In this week we review topics such as cocaine, why do our brains get addicted and the

problematic with opioid addiction. From the video Why do our brains get addicted? I
learned a lot from the addict perspective using the examples and comparing the
concept of addiction with obesity. Many times, we think that people overcoming through
these problematics lack self-esteem, discipline or even self-love but we forgot about
what we cannot see: the neuroscience behind the addiction. As neuroscientists Nora
Volkow explained how being addicted is more a biochemical problem rather than a
problem of lack of will she mentioned that “Some of us because of our genetics, our
developmental trajectories, our social circumstances are more vulnerable to these
disorders than others” (Volkow, 2015). And that make me think about my second point:
how misunderstood we have the concept of addiction. I’m majoring in neuroscience and
one of the reasons why I chose it was because I believe that we should approach any
issue related to the human brain (such as addictions) with a different perspective,
without stigma and understanding where these problems actually came from, put us
closer to solve them.
Opioids could be used for positive reasons, as an example, people who suffer second
or third grade burns, they usually give them morphine (a type of opioid) to overcome the
pain created by the burn. However, these drugs cause more negative aspects than
positives because of how well they adapt to our brains, they are capable of bind better
than endorphins (naturally segregated by our brains) and this is one of the reasons why
they are so addicted “Opioid drugs can manage much more severe pain than
endorphins can” (Davis, 2019). Endorphins