Have You Crossed A Line?

 Nobody plans to become addicted—it’s more like you casually wade in and suddenly can’t touch the bottom. In this episode, I break down how that invisible line gets crossed and why if you’re negotiating with yourself, you’re probably already in deeper water than you think. Stay with me—I’ll help you spot it early. 

Transcript

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It's time again for Doc Shock, your Addiction Lifeguard Podcast. I am Dr. Jacques Deep Burkert, a psychologist, licensed professional counselor, and addiction specialist. If you are suffering from addiction, misery, trauma, whatever it is, I'm here to help. If you're in search of help to try to get your life back together, join me here at Doc Shock, Your Addiction Life Guard, the Addiction Recovery Podcast. I wanted to be real clear about what this podcast is intended for. It is intended for entertainment and informational purposes, but not considered help. If you actually need real help and you're in need of help, please seek that out. If you're in dire need of help, you can go to your nearest emergency room or you can check into a rehab center or call a counselor like me and talk about your problems and work through them. But don't rely on a podcast to be that form of help. It's not. It's just a podcast. It's for entertainment and information only. So let's keep it in that light, alright? Have a good time, learn something, and then get the real help that you need from a professional. When did you exactly cross the line? When did you start using and then you went into abuse or addiction? Uh, you know, most people don't wake up one day and say, today I'm gonna become an addict or I'm gonna be addicted. So how does it happen? Well, that's what we're gonna talk about today. Addiction is not a moment, it's a shift. A line that gets crossed kind of quietly and gradually, sometimes invisibly. You don't even realize it's happening, but it's a shift. So it's kind of like when you walk into a body of water you can't see below the surface, you don't feel the drop off until suddenly you just can't touch the bottom. And that's kind of how it happens. You know you're in the water, but you never know when you're gonna cross that line. You're gonna shift and drift into it suddenly. So that's the topic for today. When did you cross that line or how did you cross that line? So think of it as it's about risk, it's not just about behavior. Uh it's not just how much you use, but it's what it's doing to your life. You know, we talk about the consequences all the time, and that's how we know that we are an addict, is when we have crossed that that line, that there's been that shift, and it started to uh it's started to really change your life. I heard uh Sammy Hager on a small clip, or he's inter he was uh interviewing Joe Walsh, and he he said, you know, hey man, how did how did you get sober? Because Joe Walsh was notorious for being an alcoholic, and he was for a long time. During his time with the Eagles, there was a lot of drinking in that band, but he really got hardcore, and he was really a hardcore addict for about 30 years. And he said, very wise words, he said, you know, in that Joe Walsh voice, if you've ever heard him talk, he's got this very characteristic voice, and he says, you know, uh it's it's it's not about uh anything other than you got to control your addiction. Because if you don't control your addiction, it's gonna control you. And I was like, that's that's pretty wise, that's pretty smart. Um, so it is really about what it's doing to your life more than how much you're using or when or all that. So the question is, is it that bad? That's the question that is uh gets asked. Um, is it that bad? You know, it it's always bad. So that's kind of an irrelevant question. The question is, is this costing me something? Is there some price I'm gonna pay? I tell people all the time when I'm trying to explain addiction, um it's you you really start to realize that you're losing stuff. And so when you want to try to get sober, what's happening is you're starting to understand that you're about to lose something or you have lost something that you didn't want to lose. So the idea of like, what is this doing? It's making you not be able to operate like you want to. So it's function versus dysfunction. Uh can you can you function? Or are you dysfunctional all the time? Choice versus compulsion. I can't stop. I want to, I think I do, I can do it for a couple of days, and then you realize you can't. So it's choice versus compulsion. And those are the the ideas that I want you to hang on to as I'm going through what I'm about to talk about. The first thing is the early warning signs when when that line starts to move, it starts shifting. So the l the line doesn't move all at once. It's not like one day you wake up and you're like, oh, like I said, oh, I'm an addict. You know, it's that's that's not how it happens. It's a slow drift, it drifts away. You know, you what you accepted yesterday or two weeks ago or three months ago as being not okay, suddenly you're doing it. And you don't even realize you're doing it. So some basic ideas here about what to pay attention to when you're seeing these early warning signs in your usage. You're using more than you intended, using more often than you intended. Um did you did you did you go from I drink once a week or once every two weeks to I drink every weekend to it's starting to creep into um the weekdays? I drank to blackout. Uh I didn't really intend on doing that. Once I started, I couldn't stop, so then I drank too much. I hear that all the time. Thinking about it when you're not using. So if you're if you're