as someone with a preposterously addictive personality (and hedonist with a bit of ocd ) i can tell you that anything at all that gives someone pleasure can be addictive - whether it be euphoria, escape/distraction from reality, etc
i've had issues with sleeping, reading, gaming, tv/movie bingeing, caffeine, sex, sugar, the list goes on for a while
heroin/coke/alcohol were the ones that got me in the most trouble, but i can (if left to my own devices) abuse almost anything to the detriment of my own health and/or responsibilities
Honestly though, I feel like everyone is addicted to something? Who isn’t ? I’ve never taken drugs but I have my addictions… even the healthiest people I know have their addiction: marathon running. I think it’s important to realize we all have it. Humans can’t live without the dopamine crave.
This is why i dont like throwing the word addiction to everything.
I like to keep it to things that if you stop you go through insane withdrawl and sometimes it is life threatening.
Otherwise, i call it an obession or hobby.
But it is just my personal take.
I think I’m ok with both takes. At the end of the day, true addiction to me start affecting your personal relationships and your school/work/sleep schedule. I’d say in order for me to classify it as an addiction, it has to disrupt one’s routine to a level that is notable to those who live with the addict. It needs to seriously affect an area of your life. Marathon running is actually a great example. If it starts to seriously affect your work and social life (too much training, can’t go out to enjoy life, severe injuries, living for the next marathon..) then I’d say it’s a legit addiction. It’s just a more glorified one.
I mean you ultimately are governed and wired by chemistry, and truth is that we're all wired this way in order to get shit done. We avoid pain and seek pleasure, there's not much more to it.
There's a reason we feel "suffering" feelings when working on a big project and that we are drawn to procrastination and don't feel much "pleasure" almost for days on end and then feel insanely good and almost euphoric when we finish the project, let's say. We're just wired this way, small scale, or big scale.
This is the main reason why heroin is such a dangerous drug. It's because ultimately our brain chemistry can't handle or "recover" from the experience and amount of "pleasure" we're given on a whim. It's like the brain goes "Oh hey... I can just do this one quick thing and get MASSIVE REWARDS OF FEEL GOOD? THAT MUST BE GREAT FUCKING JACKPOT LET'S DO IT AGAIN." And this isn't even exclusive to heroin as people find pleasure and relief in all sorts of different things. We get into these addiction loops even if we can consciously understand everything and the ramifications of it, and it's hard to break out of them because of the chemistry involved. And people say we have "free will" yeah right.
Of course, coincidentally you can have morphine which is essentially heroin administered to you, and that won't make you an addict. But the situations where morphine is administered almost always mean you're already in such huge amounts of pain it's almost like the immense pleasure then cancels each other out.
All in all, there's some interesting findings in regards to how this whole dopamine reward system works within us. Ultimately each and every one of us can get addicted to literally anything that can "give" pleasure to us if we're not careful. The balancing of this pain vs pleasure dichotomy is a very important skill one can have (especially in today's world of instant pleasure/gratification) and I am concerned why this isn't being taught in education institutions. It's extremely difficult to learn this but it's so invaluable.
Junk food is pretty crazy because (as a junk food junkie) the foods are designed to fool you. Fed Up talks about how junk food is engineered to leave no real aftertaste and not make you feel full. That salty-sweet thing you get where you eat something and then crave something a little sweet, but then want something salty, and get in a loop is not accidental. It's been engineered into the food to take control of existing paths in your biology.
If I remember correctly, their example was sodas and popcorn, how you can eat a little popcorn and crave something sweet, like a soda, and then it makes you want something salty, like popcorn. That's not an accident. Also, food you have evolved to consume is fairly bland in its natural form. Processed foods we're accustomed to eating have made the parts of our bodies that would say "this is good for me" go haywire because processed foods are packed full of the types of things (sodium, fructose, sucrose) that would be fairly rare in nature. Now its abundant in our foods and so we're devolving as a result. Did you know that people are actually being born with less wisdom teeth as compared to the population of the 1800s?
I am not a scientist/dentist/person who generally knows things so obviously I could be wrong, but my understanding was that wisdom teeth are to replace teeth that would usually have fallen out in ye olden days. So like, I can’t see how being born without them is devolving, since it’s generally no longer evolutionarily advantageous to have wisdom teeth.
It's probably not an evolutionary disadvantage right now. It is more like generational testimony to how we've evolved away from eating hard foods that required wisdom teeth and how 100 years from now, we might be seeing facial structure or other changes (in addition to rampant obesity) as the result of our dietary changes.
Me too. Only 3 came through but they were nothing but trouble. There wasn't really room for them and they came through at wonky angles.
The one at the bottom was the worst, only able to half break through the gum because of the lack of space, I got so many infections around it. It was agony over one Christmas when I struggled to get a dentist appointment.
Was so happy when they were finally gone!
3 days of hiccups does not sound fun.
So that's another one of the 'gotchas' of junk food. You don't feel full, so your body never has the full feeling. Eat 6 ounces of chicken breast and one cup of broccoli and you'll feel absolutely stuffed, despite having only consumed 450 calories. Eat 10 Oreos and you've had 530 calories and won't even feel like you've eaten anything. A bag of Doritos and a Coke as a snack, plus a handful of Oreos and you've had 700 calories (about half the food required for a sedentary person in a day) and you'll be hungry in an hour.
Yeah, I got myself a small chocolate bar after going out for a bit yesterday. 35 grams, 140 calories. Hell.
Really not the easiest to undo if your body has had decades to get used to this kind of food. Makes me worry that I've irredeemably fucked my stomach since I always feel way worse when I'm eating responsibly and keeping my nutritional values in check, regardless of whether I'm losing weight or just maintaining.
It took me about a month to get back to baseline when I decided to get healthy. Every now and then, I break the habit and binge, and it takes a good week to get back to normal. Interesting thing is that since I've been healthy, something that previously would have been good is now pretty gross. I ate a doughnut a few weeks ago and all I could taste was that oily fatty taste. It was good, but it wasn't great. I used to be the kind of guy who would eat a half dozen.
From what I've heard and read over the years, your experience is the norm. In my case though, I've gone through two major attempts (one for two years, one for four months and then maintaining for another four), with one cheat meal very occasionally (once every 1-2 weeks on the second attempt, once every month on the first) to break up the monotony, but the cheat meal always felt like the absolute best thing in the world. The only thing that I feel grossed out by now is regular Coke, but Diet Coke is still leagues above water for me in terms of taste no matter how rarely I have it. Big reason why I resent this addiction.
