The contrast between drug effects and advertised effects

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Puzzles

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Aug 9, 2009
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So it's that time again where I've been intoxicated and felt the need to bring up a case. In this particular instance, I know that a drug thread pops up here about once a week or more, but I don't want to ask everyones opinion on these intoxicants, instead I'd like to speak specifically to those who have actually used drugs beyond the usual alcohol, nicotine and cannibis.

After work last night, I got to talking with a like minded employee about particular drugs; mostly extacy and cocaine, but the thread will apply to all drugs. The third employee started rolling his eyes, and said that drugs were for idiots - sure, a reasonable response for most of you.

However, I asked him which drugs he had tried to base his opinion on and he said he has never tried anything except alcohol. Long story short, I got into a big rant about how what he thinks drugs do to you and what they actually do are different. I've come across quite a few people who express that they will never try any sort of drug, and fair enough it is a risk with your well being. He seemed to think however, that simply trying a drug meant that you would become addicted to it. I told him that you would need to be very weak willed to end up like this, but acknowledged that it can happen to the best of us in the wrong situation.

What I was more interested in though, was the different perceptions that people with actual real life experience had. I have tried quite a few drugs; I smoke, drink, have tried coke, extacy, MDMA (different effect to extacy pills), shrooms, amphetamines, dexamphetamines (indeed, I am on dexamphetamines as I write this) and so on, plenty of lesser drugs also experiemented with.

I have had almost entirely positive experiences with the drugs I have taken, with the exception of a time when I was quite young and was pressured into taking extacy. I had a bad reaction and for some reason spent the entire night suicidal - opposite the effect one might expect. I have one other negative experience where a friend reacted badly to shrooms (himself an experienced drug user) and he had some very, very bad hallucinations and delusions.

For those of you that have done more than the usual soft drugs, how have your personal experiences differed to what you were told would happen? Have you had mosty positive outcomes, or have you have very bad experiences and now despise drug use? I assume, thought some might not be open to admitting they once used very hard drugs like heroin, that some of you might have once thought drugs to be fantastic but now have very different outlooks after kicking an addiction.

I am sometimes frustrated with government funded adverts saying that if you take drug x, you will die in situation y and so on. Sure this is to protect the main population, but I'd like to know if anything that you have seen via PSA and so on is at all factual. A fair proportion of the people I know experiement with drugs, and many of them are in the top percentage for their specific courses at university, and back in school a lot of the intellectuals tried many drugs and turned out fine..

Without further adue (is this even a word?) I'll leave you to your responses, or else I'll write several pages of my own opinion.
 

Proteus214

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Jul 31, 2009
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I can't speak for myself, but a friend of mine tried extasy and said the experience was awful. It made him all paranoid and hyper and he felt like shit afterward.

I am aware that all the crazy stuff they say in DARE classes isn't necessarily guaranteed to happen, but those kinds of drugs to increase the risk. I am also aware that addiction is a very real risk and I tend to have a slightly addictive personality so I tend to avoid those kinds of things.
 

L4hlborg

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Jul 11, 2009
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I don't take drugs and quite frankly, not planning to take any in the future. I'm not gonna even bother to know what they do to you. If it's illegal, chances are it's not very good for you. You won't necessarily suffer a horrible and painful death, but I would still rather stay sober. I don't even drink or smoke.
 

Lord George

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I don't have to take coke or heroin to know its gonna fuck you up, though having said that the amount of stuff you hear about weed and LSD is just stupid, their both mostly harmless and in my case have even benefited me.
 

Golden Gryphon

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Jun 10, 2009
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I haven't tried any drugs myself but my dad and his brothers between them have tried most things and according to my uncle for every high there is an equal low.
 

I Fiend I

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Jul 16, 2009
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i smoked weed/hash and my heart started beating ultra fast and chest heated up, fingers went numb so i couldnt move them and i thought i was gonna die. went to the doctor he didnt find anything, and im still getting chest pains for 2 years now, im very sensitive to any smoke
 

Aesir23

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While I myself have never taken any drugs (and I don't plan to except for Ritalin, but I have ADD so that's needed), when my Mother was young she had tried Cocaine. She told me it made her feel very paranoid and she basically spent the entire time sitting in a corner.

My next door neighbour was addicted to some crazy stuff for a long time. My brother and I have talked to him about it but never too in depth. Though he does have scars all over his arms from scratching himself up while he was high.
 