thinking about it, you're plotting and scheming about when you can get off work. Uh I've, you know, people who are at work, are they they going into the bathroom and using when they think nobody's really paying attention? Are you thinking about doing that? Are you thinking about when you're gonna pick up your drug of choice, who you gotta call, how you're gonna get there? Um are you are you using it to change your mood? Are you stressed? Do you have a lot of anxiety? Are you bored? Are you happy? Are are you using to change your mood? Some people aren't comfortable being happy, believe it or not. Um, that can be a trigger. So you're trying to change your mood. Do you notice that you've had an increased tolerance? Uh you see that a lot with uh THC and alcohol. Uh you need you need an incredible amount. Then there comes a point, especially with alcohol, there comes a point where you realize that you don't need that much anymore to get the same drunk feeling. Well, that's because your BAC level is never dropping below 0.15 or 0.10, and it doesn't take much to go beyond that. A couple of drinks, and you're really plowed. Uh THC is the same thing. You just have this increased tolerance. We see that uh with other drugs too cocaine, crystal meth. You need more of it because your tolerance is just building up and building up. Here's one of my favorites minimizing or justifying behavior. It's not your problem that I didn't show up. It's not a big deal. That's your problem because you're so overly concerned about it, or something like that. Uh, that's that's a pretty common thing. Um not my problem, your problem. No, it is your problem. What are you talking about? It is very definitely your problem. Uh minimizing, but the other one is justifying. Hey, I had to do it because I was on the business trip and everybody was drinking, and so I felt out of place if I wasn't drinking, all that kind of nonsense. It's like, wow, okay, hold on. That's that's justifying. Um, okay. When you're listening when you're negotiating with yourself, something has already shifted. I can do it this one time, it's not gonna be a big deal. I'll only drink once or twice tonight. You know, a little bump is not gonna be a big deal. Um and you're negotiating, you know, you which is fine if you can actually keep to your end of the bargain, which you never can, and you know that. So you start negotiating with your with yourself, something has already started to shift and it's bad. When does it when does it become abuse? Well, there's a clear transition point when consequences begin. It's pretty simple. Abuse, think about the term of the the meaning of the of the word abuse. Abuse. I'm abusing something. There are people, uh let's just stick with alcohol for a second. There are people that can have a drink. They can have a drink and they can walk away from it. I've been in the presence of people who actually can't even finish the drink. And to me, that was always bizarre. How can you not finish this drink? What do you mean? So they just keep drinking. The ones who can't stop, they just keep drinking. Those people who can stop, they don't have a problem. They're quote unquote normal. They're the ones I call civilians. They just do not get it. They don't get how people could drink and drink and drink and not stop. Just like the people who drink and drink and drink and can't stop, they can't understand why that person only drinks half a drink and walks away. It makes no sense. So the the transition when it when it becomes abuse is there's a clear transition point when consequences begin. So the markers of that, negative consequences, relationships, work, health, money, housing, you know, the bigger, bigger impactful consequences. Um I I have sent people, many, many people, many of my clients through rehabs. And it's funny, when they do their intake, uh if they're doing the intake and they're sitting there in front of a clinician who's asking them questions, trying to help determine if they actually do have addiction issues, and the person will deny any consequences. So they say, Yeah, I I I drink, but have you had any consequences? No. So you've you know, there's nothing, there's no relationship issues or money issues or anything. No, no. And then they get denied the uh the coverage to get into rehab because there are no consequences. Well, they're lying. And so sometimes what happens is I'll get a phone call from that treatment center because they know that I've sent the person there, and they say, hey, you know what? We can't admit your client because they're denying all any consequences. I said, Really, that's interesting. Because uh two months ago they just got divorced because the spouse was sick of the uh abusive addiction behavior, and um they had a DUI, and so you know, or maybe they got fired or whatever, and they're like, Oh, really? Well, the your your client didn't didn't uh didn't say that. I said, Well, put them on the phone, let me talk to them. You know, shame of saying it out loud is is a problem, and so when you experience these negative consequences, it can be very troubling uh in your relationships. You lose relationships, you lose, you get fired, you're you're you got pancreatitis, or maybe you overdosed, um, you can't, you know, you just feel horrible. So that's one of the markers of when it's becoming abuse. Continued use despite those consequences of those negative that negative impact. You just keep using. That's a good sign. Secrecy. Oh man, secrecy, hiding stuff. Like my catchphrase that isolation is addiction's best friend, uh, is is very true. And so you start to become very secret. I you know, I was very secretive. I I I rarely drank in in uh front of people. If