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By Siya Chhibber
In 2008, author David Sedaris wrote about his struggle with a tobacco addiction in his book, “When You Are Engulfed in Flames”.
To break this habit, Sedaris explained, he decided to go “cold turkey” and moved to Japan. In Japan, smoking on the streets isn’t allowed, and the areas where you are allowed to smoke are hard to find. This made Sedaris’s habit hard to keep up.
Breaking habits can be extremely difficult, and many people don’t know where to start. Here are a few ways to go about breaking habits:
- Get rid of triggers: All addictions have triggers — a physical or emotional situation that can drag up memories of a past addiction — such as the needle or packets of drugs, or gambling cards or scratch tickets, or bottle openers and alcohol. It’s important as a first step to get rid of everything. Others can’t even bring stuff over — if you’re having a party and need to get over an alcohol addiction, tell everyone not to bring alcohol, and maybe only juice/soda. Triggers aren’t always physical, however. They can manifest in loneliness, stress, hunger, and more. This leads into the importance of a support system.
- Support system and accountability: Support systems are extremely important. After all, you can’t trust yourself to always have the willpower to quit an addiction. Keep in contact with someone you trust once a day at a certain time. This can also create a feeling of shame: If you consider a relapse, what would they think? You’d have to admit it to them. If you ever consider a relapse, instead just call them, and talk about it — use a call with your support system as an excuse not to relapse – you’re busy, you can’t do it right now. Especially in the case of opioids, about 75% of people first started opioids because they were prescribed, this could be prescribed because of a surgery or injury. After such a severe injury, it can be hard to move on from opioids, and even harder to let other people help you through it. Having a support system can keep you accountable and help you through the recovery process.
- Everyday changes: Make changes in your everyday life such as using alternative routes while driving, how household items are arranged, and even moving. If you always take the highway to work, try to take a different route, like inside roads. If you normally brush your teeth, then change, and then eat breakfast, switch it up: change, then brush, then eat breakfast. You can also change your house – move the sofa, change where you keep your cutlery and plates, paint your walls a different color. Sometimes moving or switching jobs becomes the perfect opportunity to quit an addiction because so much has suddenly changed, so you can drop the habit while you’re overwhelmed adjusting to other changes.
- Neuroplasticity: Neuroplasticity is the brain’s ability to change and adapt. One key aspect of this is pruning. In psychology, pruning is the idea behind “use it or lose it”. If you use opioids every day at the same time or in the same place, you become hardwired into it. If, instead, using the tactics above, you change things and do something else at that time, you can slowly start recovering. You don’t “use” drugs, and therefore “lose” the habit. This also includes how you talk to yourself. If you spend every day telling yourself that you’re weak and going to relapse, those pathways become stronger in your head, you believe it, and eventually give in to the relapse. If, however, you tell yourself you are strong, and that you’re proud of yourself for trying, and you’re ready to try as many times as necessary, it makes the pathways that support willpower in your brain stronger, and can help you stay motivated to break out of the cycle.
These methods aren’t a one-way path to recovery; recovery rarely looks the same for two people. Hopefully, however, these methods can help to provide a starting point.
It’s important to also reflect that, if there is a relapse, you haven’t lost. Breaking addiction can often feel like a cycle, and the important thing is you keep trying. Each relapse brings the ability to fight the urge and be able to see why you relapsed, getting stronger each time.
If you ever need serious help, you can always call 988, which is the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline.
This article was written as part of a program to educate youth and others about Alameda County’s opioid crisis, prevention and treatment options. The program is funded by the Alameda County Behavi
