Alcohol And Substance Abuse

Thanks for your continued interest in evolving mind/body science! Stay tuned for more details on how neurotransmitters, immune system challenges and hormones create problems with mind-balance.

This Explosion Does Work… – The Impulsive Brain Doesn’t

Many of the explosions we see at school, at work and in our daily lives create massive havoc. At CorePsych Radio, tomorrow [sorry for this late post] I will outline for our radio listeners my presentation at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, discussed more fully in this last post.

Agenda for the radio program in pdf here for downloading and is also available at the CorePsych Radio Agenda page [links for the show there]. Details for the October program in the pdf.

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Tagged as: ADHD diagnosis and treatment, alcohol and substance abuse, Bipolar Disorder, impulsive brain, old dominion university, Traumatic brain injury

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Personal note:
Sorry to be a bit off with my schedule of regular posts here, – have been two days meeting with various medical folk [peds, psychs, LNP's] in Long Island, and another two days in North Carolina. The good news: the medical professionals who regularly treat ADHD are increasingly informed, and doing a great job out there. The level of discussion: uniformly excellent- and by the way, we did cover this brain injury subject all four days and in previous posts.

Traumatic Brain Injury [see this TBI symptom checklist], in the

Temporal Lobe Location

Boston News with the war casualties, is so often missed, and many just don’t think about it. Even the medical professionals miss the subtlety of the symptoms and deny the clinical significance of the injury…from cycling and football, to wrestling, to public figures [Hemingway], brain injury is often overlooked.

One of the reasons TBI so often missed: Post Concussive Syndrome appears more “behavioral” with impulsivity, looks more “narcissistic” to the celebrities and successful crowd, looks like ADD/ADHD to the increasingly aware medical professionals.

And if they are drinking, smoking weed, snorting cocaine or using sleep medications, it is identified as a substance abuse problem – end of story. And the black belt recovery folk, the masters of reductionistic thinking, say: “you’re nothing but an alcoholic [fill in the blank], and that’s all you are…”

The TBI denial,
my friends, often does start with the injured person – admitting the problem is just to soft, too sissy to admit your brain isn’t working right. And if you are using substances, that abuse will make you think the abuse is the cause of the brain problem

should involve the loved ones [who often can see the difference post injury, because they see other changes as well], but they often give a false attribution to the associated relationship difficulties present in brain injury
but denial is most often a result of specific injury to the temporal lobes of the brain, both left and right, and each side plays a part in the game of denial.

More on the temporal lobes, denial and substance abuse:

SPECT and TBI
Now with SPECT brain imaging technology, we can see the brain function, can see the temporal lobe/frontal dysregulation, and we can more successfully intervene on those in denial. We can actually see the injury, and we can also often demonstrate the actual brain consequences of the substance abuse to those in denial.

Left temporal lobe denial:
When the LTL is not functioning properly we see anger, rages, -that come out of the blue. “I wasn’t angry, you’re just over-reacting. I was just making a point, expressing myself.” [BTW: you threw a chair] and these folks get called “raging alcoholics” or bipolar. They are in denial about their anger and their substance abuse. This is no excuse, just a fact: substance abuse may quiet their brain – for about 1/2 – 2 hrs, or more often, they feel better – but become dramatically unzipped emotionally.

Right temporal lobe denial:
With the RTL the denial picture is somewhat different. Injury on the right brings a spacey, “I dunno” feeling. These folks just don’t get it as you say something, they nod their head in the affirmative, get it for the moment and go out and repeat the substance abuse behaviors. Conclusion: “You’re just an alcoholic, your friend the bottle is calling you.” Learning, consequences, don’t teach, they are unteachable, and without treatment for the brain injury they may never recover. Again, they need the substance to quite excessive brain activity, uncontrollable thoughts and emotions.

No, I am not recommending substance abuse, just pointing out that they think it works.

Yes, these folks are indeed self medicating [incorrectly attempting to treat their own brain dysfunction], because we as a treatment community often miss the precise diagnosis, -and then even if we think we get it, we often don’t keep up with the specific intervention strategies for temporal lobe dysfunction.

Stay tuned, will write more about temporal lobe dysfunction and intervention strategies in coming posts.