Addictions are forever.

Let's suppose you got drunk the first time you had anything alcoholic and thought, "Wow, this feels great!" That was the good news. Here's the bad news: You're likely to have to fight that addiction the rest of your life.

Maybe you snorted a line of cocaine and thought, "This is way I was meant to feel." You're already addicted. Congratulations and condolences.

Our addictions start early. If we're smart -- which most of us aren't when we're young -- we'll recognize them and head them off. That probably happens once out of a hundred times. Most of us have to deal with them later, when they've already taken root and are harder to get rid of.

Different drugs seem to bond to particular receptors in our brains. [I don't pretend to understand how it works or why. Look it up, okay?] And our particular brains appear to be pre-programmed for specific receptors. That's why some of us get addicted to alcohol and some to speed and some to heroin, et al. Maybe it's also why some of us can't resist certain foods and get fat. Or why others of us get an adrenaline rush from dangerous activities -- skydiving, climbing,
driving fast -- and too often die young.

Unlikely as it is to happen, it's important to recognize our possible/potential addictions early, when we're young, when there's still time to understand and deal with them. If you get drunk too easily and enjoy it too much, if you go way higher than your friends on certain drugs (and can't wait to get more), if you can't just be yourself, without "enhancements", for a whole day . . . it may be time for an intervention. Not with friends and family but with yourself. You have a chance to stop things in their track. As Nancy Reagan famously said in her doomed effort to stop drug use in this country, "Just say no." Or at least say, "I need to think about this."

All substances that alter our consciousnesses give us great pleasure. (Why we need to leave our day-to-day selves once in a while is the subject of a different discussion.) They probably all connect with receptors in our brains, since they all make us feel better. But only a few out of how many make that dreaded connection in your or my brain with that specialized receptor just waiting for that drug. Bang! We're addicted. And we always will be.

What we do about the knowledge that we're addicted -- once we've accepted/admitted it -- is a matter of personal preference. Some of us deny it and keep doing what we know we shouldn't be doing. Some of us try to stop on our own, usually without success but sometimes. A few braver ones enter some kind of treatment program -- brave because you have to confess to your weakness as a pre-condition to being let in. If left alone to run their course, most addictions will eventually kill us. Whether it's from a stopped heart or from pulminary arrest or a car wreck or just the dragging weight of obesity, our addictions inevitably kill us.

To re-cap, addictions start early and last a lifetime. If you've got one, you'll always have it. If you're young, consider yourself lucky: you have time to come up with a strategy. It's too late for those of us who are already addicted, but we owe it to the next generation to warn them not to get addicted to whatever they really like. That way lies heartbreak and sorrow never-ending.

How do you know if you're addicted to something? Ask yourself these questions. Do I love it? Do I need it? Would I go to extreme measures -- betraying a friend or robbing a store -- to get more of it? Could I give it up if my relationship or job or life depended on it? Can I imagine life without it?

We all know when we're addicted, even if we swear we're not. What we do about it is up to us. Hey, we could live a long life addicted to something or other. People do. But wouldn't it be better to see it early for what it is and come to terms with it? Spare ourselves and our loved ones lots of embarrassing moments? Addictions always, in the end, make us look foolish.

If you're young, and if you're smarter than lots of us were when we were your age, you'll keep an eye on yourself, know when you're liking something way more than you should.

Addictions are forever. You and I aren't.