TheMatt

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Jan 26, 2009
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Puzzles said:
The only drugs I have not done are crack and heroine (or anything else injected, i like shagging too much to risk HIV and crack is named after a part of my butt, so that was out).

All of them are awesome. Some are more awesome then others. No effects really took me by surprise as I was told what would happen by experienced drug users.

To re-iterate, all of them are awesome. NOONE gets addicted on their first go.. I do coke maybe once every 6 months and I NEVER feel OMG I need MORE!!! (except for when I am on it, but that's par for the course.)

My favourite misinformed opinion that the general public has are the police busts you see in the paper. It's all like 'Grow house busted: 1000 plants taken - Street Value of 10 million!!!" I am always like OMG, those must be the biggest plants ever grown EVER and the cops find them every other weekend. i got half a pound off a plant once and I figured I was some sort of growing god, that is NOTHING compared to what the cops come up with.
 

Proteus214

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Jul 31, 2009
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I Fiend I said:
i smoked weed/hash and my heart started beating ultra fast and chest heated up, fingers went numb so i couldnt move them and i thought i was gonna die. went to the doctor he didnt find anything, and im still getting chest pains for 2 years now, im very sensitive to any smoke
Don't feel bad, sometimes people just have a bad reaction to it. You may even be allergic to it.
shewolf51 said:
While I myself have never taken any drugs (and I don't plan to except for Ritalin, but I have ADD so that's needed), when my Mother was young she had tried Cocaine. She told me it made her feel very paranoid and she basically spent the entire time sitting in a corner.

My next door neighbour was addicted to some crazy stuff for a long time. My brother and I have talked to him about it but never too in depth. Though he does have scars all over his arms from scratching himself up while he was high.
Sounds like meth to me.
 

crooked_ferret

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Jul 30, 2009
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I only tried cocaine, the second I started coming off of it I just wanted more and more and more, and never touched the stuff again realizing that I obviously was going to have a problem with it if I did. Meth, I've used a few times, if it's used in drastic moderation it's basically just a super charged energy booster, it is however very easy to take too much and just wind up awake for two days and so mentally burned out at the end that you can barely think at all. I did some LSD back in high school and didn't see anything wrong with it in moderation, though it's also something I wouldn't do alone at the same time.

Most these drugs just require a level of personal responsibility that is horribly lacking in our society. People very quickly want to blame everything but themselves for their actions, and on the whole the world and media seem to support this. People burning themselves with obviously hot coffee can sue the people that sold them the coffee. People blame video games on violent behavior while the fact that it's a thousandth of a percent of people that play that actually act out.

In general I have just stuck with cannabis, it's mild and let's me just sit back and release all my stress and enjoy a good game or movie. I've never even really been an alcohol drinker, I've always found it to enhance my violent side and I just don't really like that feeling.

In the end I suppose anything done in proper moderation with some consideration is okay. As you stated in your initial post though many people...

Puzzles said:
He seemed to think however, that simply trying a drug meant that you would become addicted to it. I told him that you would need to be very weak willed to end up like this, but acknowledged that it can happen to the best of us in the wrong situation.


I am sometimes frustrated with government funded adverts saying that if you take drug x, you will die in situation y and so on. Sure this is to protect the main population
The second part to an extent I think is a responsible action, however, they always take everything to the absolute extreme. I think this is also in error, if you are going to make someone aware of something the honest truth is always the best path to take in my opinion, and this hasn't been the approach with any of the anti-drug campaigning I've ever seen.

The fact remains of all these substances, I remain addicted to only one. The nicotine in my cigarettes despite paying money, using tricks, and willpower, I can not go a single day without a cig without my nerves being on end and being ready to have a freak out on the next person that speaks to me. Yet, this is the one that is legal. Of all the above mentioned drugs I can go without them and in fact don't use any of them but cannabis anymore, and even it I can go without for months without any negative effects or urges.

There's a double standard here and lies wrapped up in lies that have lead to an underground culture that practically begs for errant behavior and lifestyles associated with them. I don't know exactly what you were trying to get at but I find myself agreeing with the majority of what you said.
 

