Regarding addictions - Is anyone else like this?

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I haven't read about this being an Aspie thing so I'm wondering if anyone else is like this. I don't understand addictions at all. I hear people talk about how smoking is the easiest thing to get addicted to. I started smoking when I was 14 so I could hang around with " the cool kids" in the school toilets (yeah I know, even I can't believe I was so dumb at that age). I smoked regularly for weeks but then I just got bored with it so I stopped smoking in school. I continue to smoke only when I drank alcohol and did this until I was 19. Then I met a boyfriend who didn't like it so I gave it up completely with no problems. I didn't feel the addictive urge that people talk about.

Even with drink I don't get addicted. I can use drink to ease my stress and do this every day for a week then when my stress levels go down I forget to drink. I also gave up caffeine when I decided it was bad for me. I felt no withdrawal symptoms. I occasionally have coffee now and the caffeine has no effect on me. Caffeine does not keep me awake.

I seem to be immune to all addictions

I have a somewhat addictive personality, but surprisingly smoking is the one thing I've tried that I've never become addicted to. I've never really become addicted to drinking either, even though there was a period where I had at least one drink a day, more out of boredom and because I could than anything. I actually have a hard time seeing why drinking can be addictive, because if I drink too frequently at any given point, I tend to get really sick of it and quit for a while.

Now, as for other things, I'm a caffeine junkie, I'm severely addicted to the internet, and I'm a bit of a masturbation addict as well.

Yeah, I'm a little like you. I've never had a problem with smoking or drinking. Intellectual stimulation is the only thing which keeps me up at night, not caffeine. The only addiction I've never been able to beat is nail biting, although I'm in another bout now of trying to kick the habit.

Research shows that people with autism have fewer nicotine receptors.
http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/nicorec.htm

I'm the same, I currently smoke but when I've given up before it's been much easier than I was expecting. What keeps me coming back is that it's a perfect excuse to go outside and be on my own when I'm out with friends, and because all of the smokers at work get on and everyone ends up laughing when we all go outside together and have our 5 minutes.
I might find myself in a bit of a pissy mood for a day or so after I've given up, but once I've decided that I'm going to change my routine I don't even miss it.

Most people who aren't addicts don't understand addiction. It's not just an Autism/Aspergers thing.

Interesting...I guess with me it sort of depends on the substance, I smoke cigarettes and I think I could say its an addiction since I can't seem to quit even for periods of time, like last time I had kind of a sore throat I did smoke less but still had to have a cigarette here and there which I know just made it last longer or sometimes I smoke if I don't particularly want to if that makes sense. As for alcohol there are times in my life people could have easily assumed I was alcoholic due to how much and how often I was drinking, but I have never had withdrawal from not drinking and have cut down a lot, past few months I've only really drank a few times and I don't feel like I 'need' a drink. As for caffeine...there have been times I end up going without it a while, but I tend to end up going back to regularly drinking tea/coffee with caffeine because I have trouble sleeping enough and it helps me be more awake during the day or if I take my trazodone to help me sleep I wake up all lethargic which caffeine helps....anyways if I go without I have gotten headaches and irritable somewhat.

I also smoke cannabis but, I wouldn't describe it as an addiction.....I feel worse if I go without it, but that is more because it helps relieve some of the ptsd, anxiety and depression symptoms every anti-depressant has failed and it still gets bad enough I need something to help and that does...so I feel worse without it because they symptoms of that are more apparent but I am not opposed to finding a 'legitimate pharmacutical pill' that helps and doesn't have horrid side effects. Still probably would not give up marijuana for good as aside from the relief from that I do enjoy the feeling of being stoned. Also I hear opiates are very addictive, which for some people certainly....but I have taken them multiple times(on a rare occasions basis) and haven't come anywhere near addiction to them, though the high is certainly pleasant.

Then I was prescribed klonopin one time and ended up taking it excessively rather then for anxiety, and got to the point I needed to keep taking it and more of it, so that ended up being an issue but now I am prescribed Valium which is in the same class of drugs but don't have that issue with that one.

I even tried some harder drugs, weed and aphetamine. I was smoking a hole shedload and than when the supplier changed and the quality diminshed I stopt, one day to the other. I simply wasnt willing to pay the same price for an inferior product.

My pet theory is that many neurotypical people are taking drugs as antidepressant selfmedication because they lack some sort of strong emotional bonds, classical addictive personalitys. Autistic people don't form this emotional bonds and in the same way as neurotypical people so they are less effected by the lack of these emotional relations. For us relationships are more contractual, based on responsibility and obligation.

I can get an equal amount of emotional satisfaction from intellectual stimulation than neurotypical people can get from a "love" relationship.

I think maybe there's something significant to this regarding the receptors and the brain's interpretation.

I too and not prone to addictions.

After a surgery I was on a significant amount of narcotics to manage pain, and as an experiment I decided to just stop taking them abruptly to see what would happen.
Nothing happened.
My pain did go back up and so my quality of life decreased, but I felt no unusual urge to do anything about it.

I've been exposed to smoking and drinking throughout my life, but it never caught on.
In a similar way, the rewards of serving the hive-mind, schadenfreude, or perceiving the conceptual world to be real also never caught on.
I think all of these things are linked in a certain way to an internal chemical reward pathway in the brain.

some people seem not to get addicted, or at least not get addicted easily. some addictive substances take longer for the addiction to kick in, or may take longer in different people. some people can become addicted to non-chemical things, because of the neurochemical response that happens when they do those things.

for those who have concerns about tobacco addiction in particular, ask your doctor about a drug called chantix (in the u.s. - other countries my have different names for it). it is not an "anti-addiction" drug, it works by shutting down the nicotine receptors so the craving disappears. not many side-effects, the worst typically might be some mild nausea during the first week or so. and you only take it for a month, not forever. doesn't work for everyone, but both my wife and i had smoked for 40yr, and now we don't anymore.

I think with us it can be more of the habit or routine that we become addicted to. A comfort blanket that we can fall back on. A Stim that we can utilise.

Like when you are out and the conversation of small talk, chitter chatter is boring you to death you can go outside for a cigarette.

Like when you are struggling to be part of a conversation and you ending up drinking your drink quicker out of boredom.

Like when you use fruit machines to relieve some boredom.

I started smoking when I was 17. Funnily enough when I was going out to pubs and not at other times. I didn't drink or smoke at home, just a social thing. Something to hold / do when I was not 'involved' in the conversation. About the same time I got into fruit machines.

At the time it was just a way to get through the night. Sub-concious thing where I was bored with what they were saying so I'd play the fruit machine. Then I got into pool and when I lost that hour wait until it's your name again would leave me bored.

This was 23 years ago. There wasn't aspergers or ASD back then. I'd never heard of it. I was just this shy guy that people seemed to see as a bit boring.

As they all paired off all these things became addictions. I would smoke heavily, drink heavily, gamble heavily. I got really depressed because I would spend all my salary in the first week of the month and would then end up stuck in my bedroom for the next 3 weeks. I live with Mum till 29.

I rarely drink now. I still smoke. I don't gamble. How? I don't go out anymore. lol. So now I don't need to find 'stims' when I get bored. I don't feel the need for a beer at home and if I do then I'll go and get a few beers. But more often than not I'll drink 1 or 2 and the others will stay in the fridge

So yes I was addicted, but more a case of addicted to the habit or the 'stim' aspect of it rather than being an alcoholic or gambling addict. They were just time fillers.