What is Addiction? 

Eating is a pleasurable expierience for us all.  That is because when we eat, as well as with other tasks vital to our survival, certain chemicals are released in the brain which make us feel good.  These chemicals are meant to reinforce the behavior so that we remain healthy.  Drugs, such as meth, cocaine and heroin also cause these same chemicals to spill out into the brain.  However, rather than reinforcing the behavior to make us healthly, they reinforce behavior which gets us hooked on life controlling substances.  Eventually, the pleasure chemicals in the brain begin to wear thin and more and more drugs are needed to achieve the same amount of pleasure.  This is addiction, when one must have drugs in order to feel any kind of pleasure and eventually, to keep from feeling pain. 

The Mayo Clinic Defines Addiction as: 

Needing a drug everyday, perhaps even many times in a day 

Having to maintain a supply of the drug

Not being able to quit using the drug

Going to extreme lengths to attain the drug

Needing the drug in order to deal with difficulties in your life

Teens and Addiction:

Adolescents are at an even greater risk of becoming addicted to a drug.  This is because the higher order processesing of a human brain is not fully developed until the mid 20's .  Therefore, adolescents are more likely to engage in risk taking behaviors and to not control their impulses as carefully.  Also, changes in the chemicals in an adolescent's brain, make him or her more emotional and more stressed, also, researchers say, the adolescent is less responsive to rewards.  This makes the adolescents more likely to engage in drug or alcohol abuse, simply to feel good. 

Thankfully, Teen Challenge can help to change all of this.  With time and effort, and by the grace of God, adolescents can break free from their addictions and have a new life...experiencing the real pleasures that the Lord has to offer and the true joy that can only come from Him!