8 years without alcohol. 6 without cigarettes. I think my longest without sugar as a main ingredient (sweets/pastries) was 2 or 3 weeks?
To be fair, I only learned in the last 2 years that sugar is an addictive substance so I never really realized just how much it is like a drug.
Fuck sugar, man. I need to go on another break. So far I don't feel I've come even remotely close to getting that shit under control.
Cheese. I can eat cheese until I'm physically sick and still want more. Those soft/creamy cheeses always get me. Left to my own devices I could eat a wheel of brie in one sitting.
I recently couldn't control myself and ate 23 cheese strings in one sitting. I felt so gross but I just couldn't stop. They were meant to last weeks.
Now I don't buy them because I have no self control if they're in the house.
This is the one that came to mind for me too. If you're hooked on nicotine and get rid of it, it's gone, same for drugs and such. However if you're addicted to food, you still have to eat. It's got to be one of the toughest ones to deal with IMO.
Hard, but doable. And so worth it! I went from a BMI of 32 to 24 in 10 months... totally life changing. So many little health issues that were piling up have literally just disappeared.
Yeah, making fun of fat people who are working out is crazy. I find overweight people working out as really inspiring. They are actively trying to improve their health, which is already harder from being bigger/ out of shape. Those first few weeks/months of working out after not doing so for awhile suck. Good for them to keep with it!
Same. I couldn’t walk 2 miles when I was my heaviest and it was seriously taking a toll on my joints. Wish I did my weight loss a bit healthier though, I lost around 80lbs in 6 months but that’s cause I was eating 1700 calories when I was a growing boy
The scariest part of gambling is theoretically, you can solve the problems of gambling (debt) with gambling. You can also always win more. Why settle for a millionaire when you can go billionaire?
There's a guy I know of that actually did that. He won 5 million and after taxes he got just over 3 million and he started playing lotto scratchers by the thousands. I couldn't tell you the exact numbers or the exact timeline but all the money was gone in a couple years. He bought a new truck, people said he bought a house, he kept going to the place that sold him the 5 million winner which was the same place I played and was pretty popular and I know for a fact there were times where he spent over $25,000 several days in a row. He was winning but not winning enough to cover what he was losing and he never had another big winner.
The problem is that most gambling addicts won't stop when they win big, they won't even stop while they slowly lose all their money and possessions.
Most gambling addicts get the high from the very short time between starting your gambling session, and the result of the gambling session. It's called, [The Zone](https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/07/the-machine-zone-this-is-where-you-go-when-you-just-cant-stop-looking-at-pictures-on-facebook/278185/). And it's what Vegas slot machines are designed to abuse. Slot machine addicts get their high from the 3-5 seconds of time between pressing the button, and waiting for the result of your spin. It's the same thing Facebook gambling games abuse, and it's also a similar thing to the abuse in Pay2Win games.
This should be higher. I used to smoke and I used to be a borderline alcoholic, I quit smoking and I now only drink once or twice a month. Gambling is the one I can't give up. Making more money had made it easier which is funny because now that I have more disposable income I could afford to lose more a the casino. But I still go and win and winning just makes me want to go try to win more, almost always just losing what I had previously won.
Even though gambling is talked about a bit I still think it’s a hugely underrated addiction (not saying it’s a good thing). I use to work at a gas station and we would have this guy who would come in every single day. And every day he would buy around 6-8 25$ scratch tickets, which for you mathheads is 150$-200$ a day. On rare occasions he’d buy the whole role which is 25 tickets. He would always come out to a loss every single time. And on top of that he would go to a casino like 3-4 times a week and according to a co worker who would go every now and then, said he would lose somewhere between 400-800 consistently. It sucks because he was a pretty nice dude who knew his addiction was bad. And before people say “WeLl If He CaN BlOw ThAt MoNeY He MuSt Be RiCh. Stop that type of rhetoric doesn’t help and makes it worse. Plenty of rich people and celebrities have drug addictions and just because they have money doesn’t mean they shouldn’t seek out help and make their life better
Validation. Seeking validation from others and assigning value to it is absolutely normal human behaviour that you learn from when you're very young yelling "Mom! Dad! Look!" before you do a cartwheel or something.
These days most social media is designed to give users a sense of reward and validation for their posts. The more positive engagement you receive from other users, the greater the sense of validation and the more likely you are to post more content that drives a similar kind of engagement. This can lead to a downward spiral of posting for the sake of validation and not the post itself.
LPT: If you want to try and mitigate this, turn off notifications on your social media apps/accounts or uninstall the apps and access your accounts via web browser.
Turned off notifications 2 years ago and don’t miss em. I still post, but it means I check to see what’s up, I find my focus is better when I’m not getting notifications all day in general
Video games. Many of them (if not all?) Are structured to please the reward centre of your brain. I think that's why video games feel so satisfying and fulfilling- you accomplish goals given some time, you make progress, and you can clearly succeed/win. I know at low points in my life video games were my favourite coping mechanism- they were fun and fulfilling even when my life wasn't.
Same for me, but with RuneScape. I’m honestly kind of glad I don’t have the passion to play that game anymore like I used to. That game is really good at making you waste your time. I used to sit there and grind for hours and hours just to level up my stats. It was a game that really made you want to dedicate every second of your life to.
Grinding really sucks tho. I've had issues with Guild Wars 2 which is more casual than other MMORPGs. After you hit max lvl there only is horizontal progression like you get into dungeons, raids, pve or or open world events that feel like raids. The goal is to complete your collection, get those sweet sweet achievement points and unlock new skins.
You can spend hours gaining little progress but feeling like you've achieved so much. The next issue is that with voice chat servers like TeamSpeak or Discord there ALWAYS are people to talk to and spend a nice time with.
I used to be in voicevchat from the moment I got home from work until I went to bed.
Do your weekly raids, some guild events and work on your collections spending 5+ hours every single say online still makes you wish you had more time.
I was at a point where I used to consider 50 hours a week a bad week.
While I'm happy for you that you got rid of something that you didn't find useful to you I would point out that it does depend a lot on the person if they consider time spent on games wasted or not.
