Heroin Addiction in New Jersey

Many people do not understand why or how people become addicted to drugs such as heroin. It is often assumed that heroin abusers lack moral principles or willpower and they could stop using drugs simply by choosing to do so. In reality, heroin addiction is a complex disease and overcoming the addiction takes more than good intentions and a strong willpower – often times it takes professional help. This is because drug use, especially opiates such as heroin, change the brain’s compulsions making your body feel like it needs the drug to function and even survive, often times affecting you physically. These symptoms are normally referred to as withdrawals and can cause heroin dependant addicts go to extremes to get their next fix including stealing from loved ones and even committing burglary.

Addiction is a chronic, often relapsing, brain disease that causes compulsive drug seeking and use, despite harmful consequences to the addicted individual and to those around them. Although the initial decision to take heroin for the first time is voluntary for most people, the brain changes that occur over time challenge an addict’s self control and hamper their ability to resist intense impulse to take drugs. Through scientific advances, our society knows about how drugs affect the brain more than ever. We also know that heroin addiction can be successfully treated to help people stop abusing drugs and lead productive lives. To learn more, refer to our article about “How to Treat Heroin”.

How Heroin Affects the Brain

Drugs, such as heroin, contain chemicals that tap into the brain’s communication stems and disrupt the way nerve cells normally send and receive information so it is processed differently. There are at least two ways that drugs cause this disruption by imitating the brain’s natural chemicals called dopamine and over-stimulating different parts of the brain. Heroin has a similar structure to chemical messengers called neurotransmitters, which are naturally produced by the brain. This similarity allows the drugs to fool the brain’s receptors and activate nerve cells to send abnormal signals.

As a person continues to abuse drugs, the brain adapts to the overwhelming surges in dopamine by producing less dopamine. This results in a reduced ability to enjoy the previous drug doses and even life events that previously brought pleasure. This therefore perpetuates the cycle of abuse by compelling the user to ingest more heroin in an attempt to bring the dopamine back to normal but now larger amounts of heroin are required to achieve the same dopamine, which is commonly referred to as tolerance. Over time, long term use of heroin can cause other changes in the brain’s chemical system and circuits. Glutamate is another kind of neurotransmitter that influences the reward circuit and the ability to learn. When the optimal concentration of glutamate is altered by drug abuse, the brain can attempt to compensate and impair cognitive function. In fact, brain imaging studies of drug addicted individuals show changes in areas of the brain that are critical to judgment, decision making, learning, memory and behavior control. Together, these changes can drive an abuser to seek out and take drugs compulsively despite adverse consequences such as committing crimes or putting their lives or the lives of others in danger. To learn more, please visit the National Institute on Drug Abuse to learn more about heroin addiction.