Dual Diagnosis Treatment Center in Salmon Creek
Most medications work by flooding the brain's reward circuit with the chemical messenger dopamine. Dopamine surges in the reward circuit reinforce enjoyable but harmful behaviours, causing people to repeat the activity again and over.
Over time, the brain adjusts to the extra dopamine, reducing the high relative to the high experienced when initially taking the drug—an process called as tolerance. They may take more of the medicine in an attempt to attain the same dopamine high.
There is no single element that can indicate whether or not a person would get addicted to drugs. Addiction risk is influenced by a mix of genetic, environmental, and developmental variables. The more risk factors a person possesses, the more likely it is that drug use will lead to addiction.
Your brain will eventually adapt to the increased dopamine levels. You might have to take more medication to achieve the desired effect. It is possible that you will no longer find pleasurable things like eating or spending time in your family as enjoyable.
Long-term drug use can also cause brain chemical pathways and function changes. They can impact your ability to think clearly, judgement, decision-making capacity, memory, learning abilities, and even capacity. It can be difficult for you to resist the temptation to use drugs in uncontrollable ways when these brain changes are combined.