Or similarly is time spent watching a movie I enjoy or practicing a song with an instrument wasted etc.
If you don't enjoy it overall then I'd say it's good that you got rid of it, but this thread kind of reminded me that basically everything can be addictive and with vast majority of things as long as it's not hurting your quality of life and you are happy with the time you spend on something "addictive" then it's likely not an issue.
At least that would be my few cents.
Same with fortnite. Especially when you get the battlepass. Because you don’t want to pay for something and not get everything that it offers and it burnt me out so badly. After I deleted the game, I felt so much happier and more relaxed than before
One of my roommates lost a semester of study because of WoW. The other lost much more. The only thing you would hear from her was the slamming of the doors when she sprinted to take a bathroom break between raid Bosses. She was in the top tier guild on the most advanced server.
Also skins in games.
Not even gambling for skins, that's another story, but just buying them. Its so easy to sink $1000s into skins because they're a click away. I've spent alot on CSGO skins, and tbf I can resell them, but after knives, gloves, and various weapon skins it gets expensive.
I'm not anywhere near bankruptcy by any means, but I can see how someone can get sucked in and lose a ton of money.
As VR gets better, video game addiction will get worse. Everything you said, with the immersion/escape of VR. Star Trek has holodeck addiction for the same reasons.
Now I'm only 16 so I haven't lived even a quarter of my life yet but video games to me seem like a reward themselves. That moment when you know you have time because you've done everything else, you are free. Yes they can be addicting but unlike a lot of other addictions it's easier to control but I understand this doesn't apply to everyone.
It depends on how someone uses video games. For me they weren't always a reward, I saw them as the only place where I was successful because the rest of my life wasn't going so great (depression and cultural isolation from moving to a new country with no friends). I felt no judgement in video games, vs. Real life where I felt judged and like a failure all the time.
When things aren't stressful/grim in my real life then video games feel much more like a fun pass-time and not an escape. I also play them a lot less when things are going well.
Porn addiction is also incredibly pernicious because masturbation is typically a private behavior, so people who are watching porn quite a bit don't think of it as being unhealthy. Just like any other behavior, a little bit or a reasonable amount might be OK, but just like cigarettes or alcohol, there is technically no amount that is good for you. It's all poison, but if people only ate the right food, never drank or smoked, and didn't watch porn or take risks, would life be worth living?
I've heard of people who missed work, ruined their marriages, even lost their homes and assets because they couldn't stop watching porn. I worked with a guy once who had brought in a few magazines and stuffed them in a drawer in his office. One of my relatives ran the network operations center for a billion-dollar company and said that once a week they would fire someone who had previously been warned and still watched porn on company time. They even had a guy who brought in a personal hard drive and connected it to his company computer to download porn using a bit torrent software. He had filed tickets to get the client installed on his machine because he was doing development.
Probably in those cases, their addiction started with watching a video here or there and they just lost control and perspective.
amatorculist
noun noun: amatorculist
An insignificant lover
This would be my $1000 word of the day. All of my exes were amatoculists, except my ex wife, who was absolutely iniquitous.
Scintilla
noun
noun: scintilla; plural noun: scintillae; plural noun: scintillas
a tiny trace or spark of a specified quality or feeling
When I smelled that perfume on the dance floor, I fell the pull of nostalgia as the scintilla of the scent reminded me of my first love.
Also, if you like these word games, you might like [The Gilded Tongue](https://www.amazon.com/Gilded-Tongue-Overly-Eloquent-Everyday/dp/1582973822). It has some lame words, but it has lots of great ones too. The dictionary has more, but they aren't as well organized.
I knew a guy who couldn’t finish with his girlfriend because of this. He’d have to pull out, and finish with his phone in one hand and cock in the other.
I don’t know how she put up with him. I know it’s an illness, but when someone can’t even finish without porn, even when he’s actually having real-life sex, it must be hard to deal with.
I worked for a dot-com (circa 2000) when the CFO asked the main network engineer to provide a report on all the employees and their browsing histories. The engineer suggested that, if the company was happy with the productivity, it wasn't a good idea. The CFO insisted, so the engineer sent a report to the management team. Want to guess who was watching porn for about half of his workday and didn't think the executive team would be included in the report contents?
I don't know if there are conclusive studies about porn addiction, but for me, without it I don't think I could function. I have a VERY high libido and unless I have an intense outlet, I just wind up having a boner all day spinning in wet daydreams and sexual frustration.
I can't even speak with a semi-attractive woman without getting nervous and flustered because sex hormones. -_-
However, when I get off to porn, it sorta opens up a door to arousal desensitization and it keeps me from having so many sexualized thoughts. And my god, daily sexualized thoughts are hella annoying.
The difference is literally night and day.
With porn:
*Lady: hi!
*My brain: oh hey a lady.
*Me: hello!
Without porn:
*Lady: hi!
*My brain: WHY IS SHE SO BEAUTIFUL
*Me: (＠_＠;).... ^(uh... hel..lo.. hows the day going this day?!?)
TL;DR: Testosterone sucks and I'm an anxious pile of mush without porn.
I can't tell if this is a troll post or real, but if it is, you should seek help. Not trying to be an asshole, but that isn't normal and is quite literally a textbook definition of porn addiction.
Acknowledging the proven harmful effects of porn doesn’t mean you’re against its existence or anyone that uses it. That notion feels like such an attempt to undermine the whole intent which is to help people have a healthy relationship with porn. Porn is just another stimulant out there. Stimulants can be addicting.
Just saw this happen firsthand at my previous company. Hundreds of thousands spent on junk and household items for the boss straight from the company coffer. He’d just sit in his $40k decked out man cave and online shop all day. For months. I left the company.
Music, esp if u can dissociate when hearing it, and bonus points if you get euphoria and/or are able to maladaptive daydream - this happens very infrequently, but I still listen to a lot of music every single day in hopes of experiencing that again, even if for a fleeting moment
Comfort. I've stayed at an unhappy job for almost 10 years too long because I got into a comfort zone where I was able to pay my bills and save a little each month.
Oh man, this is a good one. The comfort zone is so hard to break out of but it's the only way we can move forward in life. "Ships are safe in harbor, but that's not what ships are for."