I did, it was maybe one or two people that I knew wouldn't say anything to me about it. But typically my drinking was in isolation, and that is true with almost all of my clients. Yeah, they'll they'll use, but not to the point where it's destructive um to the relationship, and then they'll finish that interaction with the person, so they'll leave the party or they'll leave the you know, whatever situation they're in front of the person, and then they go home and then they really start drinking. Uh same thing with with THC or anything else, like secrecy, hiding the evidence, hiding the bottles, hiding the needles, hiding the drugs. When it's found, denying that it's yours, whatever. Um, you know, many times when people uh with alcohol, the the loved ones will um sneak around and and look and see what's going on, and they'll find bottles that are empty. And I don't know what it is about alcoholism that makes you hide the bottles in pla you know, instead of throwing them away. Maybe you don't want the the trash man to know that you're an alcoholic or something, I guess. But they'll hide them. So you got bottles of vodka just stashed away in places, and you get enough of those. Like I there was one client that they went through the house and they found 40 bottles of vodka, handles of vodka, that this person refused to just take to a public trash can and dump it. They just left it in the house. 40. And I was like, oh my gosh. Well, so the secrecy starts creeping in. That's what abuse is happening. Rationalization increases, so you're just rationalizing either, you know, the fact that you're using or that it's not that big of a deal, or that, you know, it's it's not that often. Um, hey, it's part of my job because I have to have I have to go to these meetings and it's there's always drinking, I don't want to be singled out, it's not that bad, you know, stuff like that. But lastly, others start noticing before you do. I cannot tell you how often people come to my office who are loved ones of addicts, and I ask them, okay, so do you think this person knows? And they say, Well, I've been telling them for the last year, I've been telling them for the last several months. I've you know, I tell them, I tell them, I tell them, people are gonna come to you. People came to me and said, Hey man, why are you drinking yourself to death? Why are you trying to kill yourself by you know drinking? And I I just ignored that. Um, because you know, we go back to the secrecy and then the the uh rationalization, you know. Um that's what happens. So listen, when the warning lights are on, if you're in your car and the warning lights are on, you you're just putting tape over the warning light. If you just are in that denial stage, you're not the warning light doesn't go off, you just can't see it anymore because you put a piece of black tape over the warning light. Listen, you're gonna kill your car that way. So um what are you what are you supposed to do? Control is no longer in the driver's seat. What is happening? Addiction. Addiction has started kicking in, like addiction, dependency. Defining l let me define addiction for you. Um it's real clear and there's a clinical criteria for it, and we have testing for it, so we you know, we can ask you a series of questions. Uh there's an assessment test, there's actually multiple assessment tests, but it it comes down to what is addiction? Addiction is loss of control, craving, compulsions, continued use despite harm, an ever increasing amount to get the same high. Uh withdrawal when you stop. And reuse those to define addiction. You you we find those you know, it's yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. And and usually with addiction, unless the person is, you know, all in that shame-based, arrogant uh secrecy thing that can overtake you, that loss of control, the craving compulsion, continued use despite harm, ever increasing need to uh ever increasing amount to to uh get the high, and then the withdrawal when you're stopping, you you can deny it, but you know it's happening. So it's it's not that you don't care, it's that you can't stop. And that's what a lot of people who I don't know if anybody's listening to this today who's um a loved one of an addict, but you know, addicts can come across as being very arrogant, um and and the arrogance is a weapon that is used to keep everybody at bay. And it's trust me, it's not that they don't care about their appearance, their physical condition, their emotional state, the consequences of what's going on, it's that they they can't stop. Um I heard somebody explain it in a way that was was pretty clear as to what it's like when you're trying to explain it to the citizens, the the not the professionals like uh us addicts. It's like this you can present somebody with an idea very clearly, you can explain it very clearly, hey man, you your usage is going to um is gonna be have very negative consequences for you, man. You you you're using, you're not healthy, you're gonna you it's gonna kill you, and you're starting to lose everything. Or you could stop using and you could, you know, get sober and clean, you could get healthy and feel better and have relationships and you'll be employable and you'll have money, you'll get out of debt, you you won't go to you won't go to court, you won't go to jail. All you gotta do is just get sober. And we can help you do that, but it's like this is what it is. And so they're presented with these two con these two situations. The addict will listen to it and go, Yeah, let me get back to you on that. And it's like, are you kidding me? Yeah, no, I'll just get back to you on that. And that's what addiction does. It tells the