Nobody is born an addict. Addicts are created. The ingredients of addiction are tossed into a big bowl, stirred, poured into a pan, and baked like a cake. Below, we have presented the time-tested recipe for cooking up an addict.

Ingredients

• One small human, preferably an infant, toddler, or young child – either gender
• One or more unavailable, unstable, and/or inconsistent parents
• Neglect (emotional and/or physical)
• Abuse (emotional, physical, and/or sexual)
• Stress within the home (financial woes, fighting, moving around a lot, chronic and/or serious physical ailments, infidelity, etc.)
• A pinch of iffy genetics (typically evidenced by a family history of addiction or mental illness)
• One very large dollop of “don’t ever talk about our problems”
• Yeast

Preparation

• Mix ingredients in a large bowl (or a confusing, tension-filled household) and set aside until the small human expands (this is what the yeast is for) into a disconnected, unhappy child with low self-esteem.
• Push the disconnected, unhappy child with low self-esteem into a greased, floured, and highly dysfunctional school and social environment.
• Heat in life’s pressure cooker until the child starts to compulsively drink, get high, look at porn, or engage in other addictive behaviors.
• Allow the unhappy child to assume that everything is his/her fault.
• Do not engage in open dialog or offer insight into problems that the child or the family might be having.
• Do not supervise or provide guidance about handling life’s difficulties.
• Season to taste with generous helpings of “ignore it and maybe it will go away,” “covering up,” “pushing the blame onto any person who dares point out the problem,” and any other form of dysfunction in your cupboard.

Serve

• Open the front door and unleash this unprepared, troubled, insecure person on the world. If the neighbors are watching, act as if everything is perfectly OK, thank you very much for asking, now please go away and leave us alone.

In case you’re wondering, this recipe for addiction, though we’ve presented it in a tongue-in-cheek fashion, is scientifically verified. In fact, huge amounts of research confirm that problematic genetics combined with a dysfunctional upbringing and various forms of early-life trauma significantly increase the risk for all types of addiction.

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If you or someone you love is struggling with sex, porn, or paired substance/sex addiction, we offer both inpatient treatment and low-cost online workgroups. For extensive free information, including webinars, podcasts, blogs, resources, and daily inspiration for healing, we urge you to explore our sister website, SexandRelationshipHealing.com.