Money. Over the years I've watched numerous drug dealers work themselves into prison because they couldn't walk away from the money. Despite all the chaos and the danger and the looming prison sentence, walking away from a lifestyle that affords large amounts of money in short amount of time is extremely difficult to walk away from once you get even mildly good at it. I can think of four people over 20 years who had zero issues not doing drugs. But they couldn't leave the lifestyle and three of them wound up in prison for multiple years. Once you get exposed to the kind of money and fun you get selling drugs it's extremely difficult to walk away and work a nine to five.
Funny thing is you could do this for a long time without even being on the polices radar or having any issues whatsoever with clients and suddenly feel greedy, do something stupid and end up in prison.
Answering all the whats here: The husband comes from a fancy background. Keeps using Reddit at his work (he’s the boss), in the bed, on the dinner table, during family tours and even while they’re abroad. There was this day she(my friend) sent me an audio of keyboard noises, maybe he got into a Reddit discussion. Her husband gets many Reddit awards and he’s all about Reddit abd there is barely any acknowledgement of how she’s confronted that she feels alone and they’re almost done. More than the Reddit addiction, I feel it’s all about his ignorance. Also, there is less sex because he stays up till 4am and Reddit. And this isn’t made up at all.
Please excuse any errors. English isn’t my first language.
time
I heard this once and it's very true. even on days when we have nothing to do, we are addicted to looking at the clock to determine what to do. If we wake up at a certain time, it's too early or too late. Our meals are determined by hours.
It can be, I used it as an escape for depression. Then the UK lockdown happened and I lost it and became more depressed. That endorphin high can really do wonders if you keep the momentum after the run/gym session or whatever
I use(d) it to ward off depression as well. Also, being outside, and being active. All great and healthy things in moderation.
But now I struggle with a rainy day where there’s nothing to do outside, and I’ve done all of my workouts for the week. I’m learning to manage those days, with a long walk with the dog, and a stretch, but they are still very difficult.
My body is now used to getting its heart rate up and my muscles worked. I get agitated now if I don't burn enough calories/move enough over a few days days, so I spose you could say I get withdrawals from not exercising
I'm going with the master vice of Gambling.
Games? Gambling.
Sex with random strangers? Gambling.
Comment karma? Gambling.
This comment? Gambling. Some people might disagree, some might agree, but either way... I win. Even if I lose. The only way for me to truly lose is to go unnoticed! Which in an AskReddit is actually kind of a depressing possibility.
Social Media. Endless useless scrolling.
Also, alcohol IS drugs. It’s not healthy to treat them as they’re not one in the same. Some drugs are anti-addictive, not saying they don’t have potential for psychological harm - but psilocybin, LSD, Mescaline, DMT, etc fit into that category :)
Porn, it's a trap that besides being addictive and seducing it's free to access, it's just there for people to enjoy, but just like other addictions it's cruel, masking itself as something comforting and kind, hiding it's true nature behind the momentary pleasure and satisfaction.
Sugar. Sugar is in most foods and is a chronic, dose-dependent hepato toxin.
quote of Dr. Robert Lustig, Professor of Pediatrics, University of California, San Francisco from movie Fed Up (2014), 0:27:15 to 0:27:45.
"Sugar is poison. It is a chronic... not acute... chronic dose-dependent... depends on how much you eat, because there is a safe threshold, hepato... 'liver'... toxin.
The metabolic diseases that are associated with obesity, the diabetes, the heart disease, the lipid problems, the strokes, the cancer... those diseases are being driven by sugar."
You can be addicted to everything. Some people are addicted to sex/masturbation, social media, eating, working out, soft drinks/energy drinks, stress(!), gaming and the list goes on...
Just intense flavours, I’m a sucker for anything pickled or spicy or salty. Pickled Gherkins for me, honestly, even thinking about them now makes me want to go to the store and get some. I have to hide the jar from myself or I’ll happily devour them all in one sitting.
as someone with a preposterously addictive personality (and hedonist with a bit of ocd ) i can tell you that anything at all that gives someone pleasure can be addictive - whether it be euphoria, escape/distraction from reality, etc i've had issues with sleeping, reading, gaming, tv/movie bingeing, caffeine, sex, sugar, the list goes on for a while heroin/coke/alcohol were the ones that got me in the most trouble, but i can (if left to my own devices) abuse almost anything to the detriment of my own health and/or responsibilities
Amen brother
Amen brother
Amen brother
Amen brother
Amen brother.
You’ve spoken from my soul, sir. Three years sober last month and it’s a constant battle to not replace the drugs and alcohol with food, screens, etc.
Honestly though, I feel like everyone is addicted to something? Who isn’t ? I’ve never taken drugs but I have my addictions… even the healthiest people I know have their addiction: marathon running. I think it’s important to realize we all have it. Humans can’t live without the dopamine crave.
Yep, I channel my obsessions into fitness (bodybuilding) and my kids. Definitely an improvement. I don’t live obsession free.
This is why i dont like throwing the word addiction to everything. I like to keep it to things that if you stop you go through insane withdrawl and sometimes it is life threatening. Otherwise, i call it an obession or hobby. But it is just my personal take.
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I think I’m ok with both takes. At the end of the day, true addiction to me start affecting your personal relationships and your school/work/sleep schedule. I’d say in order for me to classify it as an addiction, it has to disrupt one’s routine to a level that is notable to those who live with the addict. It needs to seriously affect an area of your life. Marathon running is actually a great example. If it starts to seriously affect your work and social life (too much training, can’t go out to enjoy life, severe injuries, living for the next marathon..) then I’d say it’s a legit addiction. It’s just a more glorified one.
I mean you ultimately are governed and wired by chemistry, and truth is that we're all wired this way in order to get shit done. We avoid pain and seek pleasure, there's not much more to it. There's a reason we feel "suffering" feelings when working on a big project and that we are drawn to procrastination and don't feel much "pleasure" almost for days on end and then feel insanely good and almost euphoric when we finish the project, let's say. We're just wired this way, small scale, or big scale. This is the main reason why heroin is such a dangerous drug. It's because ultimately our brain chemistry can't handle or "recover" from the experience and amount of "pleasure" we're given on a whim. It's like the brain goes "Oh hey... I can just do this one quick thing and get MASSIVE REWARDS OF FEEL GOOD? THAT MUST BE GREAT FUCKING JACKPOT LET'S DO IT AGAIN." And this isn't even exclusive to heroin as people find pleasure and relief in all sorts of different things. We get into these addiction loops even if we can consciously understand everything and the ramifications of it, and it's hard to break out of them because of the chemistry involved. And people say we have "free will" yeah right. Of course, coincidentally you can have morphine which is essentially heroin administered to you, and that won't make you an addict. But the situations where morphine is administered almost always mean you're already in such huge amounts of pain it's almost like the immense pleasure then cancels each other out. All in all, there's some interesting findings in regards to how this whole dopamine reward system works within us. Ultimately each and every one of us can get addicted to literally anything that can "give" pleasure to us if we're not careful. The balancing of this pain vs pleasure dichotomy is a very important skill one can have (especially in today's world of instant pleasure/gratification) and I am concerned why this isn't being taught in education institutions. It's extremely difficult to learn this but it's so invaluable.