brain is telling them, uh, not a big deal, just get high. So it's not that they you they don't care. They do. It's just that they they don't know how to stop, they can't stop. Maybe they've tried stopping or whatever, maybe you've tried to stop several times, multiple times, ten times, fifty times, whatever, and you just can't. That's that's fine. But that's what happens. So the the the part of the brain that gets hijacked is the reward system. And it's it's it's funny because it it the survival wiring gets misdirected. So survival instinct, I'm gonna survive this, I need to survive this, that gets redirected or misdirected, and then the reward system gets hijacked in that process, and it you're just really into that cycle of denial, no matter what. So at that point, addiction is kicked in. There's a psychological shift that occurs too. Um, a lot of people miss it. Uh denial is funny, it's like denial, deny, deny, deny. Denial isn't stupidity, but what it is is a very devious way to protect. This is what addiction tells you to do. It's like deny it because that's protection. So I didn't do that. It's kind of like somebody who falls down and gets up real quick and they're embarrassed, and so they say, I well, what happened? Oh, I don't know. I I don't know, I heard a noise. What'd you hear? It's like, no, you hit the ground. What's that blood on your forehead? Uh oh, I don't know. I must have caught myself shaving. You know, it we we we we want to protect ourselves, whether it's ego or identity or whatever, you know, position, denial. Have and and that's if if you've ever dealt with anybody who has addiction, you hear that denial and you think it's crazy that you're denying this, but it's not stupidity, it's protection. The gradual progression turns into normalization. So you're just gradually progressing in your addiction and you're accepting it psychologically. So you normalize it and you find a way to figure out how to make the usage normal. And they it and understand the usage that you're doing is increasing, so right? So you you have to renormalize whatever's going on. So the person is starting to lose a lot of weight because they're not eating, they're not eating because they're using their drug of choice instead. So they start losing massive amounts of weight, and in your brain, you're saying, oh that uh no, it's fine. That's this is normal. And and so you you ignore it. Uh you ignore how you look. You look in the mirror and you don't even recognize who you're seeing. You just kind of gradually normalize that. The identity conflict that happens i i is when you're being confronted with it and you see it in the mirror, it's like, yeah, but I'm not that kind of person. Really? No, you are. This is what it is. This is what addiction there's, but you have to accept this normalization thing. So you become accepting of the person who has this dysfunction. The comparison. This happens all the time when people go to meetings. I hear it every time somebody goes to uh meetings, N-A-A-A, M A, whatever. Well, at least I'm not as bad as, and they point to the worst person in the room, and then they use that as the excuse to get out of continuing to get into recovery because they're not as bad as that person. See, if I was as bad as that person, and there's always somebody, almost every time, there's always somebody in the meeting who's worse than you are. So you can always find somebody to say, I'm not as bad as that person. I even heard somebody one time say, you know, uh, there was a guy in the meetings and he was going there and I met him last week, and guess what? You know, he uh he actually died. He uh he overdosed. At least I'm not as bad as that. I'm like, that's a pretty low bar to set, honestly. Um, that was my answer to that person that was in my office. I'm like, that's a very low bar to set. At least you're not dead. That's wow. Uh so I want you to think about this. Addiction doesn't announce itself, it disguises itself. Addiction is the enemy that's coming after you, and it doesn't come as a big like pitchfork holding horns on the head, bright red, like they talk about like a Satan that you know, very scary. You know, it's coming at you. Ugh. You know, that's not no, no, that would be announcing itself. It disguises itself as comfort and care and a way to soothe. And it's control, it's your personality. See, when you drink and you are in front of people, it loosens you up. That's right, this is that's the disguise. That's a lie. Um, that's not what it's doing. So when you're trying to figure out like, what what what what am I what do I what do I have to do? This what how how do I what do I do if this is what's happening, right? Honest questions, like a self-assessment. Listen, I want you to ask yourself, have you ever tried to cut back and you couldn't? And I'm when I say cut back, I mean like seriously cut back. So if you're drinking and you're and you're drunk like multiple times a week, have you ever tried just having one drink for like that day and then one drink the next day, and then not drink the next day, and then not drink the next day, and then have one drink. Have you ever tried that? But you couldn't do it, like you made it one day. Um, sober October. Oh boy. Uh they might as well just pair that up with drunk November because yeah, they get through November, but then they just go pounding, and it's almost like they gotta make up for the fact that they didn't drink in October. Um, so that's one question. Have you ever tried to cut back and you couldn't do it? Do you use to cope instead of deal? Is that your coping mechanism? Is that what you have to turn to? It certainly was for me. Um that was my coping mechanism. That was my