The therapist looked at me with an expression of borderline shock. I had been talking about the personal turmoil I suffered while trying to both climb hard and maintain a long-term relationship. I wanted to spend maximum time on big walls and in the mountains, but my priorities and those of my significant other were pulling us apart. I told the therapist that when I climbed I felt energized, and when I couldn't I felt depressed.

"You sound just like my crack-addict patients," said the therapist, during a lull.

Me? An addict? I didn't think so. But if there was a kernel of truth in what she said, was that necessarily a bad thing?

In the mid-1990s, Mic Fairchild of Boulder, Colorado, soloed a dozen or more routes nearly every day in nearby Eldorado Canyon. "When I started climbing I was logging all my pitches, but when you climb 15 to 20 pitches a day it gets to be too much, so I started using an altimeter watch and tracking vertical mileage," Fairchild explained. With his altimeter, Fairchild routinely measured days of 1,500 to 2,000 vertical feet. He peaked in 1998 with 98,000 vertical feet of technical climbing before Labor Day, when he was severely injured in a fall in Eldorado Canyon.

Fairchild is certain he was -- and remains -- addicted to climbing. "Both physically and emotionally, I would have to say, yeah. The adrenal squeeze is something you get used to -- especially all the soloing I did. I'd get up in the morning and say, 'I have to solo Ruper today,' and nothing else was going to happen until I did it."

After his accident, Fairchild suffered "raging depression." He climbed again the day his doctor told him he could bear full weight on his legs, and last year, he says, "I had a good summer, back up to 1,500 feet a day, kind of like the old days."

Unhealthy? Not according to Fairchild. "It's like the expression, 'I can stop whenever I want to, but I don't want to,'" he says. "I go to great places, meet interesting people. If that's what addiction is, then I'm happy to have it."

In the 1970s, the prolific Henry Barber climbed as many as 350 days a year. Barber traveled frequently to Great Britain to climb, and he recalls one day climbing at Harrison Rocks, the closest crag to London, then flying home to Boston, borrowing his parents' car, and climbing at Quincy Quarries the same night.

Does he think he was addicted to climbing?

"Oh, yeah, no question," says Barber.

"At a certain level, it's such a mind-saturating activity that you can't be without it," Barber added. "It's not about risk; it's about being tuned in to yourself and the environment. I used to string together 20 or 30 days of that feeling in a row. That's why I became so good at so many kinds of climbing -- I was always looking for that point of breakdown, that point of being pushed out of my mind, that feeling of incredible exhaustion at the end of the day, and then the next day wanting to get out and do it again."

Addiction or passion?

Climbing is permeated with athletes who believe they are addicted to the sport. Anywhere climbers gather -- cheap restaurants, on-line chat rooms, cliff-side campgrounds -- you hear the words, "I'm addicted to climbing." Yet when most climbers speak of their climbing "addiction," they don't really mean a medical condition, like alcoholism or a tobacco addiction. Most likely, they're just super-enthusiastic about the sport. Indeed, many life-long climbers feel that's no such thing as a climbing addiction. Alpinist Jack Tackle, for example, says he doesn't buy the addiction moniker. "I think instead it's about passion. I think the real issue is what makes climbing so unique as a sport or athletic activity that, for serious climbers, it becomes a lifestyle." Dr. Joe Ripperger, a longtime climber and psychiatrist with a practice in Norman, Oklahoma, agrees with Tackle. A true addiction, he says, "involves brain habituation, physical dependence and withdrawal, and dishonesty. [Not all] of these elements are present even when climbing is done excessively," says Ripperger. "To say that climbing is addictive is to say that a workaholic is addicted to work, or a Buddhist monk is addicted to meditation."

Geoff Powter, a clinical psychologist and longtime editor of the Canadian Alpine Journal, says climbers can get habituated to or dependent on climbing, "but to categorize it as addiction takes away from the experience of true addicts, who truly have no choice in what they do. For a junkie, other things that used to be pleasurable are taken over by the habit. For example, sex [for a drug addict] stops being pleasurable. For most climbers, that's certainly not the case." Rather, what "addicted" climbers probably have is a dependency, a strong impulse to climb that takes precedence over almost everything else in their lives. (See "Do you have a climbing dependency" on page 76 for a self-test.) Little research has been directed specifically at the psychology of climbing, but the phenomenon of exercise dependence is well documented among runners, weight lifters, cyclists, swimmers, dancers and other athletes. In clinical tests, die-hard runners who were asked to halt their workouts showed mood changes including pronounced anxiety, depression, irritability, sleeplessness and loss of appetite.

Why do some climbers become dependent on the sport? One reason, says Ripperger, is that climbing is one of only a few sports that affects us in "every major life area: psychological, physical, social and spiritual [the adventurous and aesthetic experience]." Powter believes the psychological and social aspects of climbing are paramount in fostering a dependence on climbing. First among these is the positive reinforcement one gets from non-climbing admirers ("You climbed Everest? That's so cool!") and, more important, from peers ("That dyno was sooo rad!"). For some with climbing dependence, Powter added, climbing is the most -- or only -- fulfilling aspect of their lives. "When these guys go out every day, it's because they don't have anything else in their lives," he says.

Climbing as a drug

Another reason climbers may develop a dependency is because exercise often produces vivid, drug-like senses of pleasure. Climbing causes the brain to release the feel-good chemical dopamine, stimulating the "reward pathways" in the mind. Some researchers speculate that it is, in part, the desire for repeated dopamine charges that leads people to keep drinking, taking drugs or exercising.

Other naturally produced chemicals in the body act similarly to dopamine, including endorphins, which are released in the body after exercise (and are thought to be related to the so-called "runner's high") and adrenaline, which is released in the body when a carabiner suddenly shifts on your fifth tenuous aid placement.

