“Relapse is a Complex Often Gradual Neurobiological Process Rather Than a Single Event”

relapse is a complex

often gradual neurobiological process

rather than a single event

characterized by the brain’s

reward

and

stress

systems

overriding

executive control

it occurs when

chronic exposures

to

substances

and

behaviors

rewires

the

brain

hypersensitive

to

cues

and

stressors

opens the floodgates

for

compulsive behavior

weakening the prefrontal cortex

the brain’s stop signal

relapse is a complex

often gradual neurobiological process

rather than a single event

🌊

🧠

🌱

not all floods destroy

some reveal

what refuses to die

🌊

🧠

🌱

🌱

i was not invited

i was not planned

no blueprint called for green

in a place of surge

and split

and signal override

yet

here i am

—

i drink what arrives

not knowing

if it is nourishment

or memory

or the echo of a mistake

repeating itself as weather

the flood does not ask my name

it does not slow

it simply becomes

and i

become with it

—

above me

light argues with lightning

one side sings

“again, again”

with honeyed fire

the other howls

“now, now”

with fractured sky

they meet

not in peace

but in pressure

and still

i reach

—

i do not stop the gates

i do not mend the break

i am not hero

not cure

not command

i am

a small insistence

—

a yes

buried in a thousand urgencies

a quiet

unimpressed by chaos

a memory

of something that does not rush

—

sometimes

i am bent nearly flat

sometimes

i disappear beneath the surge

and yet

something in me

refuses the final no

—

if you are looking for control

look elsewhere

if you are looking for certainty

look elsewhere

if you are looking for proof

look closer

—

i am proof

that even here

in the breach

in the override

in the flood

life does not ask permission

it simply

begins again 🌱