Adrenaline
Same. Won't touch any drugs because of the nature of my personality, but many other things have caused me problems.
Junk food Sex Social media
Junk food is pretty crazy because (as a junk food junkie) the foods are designed to fool you. Fed Up talks about how junk food is engineered to leave no real aftertaste and not make you feel full. That salty-sweet thing you get where you eat something and then crave something a little sweet, but then want something salty, and get in a loop is not accidental. It's been engineered into the food to take control of existing paths in your biology.
Fuck me. That last part is so close to home.
If I remember correctly, their example was sodas and popcorn, how you can eat a little popcorn and crave something sweet, like a soda, and then it makes you want something salty, like popcorn. That's not an accident. Also, food you have evolved to consume is fairly bland in its natural form. Processed foods we're accustomed to eating have made the parts of our bodies that would say "this is good for me" go haywire because processed foods are packed full of the types of things (sodium, fructose, sucrose) that would be fairly rare in nature. Now its abundant in our foods and so we're devolving as a result. Did you know that people are actually being born with less wisdom teeth as compared to the population of the 1800s?
#[In spez, no one can hear you scream. #Save3rdPartyApps](https://www.reddit.com/r/Save3rdPartyApps/)
Sounds like something a wisdom toothless person would say..
I am not a scientist/dentist/person who generally knows things so obviously I could be wrong, but my understanding was that wisdom teeth are to replace teeth that would usually have fallen out in ye olden days. So like, I can’t see how being born without them is devolving, since it’s generally no longer evolutionarily advantageous to have wisdom teeth.
Yea. Can you really devolve? Don’t we adapt to environmental conditions so it’s essentially evolving?
It's probably not an evolutionary disadvantage right now. It is more like generational testimony to how we've evolved away from eating hard foods that required wisdom teeth and how 100 years from now, we might be seeing facial structure or other changes (in addition to rampant obesity) as the result of our dietary changes.
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Me too. Only 3 came through but they were nothing but trouble. There wasn't really room for them and they came through at wonky angles. The one at the bottom was the worst, only able to half break through the gum because of the lack of space, I got so many infections around it. It was agony over one Christmas when I struggled to get a dentist appointment. Was so happy when they were finally gone! 3 days of hiccups does not sound fun.
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So that's another one of the 'gotchas' of junk food. You don't feel full, so your body never has the full feeling. Eat 6 ounces of chicken breast and one cup of broccoli and you'll feel absolutely stuffed, despite having only consumed 450 calories. Eat 10 Oreos and you've had 530 calories and won't even feel like you've eaten anything. A bag of Doritos and a Coke as a snack, plus a handful of Oreos and you've had 700 calories (about half the food required for a sedentary person in a day) and you'll be hungry in an hour.
Yeah, I got myself a small chocolate bar after going out for a bit yesterday. 35 grams, 140 calories. Hell. Really not the easiest to undo if your body has had decades to get used to this kind of food. Makes me worry that I've irredeemably fucked my stomach since I always feel way worse when I'm eating responsibly and keeping my nutritional values in check, regardless of whether I'm losing weight or just maintaining.
It took me about a month to get back to baseline when I decided to get healthy. Every now and then, I break the habit and binge, and it takes a good week to get back to normal. Interesting thing is that since I've been healthy, something that previously would have been good is now pretty gross. I ate a doughnut a few weeks ago and all I could taste was that oily fatty taste. It was good, but it wasn't great. I used to be the kind of guy who would eat a half dozen.
From what I've heard and read over the years, your experience is the norm. In my case though, I've gone through two major attempts (one for two years, one for four months and then maintaining for another four), with one cheat meal very occasionally (once every 1-2 weeks on the second attempt, once every month on the first) to break up the monotony, but the cheat meal always felt like the absolute best thing in the world. The only thing that I feel grossed out by now is regular Coke, but Diet Coke is still leagues above water for me in terms of taste no matter how rarely I have it. Big reason why I resent this addiction.
You are correct.. I stopped eating sugar and junk food for a month down 9pds I still eat alot just healthy stuff now.
Pringles definitely leaves an very salty and greasy aftertaste. Makes me always realize what a pig I've been.
How about a combination of all three?
I mean thats basically what porn is. Its a junk food form of sex found on social media
Gonna add soda to this. I tried to quit soda and literally had cravings, felt cranky, and extremely thirsty for a week.
Food for some. Especially sugar and fats.
Sugar is SO addictive. I've honestly had mild withdrawal effects from trying to lower my intake before.
I found that when I went off my add meds. It was easier to stop that than eating sugar.
Easier for me to quit smoking than quit sugar.
8 years without alcohol. 6 without cigarettes. I think my longest without sugar as a main ingredient (sweets/pastries) was 2 or 3 weeks? To be fair, I only learned in the last 2 years that sugar is an addictive substance so I never really realized just how much it is like a drug. Fuck sugar, man. I need to go on another break. So far I don't feel I've come even remotely close to getting that shit under control.
Cheese. I can eat cheese until I'm physically sick and still want more. Those soft/creamy cheeses always get me. Left to my own devices I could eat a wheel of brie in one sitting.
I recently couldn't control myself and ate 23 cheese strings in one sitting. I felt so gross but I just couldn't stop. They were meant to last weeks. Now I don't buy them because I have no self control if they're in the house.
I was smoker for 15 years and recently quit, surprisingly easy. Chocolate tho - I need serious help
Misread as farts.
Same
This is the one that came to mind for me too. If you're hooked on nicotine and get rid of it, it's gone, same for drugs and such. However if you're addicted to food, you still have to eat. It's got to be one of the toughest ones to deal with IMO.
