How Easy Is It to Develop a Drug Addiction

How Easy Is It to Develop a Drug Addiction Addiction Drug Use Print How Easy Is It to Develop a Drug Addiction? By Buddy T facebook twitter Buddy T is an anonymous writer and founding member of the Online Al-Anon Outreach Committee with decades of experience writing about alcoholism. Learn about our editorial policy Buddy T Medically reviewed by Medically reviewed by Steven Gans, MD on August 05, 2016 Steven Gans, MD is board-certified in psychiatry and is an active supervisor, teacher, and mentor at Massachusetts General Hospital. Learn about our Medical Review Board Steven Gans, MD Updated on June 12, 2019 More in Addiction Drug Use Cocaine Heroin Marijuana Meth Ecstasy/MDMA Hallucinogens Opioids Prescription Medications Alcohol Use Addictive Behaviors Nicotine Use Coping and Recovery There are a lot of factors that may make you more susceptible to one drug over another. Everyone is different and there are too many factors to give anyone an easy answer as to how easy it is to get hooked on drugs. Varying factors can include the biological make-up of your body, how sensitive you may be to a certain drug and the chemical make-up of the drug itself. Some people might be able to use a drug many times without suffering any ill effects, while another person might take the same drug and have a bad reaction or even overdose the  first time they use it. Likewise, you can become addicted to a drug the first time you try it, while another person might never form an addiction at all. Some Drugs Are More Addictive Than Others Just as there are vast differences between the people doing drugs, there are also big differences between the types of drugs out there. For example, you may use  powdered cocaine  and never become addicted to it, but if you were to sample crack cocaine or heroin, you might get addicted the first time you try it. Tolerance Is a Key Symptom of Addiction Sometimes an addiction can sneak up on you slowly and insidiously. As you continue to use a drug, you can slowly build up a tolerance to it, which means that you no longer get the same feeling or high that you once got by taking a small amount. Once your tolerance begins to build, you might increase the dose or frequency of taking the drug. You are trying to get that same high that you felt in the beginning when your body was not used to the drug. As you continue to build tolerance, you end up taking more of the drug. Your body becomes chemically dependent on the drug. Which means, you discover that you need to take the drug just to feel normal or leveled out. Changing the Brains Reward System Drug addiction is considered a brain disease because drugs change the brainâ€"they change its structure and how it works. These brain changes can be long-lasting and can lead to harmful behaviors. Brain imaging studies of people with addiction show physical changes in areas of the brain that are critical to judgment, decision-making, learning and memory, and behavior control. Research tells us that repeated use of a drug actually begins to make chemical changes in the brain that alters the brains reward system. When someone continues to use a substance even when it no longer provides pleasure, its called the pathological pursuit of rewards, or addiction. Usually, it takes some time for a drug to begin to change the brains reward system to the point that a person forms an addiction, but some drugs can do so very quickly. A Word From Verywell Drugs can potentially have life-threatening consequences, and individuals can have very different reactions to the same drug. If you are particularly sensitive to the effects of a certain drug, trying it even once could potentially be dangerous. The 9 Best Online Therapy Programs