Prerequisites in Forming Addictions

The concept of addiction is fundamental in psychoanalytical method. А child who comes into this world is dependent on his/her mother, who performs the function of the self-preservation instinct for the child. From this, a basic human need is formed—an infantile drive to receive care. A mother's nurturing attitude towards her child will foster the child's growth, while the mother's unconscious anxiety will hinder the child's ability to be alone, forming a predisposition to codependent relationships. A person's life path is directly related to relationships with primary objects, as they have a tremendous impact on the entire subsequent life, on the individual's ability to build relationships with partners. These relationships will either be full-fledged relationships between two adults, or the person will experience a painful dependence on another due to fixations at early stages of development. The ability to grieve without falling into melancholy upon losing significant objects is contingent on these early relationships. Complex relationships with primary objects and fixation at the oral stage of development prevent the grieving process when needed, thus hindering the necessary psychological separation from the mother and the overcoming of the Oedipus complex. A person who has not overcome the Oedipus complex falls into melancholy, remains dependent on the lost object, and exhibits addicted behavior. The study examines the idea of addiction as a way to alleviate suffering, avoid encountering pain, control aggression, seek symbiosis, and simultaneously escape depression. Addiction serves as a container for all unprocessed, undigested, and unintegrated parts of the self, acting as a prosthetic container in the absence of the Other. This is a way of subjectification and producing falseness, a pseudo-object, again in the absence of the Other. This research consists of two parts: theoretical and practical. The theoretical part traces the evolution of the concept of addiction from Sigmund Freud, Jacques Lacan, Karl Abraham, Melanie Klein to contemporary authors. The empirical part analyzes clients' cases through the lens of various approaches, including Freud's concepts of the life and death drive, Lacan's optics of enjoyment, and the Other etc. This work is of practical significance for psychoanalytic therapists, examining addiction through specific patient cases. The scientific novelty of the work lies in the classification of a large number of psychoanalytic theories and approaches to addiction and the identification of points of similarity and difference between the approaches.