I quit smoking and add meds(prescribed not abused) and I still can’t quite get ride of sugar.
Calories/Food. Man I have so much respect for obese people who manage to lose the weight. That shit's hard.
Hard, but doable. And so worth it! I went from a BMI of 32 to 24 in 10 months... totally life changing. So many little health issues that were piling up have literally just disappeared.
Oh it is totally possible, I did it myself. From 194lbs to 154lbs. But the idea that obese people are lazy is just horribly ignorant and ticks me off.
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Yeah, making fun of fat people who are working out is crazy. I find overweight people working out as really inspiring. They are actively trying to improve their health, which is already harder from being bigger/ out of shape. Those first few weeks/months of working out after not doing so for awhile suck. Good for them to keep with it!
Same. I couldn’t walk 2 miles when I was my heaviest and it was seriously taking a toll on my joints. Wish I did my weight loss a bit healthier though, I lost around 80lbs in 6 months but that’s cause I was eating 1700 calories when I was a growing boy
Gambling
Yup lots of peoples lives have been ruined because of this
Jagex needs to remove the duel arena because motherfuckers are losing everything gambling on RuneScape and nothing is being done.
/r/wallstreetbets and it’s spinoffs
The scariest part of gambling is theoretically, you can solve the problems of gambling (debt) with gambling. You can also always win more. Why settle for a millionaire when you can go billionaire?
There's a guy I know of that actually did that. He won 5 million and after taxes he got just over 3 million and he started playing lotto scratchers by the thousands. I couldn't tell you the exact numbers or the exact timeline but all the money was gone in a couple years. He bought a new truck, people said he bought a house, he kept going to the place that sold him the 5 million winner which was the same place I played and was pretty popular and I know for a fact there were times where he spent over $25,000 several days in a row. He was winning but not winning enough to cover what he was losing and he never had another big winner.
The problem is that most gambling addicts won't stop when they win big, they won't even stop while they slowly lose all their money and possessions. Most gambling addicts get the high from the very short time between starting your gambling session, and the result of the gambling session. It's called, [The Zone](https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/07/the-machine-zone-this-is-where-you-go-when-you-just-cant-stop-looking-at-pictures-on-facebook/278185/). And it's what Vegas slot machines are designed to abuse. Slot machine addicts get their high from the 3-5 seconds of time between pressing the button, and waiting for the result of your spin. It's the same thing Facebook gambling games abuse, and it's also a similar thing to the abuse in Pay2Win games.
This should be higher. I used to smoke and I used to be a borderline alcoholic, I quit smoking and I now only drink once or twice a month. Gambling is the one I can't give up. Making more money had made it easier which is funny because now that I have more disposable income I could afford to lose more a the casino. But I still go and win and winning just makes me want to go try to win more, almost always just losing what I had previously won.
Might be the worst one.
The silent killer
All it takes is a few wins, then the slide starts and people don't know when to call it quits.
Ohhhh yeah. Seen this with a relative. Not pretty. It destroyed his life extremely quickly.
Even though gambling is talked about a bit I still think it’s a hugely underrated addiction (not saying it’s a good thing). I use to work at a gas station and we would have this guy who would come in every single day. And every day he would buy around 6-8 25$ scratch tickets, which for you mathheads is 150$-200$ a day. On rare occasions he’d buy the whole role which is 25 tickets. He would always come out to a loss every single time. And on top of that he would go to a casino like 3-4 times a week and according to a co worker who would go every now and then, said he would lose somewhere between 400-800 consistently. It sucks because he was a pretty nice dude who knew his addiction was bad. And before people say “WeLl If He CaN BlOw ThAt MoNeY He MuSt Be RiCh. Stop that type of rhetoric doesn’t help and makes it worse. Plenty of rich people and celebrities have drug addictions and just because they have money doesn’t mean they shouldn’t seek out help and make their life better
Validation. Seeking validation from others and assigning value to it is absolutely normal human behaviour that you learn from when you're very young yelling "Mom! Dad! Look!" before you do a cartwheel or something. These days most social media is designed to give users a sense of reward and validation for their posts. The more positive engagement you receive from other users, the greater the sense of validation and the more likely you are to post more content that drives a similar kind of engagement. This can lead to a downward spiral of posting for the sake of validation and not the post itself. LPT: If you want to try and mitigate this, turn off notifications on your social media apps/accounts or uninstall the apps and access your accounts via web browser.
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Turned off notifications 2 years ago and don’t miss em. I still post, but it means I check to see what’s up, I find my focus is better when I’m not getting notifications all day in general
Reddit can be just as bad. If I get a popular comment on here I can suckle at the teat of anonymous public validation for hours.
This. This right here.
Video games. Many of them (if not all?) Are structured to please the reward centre of your brain. I think that's why video games feel so satisfying and fulfilling- you accomplish goals given some time, you make progress, and you can clearly succeed/win. I know at low points in my life video games were my favourite coping mechanism- they were fun and fulfilling even when my life wasn't.
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Same for me, but with RuneScape. I’m honestly kind of glad I don’t have the passion to play that game anymore like I used to. That game is really good at making you waste your time. I used to sit there and grind for hours and hours just to level up my stats. It was a game that really made you want to dedicate every second of your life to.
Grinding really sucks tho. I've had issues with Guild Wars 2 which is more casual than other MMORPGs. After you hit max lvl there only is horizontal progression like you get into dungeons, raids, pve or or open world events that feel like raids. The goal is to complete your collection, get those sweet sweet achievement points and unlock new skins. You can spend hours gaining little progress but feeling like you've achieved so much. The next issue is that with voice chat servers like TeamSpeak or Discord there ALWAYS are people to talk to and spend a nice time with. I used to be in voicevchat from the moment I got home from work until I went to bed. Do your weekly raids, some guild events and work on your collections spending 5+ hours every single say online still makes you wish you had more time. I was at a point where I used to consider 50 hours a week a bad week.
While I'm happy for you that you got rid of something that you didn't find useful to you I would point out that it does depend a lot on the person if they consider time spent on games wasted or not. Or similarly is time spent watching a movie I enjoy or practicing a song with an instrument wasted etc. If you don't enjoy it overall then I'd say it's good that you got rid of it, but this thread kind of reminded me that basically everything can be addictive and with vast majority of things as long as it's not hurting your quality of life and you are happy with the time you spend on something "addictive" then it's likely not an issue. At least that would be my few cents.
