In the realm of hungry ghosts: close encounters with addiction

Foreword / Peter Levine --

Hungry ghosts: The realm of addiction --

Part I: Hellbound train --

The only home he's ever had --

The lethal hold of drugs --

The keys of paradise: Addiction as a flight from distress --

You wouldn't believe my life story --

Angela's grandfather --

Pregnancy journal --

Beethoven's birth room --

There's got to be some light --

Part II: Physician, heal thyself --

Takes one to know one --

Twelve-step journal: April 5, 2006 --

Part III: A different state of the brain --

What is addiction? --

From Vietnam to "Rat Park": Do drugs cause addiction? --

A different state of the brain --

Through a needle, a warm, soft hug --

Cocaine, dopamine, and candy bars: The incentive system in addiction --

Like a child not released --

Part IV: How the addicted brain develops --

Their brains never had a chance --

Trauma, stress, and the biology of addiction --

It's not in the genes --

Part V: The addiction process and the addictive personality --

"A void I'll do anything to avoid" --

Too much time on external things: The addiction-prone personality --

Poor substitutes for love: Behavioral addictions and their origins --

Part VI: Imagining humane reality: Beyond the war on drugs --

The social roots of addiction --

Know thine enemy --

"Ignorant fanaticism": The failed war on drugs --

Freedom of choice and the choice of freedom ---

Toward an enlightened social policy on drugs --

Reducing harm --

Part VII: The ecology of healing --

The power of compassionate curiousity --

The internal climate --

The four steps, plus one --

Sobriety and the external milieu --

A word to families, friends, and caregivers --

There is nothing lost: Addiction and the spiritual quest --

Appendix I: Fallacies of adoption and twin studies --

Appendix II: A close link: Attention deficit disorder and addictions --

Appendix III: The prevention of addiction --

Appendix IV: The twelve steps.