What are Addiction Triggers?
One of a recovering addict’s or active addict’s worst enemies is the dreaded TRIGGER. For an active addict, the trigger comes minute by minute, hour by hour and day by day. And for the recovering addict, who is not actively using, the trigger can come out of nowhere and can blindside the recovering addict and send them right back through the cycle of addiction. Think of a gun when trying to wrap your mind around the triggers of addiction. A gun has many working parts that work in tandem to fire the bullet. Well, so does addiction. Addiction has many physical and psychological moving parts that work in tandem to get addiction’s required result, which is active using of drugs and/or alcohol. So on a gun, we “pull the trigger” which engages the hammer. The hammer then hits the “head” of the bullet which reacts to the gunpowder sending the lead portion of the bullet to its intended target. That is the process of firing a gun and the purpose of the trigger in this process.
Now, in the process of addiction, the trigger is much the same but in a hypothetical sense. An addiction trigger is something in your everyday life that reminds you of the euphoria or good times you felt while using drugs and/or alcohol. An addiction trigger can be a place you pass by daily that you used to meet your dealer to cop drugs. An addiction trigger can be a bar on your route to work where you used to spend hours drinking. An addiction trigger could also be a song that inspired you to use cocaine or an ex-lover who you used to shoot heroin with.
So, it is easy to see that triggers can be people, places or things that “nudge” at you to resume doing drugs or drinking alcohol. And like I said at the beginning of this blog, addiction triggers are a daily hurdle for active users. They are almost expected. But for those of us in recovery, the addiction trigger can come out of nowhere if we aren’t careful and prepared. It can blindside you and without warning or much though we are right back knee deep in a dangerous relapse. So we here at The Addictions Coach 1-800-706-0318 can teach you how to overcome addiction triggers and deal with them on a daily basis. If you or someone you know keeps getting sidetracked by addiction triggers call us today for immediate help. You can also click on our website link above and head over to our testimonial page to see the hundreds of testimonial videos of our clients who have used our outreached hand to change their lives forever.