a family or cultural values that say that a man proves his masculinity by being able to hold his drink may be expected to drink excessively. Failure to live up to that expectation can generate deep disappointment.
• Thirdly, the person must develop a healthy and undistorted self concept.

This distorted self concept may be a result of abusive parents, teachers or any other primary caretaker.To children the world is overwhelming, so if their primary caretakers and significant adults in their life are irrational, unjust, and arbitrary, the anxiety is intolerable. Therefore, children must maintain, at whatever cost, a conviction that the world is fair, just and rational.
Of course as adults we know this isn't true, but children cannot see it this way. They have to feel that the world must be "fair, just and rational" therefore their perception is faulty. They think, I must not be able to judge things correctly. I am stupid. Of course most of this thinking is in the subconcious.
Even when children are unfairly punished, they may be unable to believe, My parents are crazy, they punish me for no good reason. This would be too terrifying concept to tolerate. To preserve the notion that their parents are rational and predictable, their only option is to conclude, I somehow must have been bad to have been punished this way.

In short if children feel inadequate because of demanding adults or are not allowed  to flex their own muscles, they will begin to feel inadequate. Some parents are so codependent they allow their kids to grow up in a fairy land world. Not providing them with the tools to deal with reality, even with small things like doing their homework for them, then such children have no chance of developing, self confidence. A child who says "I can't" and is allowed to get away with it, actually has the feeling of inadequacy confirmed.

As children grow up, these misconceptions may continue to color thinking and behavior. They may continue to feel that they are bad people and undeserving of good things. Or they may consider their judgment to be grossly defective, which allows others to sway them easily.
A person can feel bad or worthless, even though this totally contradicts reality. Feeling insecure and inadequate makes a person more vulnerable to escapism, so often accomplished via mood altering drugs. It's a painful life for such a person and he/she dosn't feel like he/she belongs anywhere.
Alcohol and other drugs or any other form of addiction, anesthetizes the pain and allows the addict to feel as if he is living in a normal world.
Many thinking distortions are not necessarily related to chemical use. Fear of rejection, anxiety, isolation and despair often result in low self esteem. Many of the quirks of addictive thinking, are psychological defenses against these painful feelings, and these symptoms are due to the persistence of the distorted self image that began in childhood.

*David Sedlak, MD. "Childhood: Setting the stage for Addiction in Childhood and Adolescence" in Adolescent Substance Abuse: A Guide to prevention and Treatment, ed. Richard Israowitz and Mark Singer (New York: Haworth Press, 1983)