If we ask what are you addicted to, some will say gaming; some will say traveling, and so on. But are you addicted to them? Medical science says addiction is the psychological state of someone when the person just can’t live without doing a particular activity or consuming a specific thing. Now your answers might change, and many of you don’t have any strange addictions.
But if we ask you to give some examples of strange addictions, what would you say? Some will surely say alcoholism or drug addiction, but we need stranger addictions. Something that will completely blow your mind. Like addiction to eating human ashes? Or, addiction to eating drywall? Yes, there are strange addictions all over the world which you can’t even think of.
Countdown of Top 5 Strange addictions!
When the show “My Strange Addiction” first aired back in 2002, most made fun of it for being a weird show. Like who on earth eats couch cushions? Most of us thought in the name of strange addictions it is just another show with a peculiar publicity stunt. But in the crowd, some people could connect to those strange addictions shown on the TV screens. And as the show went on, it kept on gaining popularity, and to our surprise, so many people with strange addictions opened up.
It disturbed us in the meantime amused us too. So hold your hearts, because through this article we will tell you about five strange addictions you didn’t know about. Read ahead, but don’t say we didn’t warn!
1. Addiction to Eating Human Ashes
We have heard about people saving ashes of their loved ones as a memorial. We have even heard of making prayer halls on the ashes. But have you heard about anyone eating human ashes? Yes, there are people who are addicted to eating human ashes. Let us tell you a story to make your view clearer. Casie and Shawn fell in love and got married in 2009. And Casie is the main character of our story with the strange addictions. No, don’t judge her from now because the story is strange yet tragic.
Shawn died of severe asthma attack one day. It was so sudden that Casie could not bear the pain. After her husband’s last rituals were done, she collected his ashes. Things were all fine until one day when Casie was transferring her husband’s ashes from a cardboard box to a special urn. While transferring some of the ashes stuck to her fingers. And she out of the blue licked them. And that was her start in the journey of strange addictions.
She eats her husband’s ashes every day, thinking she is having her husband himself. Strange addictions like this are sure “Ugh!” for most people. But you can’t deny the fact that such strange addictions exist. Might be sickening but told you already, our list of strange addictions is for brave hearts.
2. Addiction to Eating Drywall
Now, this one is one among the strange unappetizing addictions, like really really distasteful. We all know what drywall is, don’t we? For now and then, wherever there is construction, there is drywall. Drywalls are mainly used for building decorative interiors. The use of drywall is common in constructions these days. It is strong, designer, durable, easy to install. And what else? Maybe tasty? The question may make you think like we are joking, but for people like Nicole, perhaps the drywall is delicious. Because they are addicted to eating it! Surely a gross example in the category of strange addictions, but we warned you.
Nicole has been eating her house for the past ten years. Yes, what she does is eating her house. She breaks the drywalls and eats them regularly. And not a bite or two, she eats more than three square feet of her home every single week! She loves the smell and texture of drywalls so much that she can’t go a day without eating them. We snack to Doritos, and she snacks to drywalls. The poor house got holes all over it as a victim of strange addictions. You might be thinking, how is she alive till now? And we have the same question as yours.
Don’t think Nicole is unaware of the bad effected her strange addictions can bring to her, but she doesn’t care. But you should surely care about inviting such people with weird habits to your house. Everyone has to die, and she wants to die eating drywall. Strange addictions are too addictive that people prefer to stay addicted than leading a normal life.
3. Addiction to Drinking Paint
You might have heard about people loving the smell of paints. Smelling paints give a sense of euphoria to some people, and that doesn’t go under the category of strange addictions. But can you guess what kind of happiness someone gets drinking paints? We really couldn’t figure out the secret behind such strange addictions, but if you have any clue, do let us know in the comment box below. Coming back to the topic of discussion, next on our list of strange addictions, is the addition of drinking paint.
Heather Beal is the proud practitioner of such strange addictions. She loves paints. She loves its smell, its texture, and even its taste. She thinks paint is like thicker milk with a better taste. Already vomitous? Hold on, there is more left. She drinks all kinds of paints. But her favorites are the paints used in marker pens. Did marker pen inventors ever think their invention can be included in someone’s strange addictions?
So technically, Heather gallops liters after liters paints because she can’t live without it. To be honest, I am starting to feel these people with strange addictions have some unearthly digestive system. My stomach can’t take more than three ice creams at once, and people with strange addictions drink paint and stay alive. A more interesting fact is, Heather has two daughters, and they thankfully are not the practitioner of such strange addictions YET.
4. Addiction to Eating Glass
You have heard about people addicted to drinking. But how about eating the glass itself instead of drinking? Even touching a broken glass cuts our hands, and there are people out there with strange additions of eating glass. Stomach-churning? I even find out execrable. And you will be even more surprised when we introduce you to the man behind the strange addiction of living on the glass.
78-year-old Liu Zundun doesn’t drink alcohol. But has a collection of a wide variety of all kinds of glasses. From wine to beer glasses, you can find it all in his collection. We know you guessed already the secret behind his fondness of collecting glasses. He eats them. Yes, he breaks, crunches, chews and swallows glasses like we eat chips. And he does all of these with his teeth. Don’t even try to break a glass with your teeth at home because these people with strange addictions seem to have some extraordinary body features.
This type of strange addictions can be put under Pica. It is a clinical disorder that makes someone addicted to eating stuff with no nutritional value1. Or we can say it makes a person addicted to eating things that were never made for eating. People with strange addictions like Liu Zundun stay healthy with their strange addictions. Rather they claim to die if they don’t practice their strange addictions. Be it whatever, for me and you, these just seem bizarre.
5. Addiction to Inflatable Toys
Did you like the pool toys we used to play with during our childhood? I loved them. I had a blow-up Captain America when I was a kid, and he used to be my partner to pool. After he sacrificed his life in a war with other inflatable toys of my friends, I replaced him with a blow-up Iron Man. We all loved those toys when we were kids. And some of you might have had a favorite inflatable toy. But did you love it enough to marry it? No, we are not joking. We can only wish people like Mark were joking.
27-year-old Mark loves his inflatable toys from the time when he was 14. He adores them. He lives on them. He has 15 inflatable pool toys from the age of 14 with whom he sleeps, eats, drinks, and what not! He loves all his 15 toys, but his favorite is the blow-up yellow dragon, Lila. If you ask him about the love of his life, he will repeat “Lila Lila and only Lila.” He and Lila are living in for years now, and Mark plans to marry her soon.
He cooks for Lila, sleeps with Lila, takes her in outings, talks to her for hours. In a nutshell, he does everything with his yellow inflatable toy Lila, that you expect your boyfriend or girlfriend to do with you. Lila is so soft and cuddly that without her, Mark will die. People don’t stay so loyal to their human partners as much Mark is to his Lila. I know it is just outlandish, but maybe loyalty keeps pouring out of such strange addictions.
That’s all, folks! Our list of 5 strange addictions ends here. Some of you got curious, and some got disturbed. But admit it, we did warn you. Because when it comes to strange addictions, people can leave you with your hearts pounding hard. And if you think you are addicted to any strange addiction2, don’t worry. Get some medical help if needed because there are treatments for everything. Do you know any other strange addiction? Feel free to let us know about them in the comment section.
- Crisan, E. V., and Anne Sands. “Nutritional value.” The biology and cultivation of edible mushrooms (1978): 137-168. ↩︎
- Shaffer, Howard J. “Strange bedfellows: a critical view of pathological gambling and addiction.” Addiction 94.10 (1999): 1445. ↩︎
Last Updated on by Sathi
