Ironically, the reason it’s so hard to quit drinking is because alcohol makes us feel so good! It produces a lot of the chemistry our brain’s associates with pleasure, neurotransmitters like dopamine. When we drink regularly, our brain gets used to elevated dopamine levels. But, when the alcohol gets metabolized and dopamine levels decrease, we start to feel like we’re missing something. This is a classic example of too much of a good thing becoming harmful rather than pleasurable. Over time, alcohol actually diminishes our ability to produce the pleasure we drink it for in the first place.
When dopamine levels drop far enough, the brain starts sending signals to produce more. Those signals manifest as anxiety and thoughts about alcohol. For example, let’s say we had too much to drink last night, in the morning we wake up feeling hungover and we resolve not to drink that day. But, as the day wears on and dopamine levels decrease, we start to have unwanted thoughts like “how long until my shift ends?” Or, “do I have enough alcohol at home? Or, “maybe I’ll have just one tonight!” Most of us can relate to these sneaky thoughts. They’re simply our brain’s way of alerting us to low dopamine levels. But, they occur autonomically and they undermine our desire to not drink.
It’s important to understand this mechanism in order to fix it. Without that understanding, “treatment” could look like anything but unfortunately, the outcomes would be disappointing. Any effective treatment needs to restore the down-regulated dopamine response. That’s what Go Sober does.
