Maia Szalavitz: Addiction Isn't About Drugs. It's About Pain

**Maia Szalavitz** (0:00)
America locks up more people and arrests more people for drug possession than any other country in the world. We also have the worst problem in the world. So if this was going to work, it should have worked by now.
It doesn't work because we don't arrest people for alcohol possession, we don't arrest people for cigarette possession, and we manage to dramatically reduce the harms related to those drugs. Now, if you catch somebody with possession of something that is dangerous, you may want to take that thing away from them, but that doesn't mean you need to be a police officer, and that doesn't mean you need to put a person in jail.

**SPEAKER_2** (0:53)
If someone has a problem with substance use disorder, please call 1-CALL-PLACEMENT. That's 888-831-1581.
And if we can't help you, we'll make a referral to someone who can. Please, We're Out of Time. 1-CALL-PLACEMENT is affiliated with Carrera Treatment Wellness and Spa and One Method Treatment Centers.

**Richard Taite** (1:14)
Today on We're Out of Time, I'm joined by Maia Szalavitz, one of the most important voices in addiction today. She's a New York Times best-selling author and journalist, known for her expertise in neuroscience and addiction. She studied this at the highest level and lived through it herself. Her work, for some, is changing how we understand addiction.
Moving it from something people judge to something we treat with compassion and science, and pushing for real evidence-based solutions. Her latest book, Undoing Drugs, takes a hard look at harm reduction and what's actually working to save lives. Maia, welcome.

**Maia Szalavitz** (2:01)
Thanks so much for having me.

**Richard Taite** (2:03)
It's my pleasure. When you sit with people who are struggling, what do you wish more people understood about what addiction actually feels like from the inside?

**Maia Szalavitz** (2:15)
Well, basically that it's not fun.
People assume that when you are actively using drugs, you're having such a great time that you don't want to stop, and that you are just in this blistered out state, and you're very hedonistic, and you are very selfish, and all you care about is your own bliss. And what's really going on with a vast majority of people with addiction when they are actively using is that they are in some kind of emotional pain, and they are attempting to use the drugs to solve that. And sometimes that's successful.
Sometimes, especially with things like stimulants, even though you know it's going to make it worse, you can't stop yourself from doing it. And so it's really maddening, but what it is definitely not is fun. And it is not the case that people don't stop using because everything's great and they don't have enough negative consequences. People don't stop using because they don't have hope that there will be anything that can give them what the drugs do, even if the drugs aren't doing it so well anymore.

**Richard Taite** (3:27)
All right, well, let's paint that for the, let's paint that, because you're a former addict, right? And were you doing, you were doing?
And yeah, and were you smoking it, shooting it or snorting it?

**Maia Szalavitz** (3:41)
Basically, at the end, I was doing speedball, so injecting pain and together.

**Richard Taite** (3:47)
Okay, no, no, I just wanted to know if you are real or not, because if you were snorting it, okay, then I just didn't want to have the conversation. All right, so you're real.
Okay, so yes, you start off initially because either you didn't get your basic needs met as a child, or there was a specific or continuous trauma, right? Something like that.

**Maia Szalavitz** (4:11)
I mean, in my case, as in probably most cases, it was a mix of things.
I was a very nerdy, outsider-y kid who couldn't, had a real difficulty connecting with people. I wish I had known there was such a thing as the autism spectrum when I was growing up, because I basically met so many criteria for it. But all I thought was that I'm selfish and bad and can't connect with people and care more about ideas and people, so I must be evil.

**Richard Taite** (4:43)
That's crazy. That's crazy talk.
But that's how we do it. We walk in shame-based, we're doing this stuff. The only thing I want to say for the viewers, because sometimes it is fun. Now, getting into it can either be fun or trying to avoid pain. But initially, it starts off all fun. And then you graduate to fun with problems, and then you graduate to all problems.

**Maia Szalavitz** (5:09)
I mean, also, like, I think, like, there's kind of a difference between seeking comfort and seeking bliss, and both things can happen.