Inside the Seattle clinic that treats tech addiction like heroin, and clients detox for up to 16 weeks

At age six, Sarah Hill was handed her first iPad by her parents, which she used to play games like Angry Birds and Minecraft whenever she was bored. By age 21, the Alabama native had fallen so deep into virtual reality experiences and playing video games that she’d stopped seeing friends, showering, and brushing her teeth. “If you compare video game and tech addiction to drugs,” she says, “VR is the meth of drugs.”

At college, she spent so much time holed up in her room compulsively accessing a chatbot site...