Christopher Dines Quotes

If we are continuing to attract partners that are emotionally unavailable, then it’s essential that we observe our own addictive patterns rather than focusing on theirs.

Drug and alcohol addiction almost killed me. I was a grave substance misuser in my teens. I started drinking at ten, smoking at eleven and by the time I attended high school aged twelve, I was regularly smoking marijuana and drinking alcohol on weekends. I was a full-blown alcoholic at thirteen. Tragically, I had my stomach pumped at fourteen and although I promised my family I would never drink again, I started less than two weeks later. I was completely hooked on alcohol.

Tragically, because many addicts are not given sufficient love, nurturing and non-shaming dialogue at crucial stages in their early emotional development, they are on a quest to find contentment from a source outside of themselves. Their parents might have provided bountifully for them; however, their parents were never fully emotionally present while parenting, which made their children feel starved of emotional nourishment.

Regardless of the different stages in our human development, unless we learn how to create loving and fulfilling relationships (with ourselves and others), addiction will follow – not necessarily as a manifestation of substance misuse but in the form of codependence, compulsive thinking, unhealthy relationships, sex and love addictions, overeating, insidious incarnations of self-harm and so on.

I don’t think I’ve ever met an addict in long-term recovery who hasn’t gone through at least one traumatic childhood experience. Research indicates that one traumatic event in childhood is as grave as continuous combat in a war zone. A traumatic event during childhood can leave a grave imprint on the human body.

Scores of high-powered men and women are addicted to substances or destructive addictive patterns of behaviour. As a matter of fact, it is easier to hide one’s addiction while maintaining a high-powered position compared to the addicts and alcoholics we see sleeping on street corners.

Some addicts do not even have basic parenting and instead are beaten, sexually abused, left to be looked after by a dysfunctional ‘carer’, put in orphan homes or rejected by their community. If you calculate the millions of emotionally neglected children and observe them growing up together trying to ‘get by in life’, you will understand why many adults (adult children) have addictive personalities.

Think of an untreated sex addict who spends hours every night until the early hours watching pornography on the internet instead of spending that time with their wife or husband, and then becomes so tired due to the late nights that their professional life suffers. The sex addict’s behaviour will cause resentment, destroy trust and create economic insecurities in the family and home.