A woman sharing with humor her experience with dual disorders / dual diagnosis, or being a mentally ill chemical abuser. She compares taking medication to Step 3 of the 12 Steps because, just like in Step 3, we have no idea what surrender to a Higher Power is going to do to us. See the video at TheAddictionChannel.com
Please take a moment to comment, write a post,or subscribe to our RSS feed!
The next time you hear that cocaine is not addictive, or that "a liitle can't hurt you", remember-Cocaine Lies.
Cocaine affects your brain. The word “cocaine” refers to the drug in both a powder (cocaine) and crystal (crack) form. It is made from the coca plant and causes a short-lived high that is immediately followed by opposite, intense feelings of depression, edginess, and a craving for more of the drug. Cocaine may be snorted as a powder, converted to a liquid form for injection with a needle, or processed into a crystal form to be smoked.
Cocaine affects your body. People who use cocaine often don’t eat or sleep regularly. They can experience increased heart rate, muscle spasms, and convulsions. If they snort cocaine, they can also permanently damage their nasal tissue.
Cocaine affects your emotions. Using cocaine can make you feel paranoid, angry, hostile, and anxious, even when you’re not high.
Cocaine is addictive. Cocaine interferes with the way your brain processes chemicals that create feelings of pleasure, so you need more and more of the drug just to feel normal. People who become addicted to cocaine start to lose interest in other areas of their life, like school, friends, and sports.
Cocaine can kill you. Cocaine use can cause heart attacks, seizures, strokes, and respiratory failure. People who share needles can also contract hepatitis, HIV/AIDS, or other diseases.
Know the law. Cocaine–in any form–is illegal.
Stay informed. Even first-time cocaine users can have seizures or fatal heart attacks.
Know the risks. Combining cocaine with other drugs or alcohol is extremely dangerous. The effects of one drug can magnify the effects of another, and mixing substances can be deadly.
Be aware. Cocaine is expensive. Regular users can spend hundreds and even thousands of dollars on cocaine each week.
Stay in control. Cocaine impairs your judgment, which may lead to unwise decisions around sexual activity. This can increase your risk for HIV/AIDS, other diseases, rape, and unplanned pregnancy.
Look around you. The vast majority of teens aren’t using cocaine. According to a 2002 study, less than 1 percent of teens are regular cocaine users. In fact, 97 percent of teens have never even tried cocaine.1
How can you tell if a friend is using cocaine? Sometimes it’s tough to tell. But there are signs you can look for. If your friend has one or more of the following warning signs, he or she may be using cocaine or other illicit drugs:
Women and men tend to have different types of stress-related psychological disorders. Women have greater rates of depression and some types of anxiety disorders than men, while men have greater rates of alcohol-use disorders than women. A new study of emotional and alcohol-craving responses to stress has found that when men become upset, they are more likely than women to want alcohol.
Please take a moment to comment, write a post,or subscribe to our RSS feed!
Probing the biology of cannabis addiction.
Addiction expert Barbara Mason of the Scripps Research Institute of La Jolla, California, will oversee a four-year study of the neurobiology of marijuana dependence under a grant from the National Institute of Drug Abuse (NIDA).
The comprehensive project will involve both animal and human research, and will make use of state-of-the-art functional brain imaging. The federal grant will also be used as seed money for the new Translational Center on the Clinical Neurobiology of Cannabis Addiction at the Scripps Institute.
Mason, director of the Laboratory of Clinical Psychopharmacology at Scripps, told reporters in San Diego that the research, which will also be conducted at several universities, is important work: “People are deciding every day whether to use or not to use marijuana, for medical purposes or otherwise, and there is little scientific information to advise this decision.” Mason has previously done work on medical therapies for alcoholism, and on the connections between alcoholism and depression.
An article by Terri Somers in the San Diego Union-Tribune quoted Dr. Mark Gold, an addiction expert from the University of Florida: “While treatments have been developed for addictions from alcohol to nicotine and narcotics, none exists for the cannabis dependent. This research will help the field define what cannabis is and is not, and how to treat it.”
Among the withdrawal symptoms common to heavy pot smokers, according to Mason, are anxiety, anger, sleep disturbances, and bad dreams. In earlier research, Mason discovered that those seeking treatment for cannabis addiction tended to cluster in two age groups—college age and mid-50s.
The research coincides with a growing belief in the psychiatric community that cannabis dependence is real and verifiable, despite years of assertions to the contrary.
There is at present a small and controversial body of clinical research, which strongly suggests the existence of a marijuana discontinuation syndrome. Dr. Gold and others believe that roughly one out of every ten pot smokers is at risk for marijuana dependence and withdrawal.
Photo credit: Kevin Fung, Scripps Research Institute
See also:
Marijuana Withdrawal
The Addiction Channel.com RSS