only coping mechanism. I could I could I just I couldn't deal with what was going on in my life at the time. And so that was it. So do you use to cope? Or are you capable of dealing? Has anyone expressed concern to you? Has anybody taken you aside and said, hey man, I'm really worried about you. Hey man, why are you trying to drink yourself to death? Hey man, listen, I love you to death, but you're scaring me, and I'm very, very concerned. Have you anybody ever come up to you and said that? Ever? Because if you're healthy and you're fine and you're not using in excess, no one's ever gonna ask you that about usage. They might be concerned because, hey man, you're working a lot, but they're not gonna be expressing concern because you you have got this addiction thing going. No, they're not. Here's a question for you. Are you hiding or minimizing or lying to cover the usage? Have you ever done that? Is this taking more than it's giving? So my usage is taking away from my life. We all have experienced watching movies where somebody has some loss and they're like, ah, I need a drink. You know, especially if you're watching movies from the 20s, uh, not the 20s, the 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s, even into the 70s. Hey, I geez, man, I need a drink. It was like, it was like in almost every movie. Um, that's that was done. That's not what I'm talking about. You can have a drink, fine. That's your thing, okay, fine. But is that drink leading to 10 more? And now you're you now you're talking to a therapist about the fact that your your husband or wife or whoever is like gonna leave, or your kids not talking to you? Have you been on some kind of a performance improvement plan at work because your work was falling off, and it's because you always come to work and you're either drunk or hungover and they're sick of it, and they're trying to figure out how to get rid of you? Is it taking away from you? That's a tough one. So not everyone hits bottom the same way, and that's that's something that um you have to realize it doesn't look the same. If you sit in the rooms and you listen to people and the presenters talking, and they're talking about hitting bottom, it doesn't always hit the same way. Your bottom might be different than the next person, but you have to understand while many times we talk about this all the time in recovery. You know, my bottom, it had a basement, then there was a sub-basement, then there was a parking garage under it, and you just keep bouncing through to bottom, bottom, bottom. Yeah, that's true. But there are categories that um can define those bottoms. So, like I said before, your health, your freedom, your relationships, your finances, have you lost purpose? You know, those those let's just stick with those five things. Your health. Has a doctor been telling you you gotta stop, or you know, is your health declining in any way that's noticeable? Your freedom. Freedom. By freedom, I mean, are you going to have to serve time? Do you have to go to jail for 30 days, 60 days, 90 days, 120 days? You lost your freedom. Why? Because you were caught driving while you were drunk, or you had a possession charge. I've had people that have served two years, I've had people who have served 15 years, I've had people that have served 25 years. They're coming into my office to get free from that. But did you did they lose their freedom? Yeah, absolutely. Every single one of them was some kind of a drug or alcohol-related charge. Are you losing relationships? People just not wanting to deal with you anymore? They're sick of it. So you're not asked to parties, you're not asked to family events, you're told to leave. Are you losing friendships? Are you losing uh romantic relationships? Are you broke because you keep losing jobs? Is that happening? Have you lost the sense of purpose? Did you lose your purpose? Is the getting high and drunk the only purpose you have left? You don't have to lose everything to recognize that you have a problem, but you might lose something. And like I said, what happens usually is you lose or are about to lose the one thing you did not want to lose. So hopefully, if that's where you've gotten, there's a turning point. That's that moment of clarity. Honesty is the doorway. If you understand the truth, the truth will set you free. There's some scripture that I'm taking out of context, but it's true. If you're honest, that's the doorway into the freedom. It's not the freedom, it will set you free. Like honesty will set you free. The truth, this is what we're saying about Jesus being uh the Lord and God, but and you accepting that, right? But it's like that's not what I'm talking about. What I'm talking about is if you understand the truth, the truth will set you free, but it's your job to then go through the door to get to freedom. Surrender versus control. Surrender looks very different than control. And I'm sure that when you first try and started trying to get sober or clean, you were trying to control your addiction. And like Joe Waltz said, you either control your addiction or it controls you. But in order for you to control your addiction, you have to surrender to the fact that you are an addict. So there's an importance that you exercise humility and be able to accept that humility within yourself. And that's where the tool, arrogance, that the enemy, addiction, gives you to try to slay it, right? Keep you from being humble, having humility that I am a I have a flaw. And the the moment you tell the truth, that's the moment the recovery becomes possible. And until then, not gonna happen. So, what do you do if you recognize that that line has been crossed? You've shifted, it's drifted, it's