If you’re overcoming a recent addiction, it may feel like something’s missing. A big part of your life is no longer there. For some, these feelings can drive them to take on a transfer addiction to fill the void. That may be alcohol, illicit drugs, or prescription opioids. While this may provide temporary relief, it derails your sobriety progress, leaving you in need of recovery from two addictions.
What is Transfer Addiction?
Transfer addiction, also known as addiction transfer and cross addiction, involves the transfer of an addiction from one harmful substance or behavior to another, according to EBSCO. It can also pertain to using multiple substances at one time, also known as polysubstance abuse. Taking up a benzodiazepine addiction after getting sober from alcohol use disorder would be an example of transfer addiction. No doubt this can be a frustrating and discouraging experience when it happens, especially if you were hoping to maintain long-term sobriety. But behind the scenes, different addictions share some common similarities.
The US Department of Justice goes as far as to say that once you’re addicted to one drug, you’re addicted to all drugs. Such an idea may seem strange on the surface, but drug addiction and alcohol addiction are often rooted in the same underlying cause: unresolved past trauma. If trauma (especially ACEs trauma) from your past remains unhealed, you’re always looking for a way to cope with it, so you may bounce from one substance to another to self-medicate.
Addiction Transfer Behind the Scenes
Whether it’s cocaine, benzos, marijuana, or alcohol, each substance produces the same pleasure chemical in your brain when used. This is called dopamine. As you use any of these substances over and over again to cope with your trauma, you become chemically dependent on the continuous supply of dopamine to function. Over time, this leads to addiction.
If you’ve been trying to overcome an addiction, you may take on another substance to continue your pleasure-seeking behaviors as a trauma coping mechanism. After all, your brain craves the dopamine you’ve been getting. When you have a dopamine deficiency, it’s easy to seek out a new substance to get your brain back to the levels it’s gotten used to over time. Consequently, this leads to addiction transfer. Though you may have gotten over one substance, you haven’t really healed your addiction.
Addiction Triggers and Cross Addiction
The addiction recovery journey is a lifelong process. Overcoming an initial addiction doesn’t mean you’ve vanquished it from here on out. Addiction triggers are always out there trying to tempt you to pick up where you left off. For many, a common addiction trigger is anxiety. No longer pursuing something that has been really important to you (your addiction) may make you feel really anxious, if you’re honest. When anxiety shows up, you may be conditioned to enter into a fight flight freeze fawn flop trauma response.
When anxiety or stress arises, you may want to seek out some kind of pleasure-generating substance to cope. If you don’t want to go back to your prior substance, taking up another one will provide that relief you crave. And so the cycle of dopamine continues on as you encounter anxiety or other negative feelings in your everyday life.
Ways to Fight Back Against Transfer Addiction
You can’t go into recovery without a plan in place. Transfer addiction is always a potential challenge for anyone seeking long-term sobriety. In order to protect yourself from the temptations of addiction transfer, it’s important to have some healthy coping strategies at your disposal, such as:
- Being with family: Did you know that affection from a loved one can produce dopamine? Making time for family can be the healthy distraction you need when cravings or triggers arise.
- Spending time in nature: Going outside not only gives you vitamin D, but it also helps reduce stress and restore calm.
- Engaging in physical fitness: Exercising is not only a stress reliever; it also helps reduce cravings. And even better, healthy physical activity produces dopamine and endorphins, making it a better coping mechanism.
- Pursuing new hobbies: Taking up a hobby can help fill the addiction void, boost your self-esteem, and even connect you with other people.
- Meditating: Something you can do at any time, meditation brings you back into the present moment and takes your mind off of addiction cravings when you’re triggered.
Heal From Transfer Addiction at Sana at Stowe
Maybe tried to get sober from substance abuse and ended up taking on a transfer addiction instead. What should you do next? The best step you can take from here is to seek professional help. After all, you can’t overcome addiction through willpower alone. It’s likely that your past trauma still remains unaddressed. At Sana at Stowe, our New England-based alcohol and drug addiction treatment programs heal your transfer addiction at the source. Partnering together, we help you achieve real transformation through trauma-informed care and evidence-based treatment. To learn more, contact our team today.