Climbing's rewards also can help reduce so-called "negative affects," such as tension, depression and low self-esteem. You feel down, so you go climbing to feel better. Indeed, exercise is often prescribed to people with depression.

A rare few climbers have mental disorders that may share some symptoms with addiction. Manic depressives (those who alternate uncontrollably between extreme depression and euphoria or irritability), for instance, might pursue climbing at extreme levels because climbing can act as an antidepressant, making them feel normal. "Therefore," says Ripperger, "there may be climbers who need to climb to stay mentally healthy."

Take "John," a longtime climber, skydiver, BASE jumper and solo adventurer who prefers to remain anonymous. Diagnosed manic depressive, he says his life revolves around pushing the envelope. Without extreme adventure, he says, "I just roll up in a ball and die." Even with the aid of climbing or other activities to stabilize their moods, one in five manic depressives commits suicide.

The dangerous quest for "the zone"

Attempting to explain their dependence, many climbers speak of an ongoing quest for the so-called "flow state," an ephemeral feeling that has been described in many sports. In baseball, for example, a hitter "in the zone" sees a pitched ball as fatter, slower and easier to hit than usual. In climbing, once-difficult routes may suddenly, fleetingly and inexplicably feel easy. This feeling of mastery, complete concentration and immersion is both rewarding and rare -- and highly desirable.

Dan Levison of Boulder, Colorado, says his dependence "stems from the euphoric feeling that one feels between successful or meaningful climbs, redpoints, bouldering sessions or summits. The high generated ... is fleeting and requires more climbing."

Not only does the flow state require more climbing, says Ripperger, but also harder challenges. "If a climber has improved his skill, he must also increase the challenge to achieve the flow experience again," he says. "In climbing, this can become dangerous because elite climbers have a tendency to take increasing challenges to life-threatening levels."

Two-time Everest climber Brent Bishop has known many dependent climbers over the years and explains the risks plainly: "Let's not forget that you won't get whacked doing two sessions of aerobics a day, but the number of friends we've lost [in climbing] is startling."

Danger aside, says Bishop, the key element that makes climbing, and particularly mountaineering, take a larger toll on a person's life than other sports is the amount of time that it requires. "Climbing is obsessive," he said, "but the real issue is the opportunity cost of the time it takes to pursue your craft to a relatively high level. If you are obsessive about working out at Gold's Gym, that could take a few hours a day, but if you are excessive about climbing, well, that takes hours a day, plus weekends, plus weeks for small trips, plus months for those bad riders in the Himalayas."

Pete Athans, who summited Everest seven times during a total of 15 expeditions since 1985, regrets that he has not always made enough time for family, relationships and non-climbing work. "The addiction for me is manifold and cuts pretty deep," he says. "In hindsight, I think I would have done fewer trips."

Should you quit?

What should you do if you want to reduce your climbing dependence? Psychiatrists say athletes who want or need to make a change -- usually because the quality of their lives is being impacted -- should seek professional help. "If someone was truly worried about climbing too much, any therapist would likely be able to do something for them," Powter says. "Also, many of the newer anti-depressants work wonders for obsessive-compulsive disorders, and would probably help. And the 12-step programs, like Alcoholics Anonymous, offer a very transferable way of addressing different kinds of addictions."

It's possible, however, that some dependent climbers may be better off because of climbing. One prominent alpinist, who asked not to be named, had a mother who suffered from severe alcohol-related problems. He speculates that he has inherited a family tendency toward addiction, and that high-end climbing is a more positive outlet than other activities he might have taken up. "Obviously, I can't say for sure, but I suspect I have the potential to get hooked on things," he says. "After dealing with my mom's problems and her near death on many occasions, I'm painfully aware of the trappings of substance addiction. Instead, I consume myself with other things."

Ripperger agrees that climbing can be a positive outlet. "I would never ask a [dependent] climber to give up climbing, like giving up an illegal drug of abuse or alcohol," he says. "I would teach that person to bring climbing back into proper perspective. ... This is where psychotherapy or counseling can be helpful."

It has been nearly a decade since that therapist compared me to a crack addict. As I get older, I feel the pull a bit less than I used to. I sometimes leave the climbing shoes behind when I travel. I'll give up a perfectly fine spring day to put in a vegetable garden. Within my group of close climbing friends and partners, I'm among the least dependent.

And yet I realize that, through my choices of work, home and friends, I have devoted much of my life to climbing. I think about it every day. When the sun shines brightly and I choose not to climb, I still feel like I should be climbing. When work or other obligations keep me home, I'm often crabby at the end of the day.

When I do climb, and a route goes well, nothing else offers such a feeling of satisfaction. I could quit anytime. I just don't want to.

SIDEBAR

Do you have a climbing dependency?

The following self-test was developed from similar ones for exercise- and risk-dependence.

1. Have you ever kept climbing plans or purchases of climbing equipment secret from family or friends because you were afraid of how they would react?
2. Have you ever lost a job or gotten in trouble at work because of calling in sick to climb?
3. Have you ever argued with family or friends over your climbing?
4. Do you plan your days around climbing?
5. Have you ever climbed even when you felt sick or exhausted, or when you had an injury?
6. Do you become anxious or depressed if you miss a planned climbing day?
7. Does climbing take precedence over family or social activities?
8. Have you ever ignored a cliff closure in order to climb?
9. Are all or most of your friends climbers?
10. Do you document every climb and training day?

If you answered yes to seven or more of these questions, you may be a dependent climber. Thanks to Jim Cormier and Geoff Powter for some of their ideas.