you know, it's it and you're over the line. There's a very important uh action. There's several actions you gotta take. And I talk about this at the closing of every episode. You gotta talk to somebody, get out of isolation. It is the single most important thing you can do. If you do nothing else, take the free route of stepping into the rooms, go to a meeting and keep going to those meetings, get out of isolation. The whole, the two real valuable things about NA, AA, MA, all the all the A's is you're out of isolation and you're in the recovery community. And the second thing is you're working a program with a sponsor where you're working the steps. Those, I believe, are the two most important things about the AAs or the NA's or the MAs. Get out of isolation and work with the sponsor to work through the 12 steps. Here's another one. Get a if you think you have possibly might have an addiction, go get a professional assessment. Talk to somebody like me who can administer an assessment test and can say conclusively to you, yeah, you have an addiction problem, you have an abuse problem. There's an importance in trying to get into some kind of a level of care, therapy or outpatient treatment or residential treatment, but you cannot get clean and sober yourself. You're not going to do it by yourself, you're not going to do it in isolation. I don't care how you think you are strong enough to do it, you're not going to do it. Trust me. You got to remove access from your drug of choice. You got to get it out of the house. I have these conversations with my clients. Like, I've got this incredible wine collection, and they're an alcoholic. And I'm like, okay, well, you have two choices. You can either continue to be an alcoholic or you can just give away or sell all of the wine that you have. It's great that you are a wine connoisseur, but guess what? That's your drug of choice. Get rid of it. And I have to sometimes negotiate with people on that one because they don't want to do that. It removes their identity. They've attached that much meaning to it. But you got to get rid of the access. Maybe you got to get rid of friends. And I've said this in many podcasts in the past. The way that I deal with people who have drug addiction issues is I tell them, I want you to get your phone out, give me the name of every single person that is associated with usage for you. The friends or the dealers, the people that want you to get high with them, the parties. I want you to give me all their names. And they and I write them down. I say, okay, I want you to open up your phone, and you're going to say goodbye to those people today. Open up your phone, open up your contacts. I want you to go in there. I want you to block all of their numbers. Okay. Then I want you to go in and delete all of their contact information. Block it first, then delete it. Then we go into their text messaging and I say, okay, tag those people, and I want you to delete all the text messages from those people. That way you can't read them, you can't get access to that person. They can't get access to you because you blocked them and you deleted them, so they're gone. And then we start going through the social media. And whatever, you know, Snapchat, Facebook, all of them. Are you following people on Twitter? On X? Are you are you where are you following people? How are they getting to you? We go through the other things, the WhatsApp and all the other, you know, Telegram and all the other ways they communicate. We block, then we delete, remove access. Then you got to start building some structure. And the structure is the structure around recovery. The structure is around non-usage. You got to start building that. And you are not going to be able to do that by yourself. You need help with that. So go back to talking to someone, get out of isolation, but seek professional assessment and professional help. They can help you get some structure around them. You know, kind of like on the beach, uh, I don't know if you've ever paid attention to the uh the rip current signs. They always tell you the same instructions. If you get caught in a rip current, don't swim into the current trying to get to shore. You swim across the shoreline. The rip current, you will eventually you'll be drifting out a little bit, but if you swim parallel to the shore, you're eventually going to get out of the rip current. And that's when you'll be able to get to shore. If you try to do it head-on into it, you're not going to do it. So don't work yourself to death by yourself. Be smart. Do what you're supposed to do. But the way that that happens is working with somebody. Trust me on that one. Just you've got to work with somebody. So crossing that line doesn't mean you're stuck there, it just means you're there. But you can come back over the line. But ignoring it will take you deeper into that addiction. Pay attention to that line because the earlier you see it, the easier it is to come back. Oh my gosh, this was like a marathon meth uh episode of Doc Jockey Addicting With God. Apologize for being so long-winded, but I got a lot to say. If you got something out of this podcast, if you did, like and subscribe and tell your friends, I really appreciate you listening. And if you need help, you can reach out to me. Uh if you don't want to reach out to me, that's fine. Go get uh go get into therapy, talk to somebody, find a way to help. What a rehab. Go to a meeting. Find a sponsor. Doing nothing, that's just gonna end up being dead. Or do something. It's not worth saving your addiction by ending your life. That's it. So I appreciate you listening to this episode, and until the next one, this is Doc Shock saying, see ya.