Every Addiction I Ever Had Lost to Art

I never really had a nicotine problem.

I’d tried it a few times over the years, a puff here and there, and nothing ever stuck. I figured nothing ever would.

Then I hired a new in-home assistant, and she was nervous. Very nervous, the way anybody is in the first weeks of a new job inside somebody else’s house.

A few times I caught her sneaking puffs on a nicotine vape to calm her nerves.

I didn’t want her to feel bad about it. Nobody needs a scolding on top of nerves. So I just laughed and said the first thing that came to mind.

“You gonna share that, or just sneak it?”

She gave me a puff.

And I still can’t tell you how one puff turned into me chain-smoking vapes. But it did.

I think it was stronger than anything I’d ever had before. I was hooked almost immediately.

Here’s the part I didn’t see coming. I have severe ADHD, and every single puff brought this sudden, ridiculous clarity to my brain. The noise went quiet. My thoughts lined up in a neat little row like kindergartners waiting for recess.

For about ten to twenty seconds.

Then it was gone, and I wanted it back.

It didn’t take long for me to need that clarity. And it didn’t take much longer for the clarity to stop being the point at all. I just needed nicotine in me to function. Period.

So what got me through the guilt? The cravings? The need?

A daily walk helped. For sure.

But what healed me was the wheel.

Every time it got hard, I jumped back into throwing. I stopped doomscrolling. I stopped binge watching. Instead, I walked out to my studio, sat down at a wheel, and threw until the cravings went quiet.

Then they’d come back. And I’d sit back down.

Eventually, they went quiet for good.

Which is very good news, because I can’t be the owner of the greatest pottery studio on earth while chain-smoking a vape in the back room. I mean, I could. It would just be a terrible look.

Years before the vape, I had a different problem brewing.

Gambling.

I had risen all the way to the level of professional poker. Not to brag, but I was good. Like, actually good.

Which is a strange thing to brag about in a post about addiction. I see that now.

I’d go to Vegas with friends who were also very good poker players, and we’d all make a ton of money at the poker tables.

And then we’d go blow every bit of it on craps and roulette.

A whole trip of skill and patience and math, handed right back to the casino at two games where skill does nothing for you. American roulette keeps about 5.3 cents of every dollar you bet over time. The craps pass line keeps about 1.4. The house never has to beat you on any one night. It just needs you to keep playing.

What got me out? Switching the bad habit for, you guessed it, art.

I started taking my iPad with me. While my friends dumped their winnings on the tables, I sat up in my room and illustrated. Constantly.

And that addiction took almost no time to beat. I’d go to bed with stacks of cash sitting on the nightstand next to me. I’d go home with stacks of cash in my backpack. The evidence was right there every morning, in a pile.

It turns out it’s very hard to argue with a pile of money.

Vapes and roulette are the two that took me the furthest. They aren’t the only ones.

I’ve had other addictions start to bloom over the years. From sex to social media. From doomscrolling to self-pity. Even things that look healthy from the outside, like exercise and leadership and weight loss. Binge eating. Work.

None of them ever took me as far as those first two. And every single time, I knew I didn’t want the thing running my life. Every single time, I used some kind of art to pull myself completely out of it.

Here’s what I’ve come to believe after all of that. Most people who swear they don’t have an addiction do. It just doesn’t look like one.

Nobody stages an intervention for the guy answering work email at midnight. Nobody worries about the friend who always has to be the one in charge. Nobody calls feeling sorry for yourself a habit. But any of them can run your life as hard as a vape ever ran mine.

And admitting one, out loud, at the level it’s really at? That takes real courage. Not “I could probably cut back a little.” The real number.

I know how hard that is to say. I’ve had to say twelve packs a day.

So I built something to help you find yours.