How the Addiction Industry Keeps You Small

"Only in the addiction field has it been considered a great advance to define yourself, permanently, by your most damaging trait, by the lowest point in your life, by your trauma."– Stanton Peele

And somehow, we’re supposed to call this progress?

Let’s be honest: in what other area of life do we ask people to wear their pain like a name tag forever? No one tells a rape survivor to introduce themselves by their trauma. No one tells someone who beat cancer that they’ll always be diseased. But in the addiction world, we’ve normalized this bizarre ritual of self-flagellation.

“Hi, I’m John, and I’m an addict.”Ten years clean? Doesn’t matter. Your identity, your worth, your whole damn story is now reduced to what you did at your absolute lowest. And you’re supposed to repeat it—over and over—like a mantra.

This isn’t recovery. It’s psychological imprisonment.

This twisted ideology has been pushed by a recovery industry that profits off lifelong patients and permanent powerlessness. They’ve convinced people that healing means staying in purgatory. That growth means obsessing over your “disease” and thanking your higher power for another day of being broken-but-breathing.

It’s a scam.

Addiction is not an identity. It’s something people go through. Often during brutal, chaotic times in their lives. And guess what? People grow. They change. They get better. But that doesn't sell as many workbooks, court-mandated programs, or therapist sessions, does it?

The disease model tells you that your brain is hijacked. That you’re genetically wired to screw up forever. That you can never trust yourself again. That your best bet is to join the identity cult of the “recovering addict” and accept a lifetime of managing your damage.

Hell no!

You are not your worst moment. You are not your old coping mechanism. And you sure as hell aren’t broken beyond repair.

It’s time we stop forcing people to stay stuck in their trauma just to be accepted in recovery spaces.

So What Can We Do Instead?

1. Drop the damn labels. Stop calling yourself what hurt you. Say: I had a problem. I dealt with it. I’m moving on. That’s real. That’s strength. That’s not shame.

2. Stop making “recovery” a prison sentence. You don’t owe anyone a lifetime of public confessions just because you used to drink or use. You get to heal and move forward. You get to stop counting the days. You get to live.

3. Celebrate growth, not just survival. Build communities that care more about who someone is becoming, more than what they once were. Enough with the endless trauma loops and relapse fear porn.

4. Clean up the language."Addict" and "alcoholic" aren’t personality types. They’re slurs we’ve normalized. Try this instead: person. That’s all you ever needed to be.

5. Burn the disease model to the ground. You are not “chronically ill.” You are not “powerless.” You are a human being who used something to survive. That’s it. Stop feeding people this lifelong dependency garbage. ALL of the current research demonstrates that the "disease model" is made up rubbish.

6. Redefine recovery. Recovery isn’t about abstinence or fear or micromanaging your every impulse. It’s about reclaiming your life, your body, and your choices. It’s about building something new—not policing the old.

7. Let people decide who they are. If someone says they’re done identifying as “in recovery,” believe them. Honor that. Celebrate that. Stop dragging them back into the pit just because you’re still standing in it.

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References:

• Peele, S. (1998). The Meaning of Addiction: Compulsive Experience and Its Interpretation. Jossey-Bass.

• Peele, S., & Thompson, I. (2007). Addiction-Proof Your Child. Three Rivers Press.

• Slate, S., Scheeren, M. W., & Dunbar, M. L. (2017). The Freedom Model for Addictions: Escape the Treatment and Recovery Trap. Baldwin Research Institute.

• Szalavitz, M. (2016). Unbroken Brain: A Revolutionary New Way of Understanding Addiction. St. Martin’s Press.