Your brain produces feel-good chemicals when you drink alcohol. This chemical surge makes you feel rewarded. It also makes you drink more, until you feel sedated and content. This is how addiction begins.

By the time addiction sets in, your brain is dependent on alcohol for normal daily functioning. Your brain can adjust to your lifestyle when you overuse alcohol and can rewire itself to function after detox. However, even in sobriety, your brain does not forget alcohol. This amazing organ has become chemically conditioned to the substance, almost weak to the lure of drinking. It will always remember the reward experienced early in drinking–the reward it keeps chasing in addiction.

Just as you feel rewarded by your brain for drinking, it also punishes you when you don’t drink. This punishment is withdrawal. Your body needs alcohol to function normally.