I recently came across the term emotional addiction that I wanted to share with you. Here’s a definition to help explain what this addiction is as listed by the 7 Summit Pathways Treatment & Recovery Center:
“Those who develop an emotional addiction become hooked to feeling a familiar way or responding to their powerful, innate emotions. The brain gives off chemical reactions in response to certain emotions, similar to those experienced while taking part in other addictive behaviors or substances. People with emotional addiction can become dependent on a certain emotion for comfort, relief, distraction or escape.”
Although you may not be an alcoholic, having grown up in an alcoholic or dysfunctional family can create other unhealthy behavior patterns that you may have adopted to help you cope with the unhealthy behaviors you experienced as a kid.
One such set of unhealthy behaviors is falling into emotional addiction. Some common behaviors that fall into this category are “falling in love,” but being really in love with falling in love. Another example is brooding time and time again about an issue, but being stuck in a loop in which you’re trapped in the emotional response, but not able to move past the feeling.
Take a look at your life and how you react in times of stress, grief, and happiness. See if there are common behaviors that you fall into when you feel a certain way.
After my first girlfriend broke up with me, I became depressed and found that there were certain songs that I could listen to that would bring me back to how I felt about the relationship. Over months and months, I played those same songs to help put me in the same depressed state. I became stuck and unable to move on and lost in the emotional response of a breakup rather than learning how to move on.
As you go about your day, take a hard look at your life and see if you can identify with any of this behavior. If you do, be honest with yourself, explore why you feel this way, and work on ways to break the cycle through therapy.