Why Dependence Develops: The Method's View on Tolerance, the Brain, and Self-Medication

People often confuse two very different things: the need to take medication and dependence itself. Dr. Saulitis's method offers a clear distinction — and that distinction explains why dependence arises in the first place and who falls into it.

Dependence Is Not "Taking Medication"

As long as a person is mortal, as long as there is illness and aging, people will take medication — and there is nothing pathological in that. If someone with high blood pressure stops treatment, the pressure returns; if you take insulin away from a diabetic, blood sugar rises again. That is not dependence — it is simply an interrupted treatment of a disorder. Psychiatric medications must be understood the same way: some drugs treat, and some conditions return without treatment.

Dependence is a qualitatively different phenomenon. Its main marker is rising tolerance: more and more of the substance is needed, and the person can no longer function in ordinary life without it.

How Tolerance Grows Unnoticed

Dependence rarely begins as a catastrophe. It creeps in gradually: once together, a second time, a third, a fourth — and the person wakes up already using daily. First "just a little," then unable to fall asleep without it, unable to eat, unable to start the day. That is the moment the person has "entered that reality."

The method stresses: the dose decides everything. Any substance can be both medicine and poison — the line is drawn not by its name but by the quantity and by whether control is lost.

Self-Medication Is the Root of the Problem

A particular and common scenario: a person has a psychiatric disorder and begins to "treat" it with a substance — to mute anxiety, dysphoria, pain. This is self-medication, and it is as destructive as uncontrolled use of sedatives. The outcome, as the doctor says, is predictably grim.

That is why the method's first question in dependence is what lies beneath it: which disorder the person is trying to cover with the substance. Without an answer to that, simply "quitting" is nearly impossible.

Why a Substance Stays in the System Longer Than It Seems

Sedating, intoxicating substances are not cleared instantly. They settle in fatty tissues, in the brain, in neurons, and linger there for weeks. So the feeling of "I only use on weekends" is deceptive: the body is in fact living under constant influence. At different life stages — childbearing age, menopause — this influence matters especially.

Who Has It Easier and Who Harder

The method links the course of psychiatric disorders to the level of education: the higher the education, as a rule, the milder the course and the better the treatment prognosis. This is not a verdict but a guide — the resource of awareness and understanding works as a protective factor.

Practice: An Early Self-Audit for Dependence

1. Check your tolerance. Ask yourself: do you now need more than at the start to get the same effect?
2. Track the rhythm. Morning and evening, to fall asleep, to eat — has the substance become part of every single day?
3. Find what lies beneath. What exactly are you muting — anxiety, pain, dysphoria? That is the real target.
4. Take a pause. If you notice daily use, stop — don't pile up more problems for yourself.
5. Go to a specialist, don't self-treat. First a conversation with a psychotherapist, then, if needed, a psychiatrist who can carefully design a way out.