ADarkHorse

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Feb 1, 2009
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Firstly, I Fiend I, you wimp, don't be such a hypochondriac.
MDMA, who doesn't love MDMA? Fun lovey drug! keeps you dancing all night and the feeling you get as you come up of a nice big bomb is unmatched. My personal favorite.
Coke is a bit of a waste of money in my opinion, for the same price you could get a gram of some tasty MDMA and have a far more enjoyable night! Good for a long night heavy drinking however!
Pills (E's/speed/MDMA/whatever else) are generally good, but obviously depending what they're cut with can send you a bit off kilter. My advice is stick with the well known brands, white rolexes, blue fantasias or whatever and STAY AWAY from speckled brown pills.
Ketamine is fun and cheap but can be dark if you fall in the k-hole, it's the strongest hallucinogenic I've ever had (Stronger than acid or 'shrooms) though it doesn't last too long. Last time I went there I was seeing in TRON vision, blue outlines on everything that glowed in response to sound.
'shrooms are very very enjoyable round a bonfire with a few mates, funny times with mild to medium trippyness, I'm not a massive fan of munching *loads* though, just enough to get me in a nice place..
Weed, not a fan, any more at least, used to love it but developed an intolerance to it, now even the smell of it can send me running to the toilet. Shame really as I miss the feeling.

As for all the above, it is my firm belief they are best enjoyed in moderation, have fun but don't be a dick!
 

Booze_Hound

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Aug 1, 2009
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crooked_ferret said:
The fact remains of all these substances, I remain addicted to only one. The nicotine in my cigarettes despite paying money, using tricks, and willpower, I can not go a single day without a cig without my nerves being on end and being ready to have a freak out on the next person that speaks to me. Yet, this is the one that is legal. Of all the above mentioned drugs I can go without them and in fact don't use any of them but cannabis anymore, and even it I can go without for months without any negative effects or urges.

There's a double standard here and lies wrapped up in lies that have lead to an underground culture that practically begs for errant behavior and lifestyles associated with them. I don't know exactly what you were trying to get at but I find myself agreeing with the majority of what you said.
You've hit the crux there, alcohol and tobacco fall within the middle of the harm/depedency graph (google it), and are for more dangerous than many other drugs such as cannabis. Yet both are legal.
 

gravitron89

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Aug 1, 2009
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Wow, its funny how many people here aren't even trying to answer the questions asked. Just chucking in their two cents on how if its illegal its bad for you. Drugs you get from the doctors are generally speaking far more harmful to the body (not taking into account the possibilities of impurities in street drugs). We run on chemicals, that's what all living things do. People need to clear up their definition of "drugs" before pointing the finger. Viagra is a harmful drug but some people use it as a tool to better their quality of life, the same can be said for psychedelics. If one wishes to address their emotional issues head on there are tools out there, but so many people are unprepared and illinformed and end up misusing these tools.

To answer your question:
What you read about drugs and what the drugs effects are like are ALWAYS going to be different, language is a very basic tool when it comes to trying to record abstract thoughts for another person to perfectly understand. I have had experiences on mushrooms that have lasted only a few moments but I could write you a whole book on what that moment was really like for me and the thoughts it opened up to myself. The best way to answer your question (reading between the lines a bit and judging by your list) is by directing you to someone who has said it much better than I ever could.


"Ever since the first couple of times i'd taken it in my early twenties, I'd always maintained a great interest in heroin. I'd sort of fallen in love with the warmth of it - the way it felt like crawling back into the womb. I always knew it would be the one, because it was the only drug that did what was promised.

I won't lapse into saying it did exactly what it said on the tin, because i despise advert- authoritised idioms, but heroin delivered. LSD kind of does a bit, especially when all the things that are familiar to you peel away and you suddenly realise the fragility of how you normally see the world. Marijuana kind of doesn't really, although it's a laugh for a while. (I say that having smoked it constantly for a decade). Alcohol makes you sick and give you a headache. Crack is like inhaling plastic, but so brief and flimsy and brittle as a high. Normal cocaine just makes you nervous, amphetamines are even worse, and ecstacy never really agreed with me. But heroin gets the job done.

What it mainly does is take you right out of reality, and plant you somewhere more manageable. In short, it contextualises everything else as meaningless.
All of us, I think. have a vague idea that we're missing something. Some say that thing is God; that the longing we feel- be it for a lover, or a football team, or a drug - is merely an inappropriate substitute for the longing we're supposed to feel for God, for oneness, for truth. And what heroin does really successfully is objectify that need.

