Shop-a-hoklics

Addiction can take different forms. Just read Million Little Pieces. It’s a memoir of an addict. The person writes in detail how it feels to be addicted. In short, punchy sentences, he describes his passage through the abuse – alcohol, drugs, cigarette, coffee – everything. The pages flew by when I read. The book was over so quickly it felt like a wind flipping through the pages of the book, opening the cover, tossing through the pages, and then the end. All three hundred and more pages.

Since publishing the book, we’ve come to know the author made many parts of it. Most of it wasn’t true. But I don’t care. For me, they were a great insight into what an addict goes through. Ok, they turned fiction, but it still was a great read.

In the middle of the book, during the rehab, the author is told to avoid number of things when he is released. Cigarette ok, stick to it, better than alcohol and drugs. But watch out for others, minor ones, through which you will go straight back to hardcore addiction. One of them is shopping. Control what you shop. Don’t splash out. It’s an addiction. One leads to another.

I remembered shuddering when reading I passage. I’m not rich, I don’t shop regularly. I’m not an addict also. I don’t smoke, I only drink. But yes, I am addicted to shopping, especially when I go shopping. When I enter a shop, I seldom come out without buying anything. I can’t control the urge to buy, possess what tickles my fancy. Should I watch out then? Should I be careful, worry that it may lead to more drinking, other addictions?

I’ve never had any drinking problem. I’m a social drinker. I don’t drink alone, or at home, unless I have friends, and I don’t normally drink during weekdays. But the shopping bit worries me.

Yesterday was no different. I went to one of the shopping center to buy a comb. I mere two pounds worth of comb. When I come out, I’d splashed two hundred quid.

I was with a friend and he said he wanted to buy a pair of shoes. He liked what he saw, bought them. They were really a good pair of suede from Gant. The problem was, I really liked it as well.

I came out of Gant buying a pair of jeans and a very expensive belt. I then told my friend, I wanted to buy shoes too, like the one he had. We went around looking, and when I saw the one I liked, there was no stopping.

Your guilt of spending, or what you're about to spend, doesn’t surface when you are trying the shoes in the shop. The lure of it lulls you. You move to the counter, take out your plastic, punch your pin, no guilt yet. When you leave the shop, come out in the cold of the outside, you start to think what you’ve done. That’s what happens to me.

You wait for the train. You’re not speaking to your friend. You’re thinking of home, dinner, work next day, and then your shopping, the amount of money you’ve splashed. It takes two full day’s hard work to earn that much, what you’ve spent in an less than an hour.

Then, you reach home, try all your purchases. Like mine yesterday, if you really like what you’ve bought, at least you don’t feel grieved. Or, there is no stopping taking a free fall.

I feel fashionable after the lavish acquistion. But I also feel poor. Worst, I feel like an addict.