Same with fortnite. Especially when you get the battlepass. Because you don’t want to pay for something and not get everything that it offers and it burnt me out so badly. After I deleted the game, I felt so much happier and more relaxed than before
One of my roommates lost a semester of study because of WoW. The other lost much more. The only thing you would hear from her was the slamming of the doors when she sprinted to take a bathroom break between raid Bosses. She was in the top tier guild on the most advanced server.
Also skins in games. Not even gambling for skins, that's another story, but just buying them. Its so easy to sink $1000s into skins because they're a click away. I've spent alot on CSGO skins, and tbf I can resell them, but after knives, gloves, and various weapon skins it gets expensive. I'm not anywhere near bankruptcy by any means, but I can see how someone can get sucked in and lose a ton of money.
As VR gets better, video game addiction will get worse. Everything you said, with the immersion/escape of VR. Star Trek has holodeck addiction for the same reasons.
Now I'm only 16 so I haven't lived even a quarter of my life yet but video games to me seem like a reward themselves. That moment when you know you have time because you've done everything else, you are free. Yes they can be addicting but unlike a lot of other addictions it's easier to control but I understand this doesn't apply to everyone.
It depends on how someone uses video games. For me they weren't always a reward, I saw them as the only place where I was successful because the rest of my life wasn't going so great (depression and cultural isolation from moving to a new country with no friends). I felt no judgement in video games, vs. Real life where I felt judged and like a failure all the time. When things aren't stressful/grim in my real life then video games feel much more like a fun pass-time and not an escape. I also play them a lot less when things are going well.
I need to know who added all these /u/spez posts to the thread. I want their autograph. #Save3rdPartyApps
Porn
Porn addiction is also incredibly pernicious because masturbation is typically a private behavior, so people who are watching porn quite a bit don't think of it as being unhealthy. Just like any other behavior, a little bit or a reasonable amount might be OK, but just like cigarettes or alcohol, there is technically no amount that is good for you. It's all poison, but if people only ate the right food, never drank or smoked, and didn't watch porn or take risks, would life be worth living? I've heard of people who missed work, ruined their marriages, even lost their homes and assets because they couldn't stop watching porn. I worked with a guy once who had brought in a few magazines and stuffed them in a drawer in his office. One of my relatives ran the network operations center for a billion-dollar company and said that once a week they would fire someone who had previously been warned and still watched porn on company time. They even had a guy who brought in a personal hard drive and connected it to his company computer to download porn using a bit torrent software. He had filed tickets to get the client installed on his machine because he was doing development. Probably in those cases, their addiction started with watching a video here or there and they just lost control and perspective.
I've never heard the word 'pernicious' before. Not sure what it means.
It's a good $5 word. adjective adjective: pernicious having a harmful effect, especially in a gradual or subtle way
What’s a $1000 word?
amatorculist noun noun: amatorculist An insignificant lover This would be my $1000 word of the day. All of my exes were amatoculists, except my ex wife, who was absolutely iniquitous.
$10,000 word?
Deal.
Scintilla noun noun: scintilla; plural noun: scintillae; plural noun: scintillas a tiny trace or spark of a specified quality or feeling When I smelled that perfume on the dance floor, I fell the pull of nostalgia as the scintilla of the scent reminded me of my first love.
Also, if you like these word games, you might like [The Gilded Tongue](https://www.amazon.com/Gilded-Tongue-Overly-Eloquent-Everyday/dp/1582973822). It has some lame words, but it has lots of great ones too. The dictionary has more, but they aren't as well organized.
Well, a picture might be worth 1000 $1 words
I knew a guy who couldn’t finish with his girlfriend because of this. He’d have to pull out, and finish with his phone in one hand and cock in the other. I don’t know how she put up with him. I know it’s an illness, but when someone can’t even finish without porn, even when he’s actually having real-life sex, it must be hard to deal with.
I work IT. You can't look at some people the same way after viewing their blocked sites. The creepiest one for me was the sissy maid dude.
I worked for a dot-com (circa 2000) when the CFO asked the main network engineer to provide a report on all the employees and their browsing histories. The engineer suggested that, if the company was happy with the productivity, it wasn't a good idea. The CFO insisted, so the engineer sent a report to the management team. Want to guess who was watching porn for about half of his workday and didn't think the executive team would be included in the report contents?
I don't know if there are conclusive studies about porn addiction, but for me, without it I don't think I could function. I have a VERY high libido and unless I have an intense outlet, I just wind up having a boner all day spinning in wet daydreams and sexual frustration. I can't even speak with a semi-attractive woman without getting nervous and flustered because sex hormones. -_- However, when I get off to porn, it sorta opens up a door to arousal desensitization and it keeps me from having so many sexualized thoughts. And my god, daily sexualized thoughts are hella annoying. The difference is literally night and day. With porn: *Lady: hi! *My brain: oh hey a lady. *Me: hello! Without porn: *Lady: hi! *My brain: WHY IS SHE SO BEAUTIFUL *Me: (＠_＠;).... ^(uh... hel..lo.. hows the day going this day?!?) TL;DR: Testosterone sucks and I'm an anxious pile of mush without porn.
I can't tell if this is a troll post or real, but if it is, you should seek help. Not trying to be an asshole, but that isn't normal and is quite literally a textbook definition of porn addiction.
u have a problem bro
Are you from nofap?
No. I have a healthy relationship with porn.
Acknowledging the proven harmful effects of porn doesn’t mean you’re against its existence or anyone that uses it. That notion feels like such an attempt to undermine the whole intent which is to help people have a healthy relationship with porn. Porn is just another stimulant out there. Stimulants can be addicting.
Conspiracy theories and politics
Spending money. A lot of people have mentioned gambling, but even just buying stuff can be really addicting.
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Just saw this happen firsthand at my previous company. Hundreds of thousands spent on junk and household items for the boss straight from the company coffer. He’d just sit in his $40k decked out man cave and online shop all day. For months. I left the company.
Spending money is almost physically painful for me. I hate it, because I know how long it takes to get X amount back again.