My mate Karl once told me he'd been looking after this five-year-old boy who- not knowing enough to have an ironic inflection to his words- said "I want something" He didnt know what it was. Not "I want sweets" or "a can of Coke" or "to watch the Tweenies", but "I want something". All of us, I think, have that feeling. And what heroin does when you first start taking it is tell you what that something is."
"from then on the idea of need is no longer an abstract thing, but a longing in your belly, and a kicking in your legs and a shivering in your arms, and sweat on your forehead and a dull pallor on your face." - Russell Brand
 

crooked_ferret

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Booze_Hound said:
crooked_ferret said:
The fact remains of all these substances, I remain addicted to only one. The nicotine in my cigarettes despite paying money, using tricks, and willpower, I can not go a single day without a cig without my nerves being on end and being ready to have a freak out on the next person that speaks to me. Yet, this is the one that is legal. Of all the above mentioned drugs I can go without them and in fact don't use any of them but cannabis anymore, and even it I can go without for months without any negative effects or urges.


There's a double standard here and lies wrapped up in lies that have lead to an underground culture that practically begs for errant behavior and lifestyles associated with them. I don't know exactly what you were trying to get at but I find myself agreeing with the majority of what you said.
You've hit the crux there, alcohol and tobacco fall within the middle of the harm/depedency graph (google it), and are for more dangerous than many other drugs such as cannabis. Yet both are legal.
well the OP didn't want us to get into it, but anyone that knows the truth knows that cannabis being made illegal had nothing to do with it's effects as a drug.
http://www.venusproject.com/ethics_in_action/Real_Reason_Hemp_Illegal.html
 

gravitron89

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Aug 1, 2009
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Oh I thought I would add. I have taken magic mushrooms, lsd, lsa, mdma, methylone, valium, weed codeine, sleeping tablets, NOS, speed, ketamine, mescaline and a large handful of legals. None of them I found particularly addictive apart from sleeping tablets and weed. Weed is a ***** to kick because of the embedding of it in ones social culture. Watch out for regretamine, people get very messy on it and assume they had a good time because they cant remember. Its sad. Never touch coke in my opinion. No-one gives it a good review overall (pros/cons). No-one.
 

Tossth Esalad

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Jul 11, 2009
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Apart from the run of the mill substances(which i use quite often), I've tried amfetamine and LSD, once each.

The amfetamine was a resounding disappointment, manifesting itself as the equvilent of a big caffine high...

LSD on the other hand, was, eh, interesting. It started out great, as in "I can see the music dude!", but ended up beliving that Papa Smurf was going to kill me. Yeah, Papa Smurf...
 

gravitron89

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shewolf51 said:
While I myself have never taken any drugs (and I don't plan to except for Ritalin, but I have ADD so that's needed), when my Mother was young she had tried Cocaine. She told me it made her feel very paranoid and she basically spent the entire time sitting in a corner.

My next door neighbour was addicted to some crazy stuff for a long time. My brother and I have talked to him about it but never too in depth. Though he does have scars all over his arms from scratching himself up while he was high.
You do realise that ritalin is a methamphetamine analogue yeah? Chucking ritalin at kids who have 'ADD' bothers me. Drugging them up as opposed to teaching them how to focus. Positive change always comes from within.
 

HentMas

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Apr 17, 2009
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well... a friend of mine went to see a guru for a guided session of shrooms (if you know something about shrooms, they had used them a lot in Aztek times to comunicate with the gods, and in some places here in Mexico people preserve that tradition) soo well, the guru (or shaman or whatever) starts the rithual and after some mumbo jumbo he didn´t understood (he went only to get high, didn´t really cared about the tradition) he got the shrooms and experienced a vission where a cow standing in the middle of a huge green field started talking to him

"Arthur (not his real name) WHY MUST YOU KILL ME!?"

"huh??" my fiend answered

"WHY must you take my flesh and my meat and eat me!?, i have never done anything to you! what harm could i possibly have done to you? WHY MUST YOU KILL ME AND EAT ME!?"

"i am sorry cow, but what else could i do?"

the cow started to cry

"you must do as you see best, just remember, i have never harmed you, question yourselve, WHY MUST YOU KILL ME?"

sooooooo, afret a huge freak out in wich the guru had to stop the session and pull him back to his senses, my friend explained everything he saw to the guru

the guru got al serious and said "indeed, you have crossed the barrier of our mortal coils (i dont know if this is the correct translation), you have discovered another aspect of yourselve, do not fear, no harm will come to you, you need to meditate upon what happened"

hahaha, soo yeah, my friend stopped eating cow meat for a year...

quite a story huh? oh, and i have only smoked pot, so i think you dont care about my own storyes
 

Deleted

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Jul 25, 2009
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Maybe on my deathbed I'll take a puff of some strong stuff to die happy. I know people who took drugs and they tell me you just see crazy colors and dream for a while.