The idea of trying something different, more ‘intense’, looks quite appealing to the animal brain. Usually, this happens as the addict begins hanging around people who drink or use the way they do, i.e. more than their old friends. These same people are the ones who will introduce them to new drugs, usually when the addict is drunk or high and their inhibitions are low. Even if they decline the first time a drug is offered, chances are that the animal brain will decide to give it a whirl when asked in the future. Remember, addiction attacks the brain above all other organs. This means the organ that tells your loved one how to think, feel and act does not work correctly. The brain of the person you care about has been hijacked. The person you love is no longer there. With the limbic system in charge, the addiction has free reign to steadily progress; free reign to destroy organs like the brain, liver, heart, and pancreas. It has free reign to cause malnutrition and diseases like cancer, AIDS, and hepatitis, just to name a few. Once activated, the disease can only get worse, destroying lives along the way, until the person afflicted by it is helped into recovery, or dies from it. There are no alternatives. Once the disease process is activated, deciding whether or not to use a drug is no longer an option for the addict acting on his own. While drug use was once an activity to bring about pleasure, at some point, the progression of the disease and the discomfort of withdrawal has made drug use about avoiding pain. Additionally, brain imaging studies have shown that addiction severely alters brain areas critical to decision-making, learning, memory, and behavior control. The portion of the brain most severely affected by alcohol and other drugs are the frontal lobes in the Cerebral Cortex. When over stimulated by drugs, the dopamine system in the frontal lobe of the Cerebral Cortex begins to shut down, leaving the Limbic System/animal brain in charge In the illogical universe of an addict, one plus one does not always equal two
