Addicts and Moderation

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In February 1972, psychiatrist Joe Cassius told me in a therapy session in Memphis, Tennessee, that I had “an addictive personality” and that even when it came to Transactional Analysis I didn’t practice moderation. Addict: 1) To give oneself up to something habitually 2) To cause a person to depend physically on a drug Moderation: Not extreme, excessive or intense Can you be addicted to food, books, smoking, alcohol, plants, coffee, tea, soda, water, the Internet, movies, magazines, television, sex, love, theatre, particular movie or Broadway show, etc.? Yes, I know smoking and alcohol can be considered drugs but what about any of the other items I listed? I have been addicted to every item on that list, yes, including a Broadway show. Having seen “A Chorus Line” 101 times, traveling all over the United States, going to a city for a weekend and seeing it Friday Evening, Saturday afternoon and evening and Sundays which includes, aside from paying for the tickets, paying for hotels, meals, drinking (well at least the last 5 years of the 1970s) and other expenses, would you call it by giving up to something habitually, my being an addict? On the definition of moderation, it is a word that I don’t recall ever following. For 60 years of my life I smoked 2-3 packs of cigarettes every day until July 28, 2008, when I had my last smoke before going into the operating room for an aorta valve replacement. From my teen years until January 21, 1981, I drank alcohol, many times excessively, until that morning when I woke home and didn’t know how or when I got home nor what I did or even I had my car. I have not had a drink or a meal made with alcohol since. How about another example of moderation not practiced that may sound silly but can reading be a ‘drug’? I use to read 5-6, if not more, books a month and in the past 2 and a half years I don’t think I have read that many! Someone sent me Larry Kramer’s “The American People Volume 1” for my birthday in February 2016 and I still haven’t finished it though he is my favorite living author. Oh yes, I did finish reading 2 books a friend sent me but that’s been it. Of course, my biggest drug has been food and even that I don’t know from moderation. When I was on a diet I was on a diet and when I wasn’t I was eating everything in sight. (To be continued)