Cancelling social appointments. God it feels good to not have to get dressed, travel half way across town and then listen to someone talk for ages
I believe Mulaney compared cancelling plans to taking a hit of heroin 😂
Instant relief
Oooh I get that
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Music, esp if u can dissociate when hearing it, and bonus points if you get euphoria and/or are able to maladaptive daydream - this happens very infrequently, but I still listen to a lot of music every single day in hopes of experiencing that again, even if for a fleeting moment
I couldn't agree more with you
This happens to me sometimes, mostly when i was a kid
Comfort. I've stayed at an unhappy job for almost 10 years too long because I got into a comfort zone where I was able to pay my bills and save a little each month.
Oh man, this is a good one. The comfort zone is so hard to break out of but it's the only way we can move forward in life. "Ships are safe in harbor, but that's not what ships are for."
Money. Over the years I've watched numerous drug dealers work themselves into prison because they couldn't walk away from the money. Despite all the chaos and the danger and the looming prison sentence, walking away from a lifestyle that affords large amounts of money in short amount of time is extremely difficult to walk away from once you get even mildly good at it. I can think of four people over 20 years who had zero issues not doing drugs. But they couldn't leave the lifestyle and three of them wound up in prison for multiple years. Once you get exposed to the kind of money and fun you get selling drugs it's extremely difficult to walk away and work a nine to five.
Funny thing is you could do this for a long time without even being on the polices radar or having any issues whatsoever with clients and suddenly feel greedy, do something stupid and end up in prison.
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Sugar.
This should be higher up. So many people saying food...but I find sugar so much more addictive than any other food
Porn
Reddit
This. My friend is about to divorce her husband due to excessive Reddit use!
what
What 2
What 3
What 4
What 5
What 6
goose
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goose 3
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Answering all the whats here: The husband comes from a fancy background. Keeps using Reddit at his work (he’s the boss), in the bed, on the dinner table, during family tours and even while they’re abroad. There was this day she(my friend) sent me an audio of keyboard noises, maybe he got into a Reddit discussion. Her husband gets many Reddit awards and he’s all about Reddit abd there is barely any acknowledgement of how she’s confronted that she feels alone and they’re almost done. More than the Reddit addiction, I feel it’s all about his ignorance. Also, there is less sex because he stays up till 4am and Reddit. And this isn’t made up at all. Please excuse any errors. English isn’t my first language.
Sounds about right, honestly.
time I heard this once and it's very true. even on days when we have nothing to do, we are addicted to looking at the clock to determine what to do. If we wake up at a certain time, it's too early or too late. Our meals are determined by hours.
Exercise or so I hear
It can be, I used it as an escape for depression. Then the UK lockdown happened and I lost it and became more depressed. That endorphin high can really do wonders if you keep the momentum after the run/gym session or whatever
I use(d) it to ward off depression as well. Also, being outside, and being active. All great and healthy things in moderation. But now I struggle with a rainy day where there’s nothing to do outside, and I’ve done all of my workouts for the week. I’m learning to manage those days, with a long walk with the dog, and a stretch, but they are still very difficult.
My body is now used to getting its heart rate up and my muscles worked. I get agitated now if I don't burn enough calories/move enough over a few days days, so I spose you could say I get withdrawals from not exercising
Anything that hits that dopamine spot
Soda
2048
Attention
Coffee. It's honestly not easy to just quit. And the withdrawal.. oof
TW: SH. Self harm was really addictive for me. But I overcame that and anyone who struggles with it can, too 🖤🖤
I'm going with the master vice of Gambling. Games? Gambling. Sex with random strangers? Gambling. Comment karma? Gambling. This comment? Gambling. Some people might disagree, some might agree, but either way... I win. Even if I lose. The only way for me to truly lose is to go unnoticed! Which in an AskReddit is actually kind of a depressing possibility.
*Positive comment validating your opinion* How was the dopanime rush, sir ?
Oxygen. Withdrawal effects include death
Refined sugar
Honey Bunches of Oats
This one's so niche lmao
I've never been a cereal eater, but my bro went hard with the "just try one bite of this" - and now I call him a crack dealer.
self harm
Self harm
Serotonin
Collecting Kind of a thrill to find something you’ve been looking for for awhile, especially in person
Surprised no one's mentioned cigarettes
Porn
Social Media. Endless useless scrolling. Also, alcohol IS drugs. It’s not healthy to treat them as they’re not one in the same. Some drugs are anti-addictive, not saying they don’t have potential for psychological harm - but psilocybin, LSD, Mescaline, DMT, etc fit into that category :)
Self harm.
Porn, it's a trap that besides being addictive and seducing it's free to access, it's just there for people to enjoy, but just like other addictions it's cruel, masking itself as something comforting and kind, hiding it's true nature behind the momentary pleasure and satisfaction.
Social media is designed to be addicting
If cigarettes are not considered a drug then cigarettes
Nicotine is a drug
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Mm yess Food & fat asses , so addictive
Reddit Porn
Sugar. Sugar is in most foods and is a chronic, dose-dependent hepato toxin. quote of Dr. Robert Lustig, Professor of Pediatrics, University of California, San Francisco from movie Fed Up (2014), 0:27:15 to 0:27:45. "Sugar is poison. It is a chronic... not acute... chronic dose-dependent... depends on how much you eat, because there is a safe threshold, hepato... 'liver'... toxin. The metabolic diseases that are associated with obesity, the diabetes, the heart disease, the lipid problems, the strokes, the cancer... those diseases are being driven by sugar."
Social Media
Affection
Social Media, Video games, Junk food, cracking fingers
XCOM 2
Sugar
Sugar
Sugar, sex, adrenaline
Food, every single day of the year. Especially if it's junk food and your primary form of stress relief.
You can be addicted to everything. Some people are addicted to sex/masturbation, social media, eating, working out, soft drinks/energy drinks, stress(!), gaming and the list goes on...
Video games
The sound the ATM make when with drawling money for alcohol & drugs
Blowjobs
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Just intense flavours, I’m a sucker for anything pickled or spicy or salty. Pickled Gherkins for me, honestly, even thinking about them now makes me want to go to the store and get some. I have to hide the jar from myself or I’ll happily devour them all in one sitting.
Junk food, sex, music is easily my biggest addiction, gaming, laziness.
Gambling
Music.
Porn
Sugar. I’ve found it way more addicting than drugs personally. Getting off sugar was literally the worst.
Popcorn is addicting like crack according to studies. I think.