Alcoholics often suffer from low serotonin levels, which they try to combat by “self-medicating” with alcohol. Unfortunately, the increase in serotonin levels is only temporary, and overtime, the natural production of this neurotransmitter is depleted.

Of course, the drinking eventually took on its own maddening obsession, which brings me back to my stay at Foundations. As I told my assigned psychiatrist all of this history, I saw a light bulb suddenly go off in his eyeballs. He told me my problem was mostly likely a deficiency of serotonin, a neurotransmitter in the brain responsible for modulating mood, emotion, sleep, and appetite. As he explained, people with low serotonin levels often display emotional rigidity, meaning they get “stuck” on a single idea and are unable to shift attention. This would explain my unhealthy obsession with self-achievement and my predilection towards harmful, repetitive behaviour like say…alcoholism.

Alcoholics often suffer from low serotonin levels, which they try to combat by “self-medicating” with alcohol. Unfortunately, the increase in serotonin levels is only temporary, and overtime, the natural production of this neurotransmitter is depleted. This is why alcoholics who suddenly stop drinking, experience heightened irritability, not to mention uncontrollable shaking and seizing. Since their natural levels have been completely depleted, the only way to get back to a normal level or homeostasis is by taking another drink of alcohol. Of course, this only propagates the deficiency, which explains why alcohol is so harmful. You end up having to drink more and more just to feel “normal”, when, in reality, the alcohol is slowly deteriorating your brain and liver.

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