Memoirs of an Addicted Brain: A Neuroscientist Examines his Former Life on Drugs

A developmental psychologist applies his professional expertise to a study of his younger days when he used all kinds of powerful drugs--from cough medicine and alcohol to opium and LSD--to explain the neurological effects they can have on the brain and nervous system.
In a vivid, candid memoir of his own addiction, a renowned neuroscientist articulates exactly how drugs speak to the brain, illuminating both the science of craving and the human condition
Marc Lewis’s relationship with drugs began in a New England boarding school where, as a bullied and homesick fifteen-year-old, he made brief escapes from reality by way of cough medicine, alcohol, and marijuana. In Berkeley, California, in its hippie heyday, he found methamphetamine and LSD and heroin; he sniffed nitrous oxide in Malaysia; and frequented Calcutta’s opium dens. Ultimately, though, his journey took him where it takes most addicts: into a life of desperation, deception, and crime.But unlike most addicts, Lewis recovered to become a developmental psychologist and researcher in neuroscience. In Memoirs of an Addicted Brain, he applies his professional expertise to a study of his former self, using the story of his own journey through addiction to tell the universal story of addictions of every kind.