If you scored any points in the first 3 questions of any section then it is highly likely that you have some form of addictive disorder with that set of substances or behaviors, because questions 1-3 deal with the core characteristics of addiction. Those 3 questions were formulated from the “ABC” of The American Society of Addiction Medicine’s 2011 definition of addiction.
Addiction is characterized by …
- Inability to consistently Abstain
- Impairment in Behavioural control
- Craving
If you scored 1 or more on questions 4 – 14 in any of the sections then this is also a sign that something might be problematic and needs closer attention.
Essentially, addiction exists on a continuum. Obviously the closer we get to a full score (14) the more entrenched our addiction issues are, but even a low score of 3 or 4 is indicative of a potentially serious problem.
So now you should be able to see where your major problems are but hopefully you can also see that there are other areas which may become problematic later. If you were lacking in awareness around any of these issues then hopefully this has raised your awareness of the fact that addiction is a syndrome form of illness. It manifests in many different ways and all of those manifestations are a result of the same underlying behavioral illness/disorder.
In the following modules (course 1) we will learn about how different addictions interact with each other to become more than the sum of their parts.
In course 2 we will use the ‘3 circles’ approach which enables us to build a comprehensive recovery plan for multiple addictions.