On the 7th of October, Carol came in to talk to the TYs about addiction. She first asked the TYs to think about what three words came into their minds when they thought about addiction. “Drugs, Alcohol, Money Addiction" were some of the first words that the students thought of. After that, the woman started talking about choice.
She asked the TYs if they thought that once people were addicted to something, if they had the choice to abstain from it. The TYs had mixed opinions on that matter and some said that people had the choice, some said not and some said they had the choice at first. The woman told the TYs that people don’t have the choice to abstain. She taught them that when people get addicted to something, they get an enormous amount of dopamine which makes them high or gives them a buzz. This in turn keeps people from abstaining from whatever it is that they are addicted to and it also makes them do it over and over again. But over time, the amount of dopamine produced and received decreases and people get more tolerance. To experience the same buzz, they up the dosage which gives them a new high. The TYs learnt all of this in the talk and they also learnt to be supportive and kind to those who were addicted to something as most often, they did not have a choice.
TYs learnt a lot about addiction that day and how it was a psychological disease that needs time to be treated. The students learnt about tolerance, the dopamine that is produced when people are high and how most people only resorted to drugs because of childhood trauma or a hard time in life. Because of the talk, many TYs were now aware of the reason people tried drugs(peer pressure, trauma) and why it was so hard to stop. TYs really appreciated the opportunity to learn more about addiction as it is a heavy part of most people’s lives. The TYs really enjoyed the talk and can’t wait for the next one!