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Alcohol and drugs effects essay
Alcohol and drugs effects essay
Psychological effects of drug abuse
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I was powerless over drinking and using...
Imagine a cold, unheated apartment in the middle of Hollywood. A bachelor sized apartment. No pictures hanging on the wall, a mattress in the middle of the floor, a hard back folding chair sitting in the middle of the room, a few kitchen utensils and some old pots and pans laid on and around the kitchen stove with no place to go. You could hear the traffic zooming by on Franklin Avenue. When you opened the door with your key, you could see cockroaches running about on the walls and the floors. It felt was cold and smelled awful. The first time I was visited by my then boyfriend, I watched him shoot cocaine, and kept a careful eye on where all the cockroaches were headed. It wasn't long before I allowed him to shoot me up also. It happened in that apartment, the place two sick, suffering addicts, my boyfriend and I, called home. This is the place I remember when I think about taking another drink again. By God's grace, I will never have to go back there again. Thirteen years later, I am still so grateful for my sobriety and abstinence from all mind-altering drugs. I'd like to tell a bit of my story and a bit of my recovery. The feeling I got after cocaine went through my veins, into my brain was like nothing I'd ever felt before. It was sure ecstasy. My body convulsed as the drug took its effect. Time was no longer a part of my world. Who knows how long we spent in that awful apartment. I hallucinated and felt things touch me that weren't real clear to the naked eye. I was truly in another world, an evil, dark world. He always provided the drugs and alcohol. When the drug would start to wear off, panic would set in. I remember wishing I had a gun to kill myself. The pain that set in when my body began to crave more was again like no other feeling I've ever experienced, or want to experience again. I couldn't sleep, I felt extremely hopeless, my body couldn't sit still and my mind would not stop racing. It was absolute hell. Thank God there wasn't a loaded gun around. This is what it was like. I was prey to misery and depression, did not have any real friends, and most of all I hated myself. I knew I could not take any more cocaine. If I did, I wouldn't be writing to you today. However, this is a disease that affects the body, mind and spirit. My mind was gone. If I was offered cocaine, I could not turn it down. I mi...
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... me if I ever injected into my neck veins. I thought-I'll stop before it gets that bad. Later on in my addiction I collapsed veins in both sides of my neck. I said I would NEVER sell my body, but Sept. of 1997 I started doing just that.
While in my current program, I made the difficult decision to have the family that adopted my first child adopt Amanda as well. I know it was the right choice. I have held the same job at a dog grooming shop for a year, and will graduate this program this year. I am saving my money to get a car. I have found some self esteem and forgiveness of myself. I like myself for the first time since early childhood. Next Fall I plan to go to college to get certification to be a Substance Abuse Counselor, or go to school to learn computer animation or computer graphics. I haven't decided yet. I just know that I want to help other addicts. I attend 12-Step meetings, and spend most weekends with my parents or birth mother. I have learned a sense of responsibility and have learned to take care of myself.
I still have hard times, but they are a luxury compared to my problems I faced while on drugs. Just having a nice safe clean bed at night makes me grateful!
Cocaine abuse and dependence affected 1.4 million Americans in 2008 (Volkow, 2010). Cocaine is known for its addictive properties (Letchworth et al., 2001). Therapeutic and medicinal techniques utilized to relieve drug effects and drug seeking behavior have become increasingly popular in the scientific community. In general the affected areas during or after cocaine use have been identified subsequently providing research into the physiological aspects of cocaine use. Research to determine drug-seeking and relapse is imperative due to the prevalence of cocaine use and the rehabilitative qualities a medicinal cure could provide.
When a person takes cocaine, it causes a rush. There is between one or two minutes of intense pleasure. This is followed by five to 8 minutes of euphoria, then as the high comes down, an overwhelming urge for more, which may last for a day. (3) When a user is between cocaine doses or halts usage, the opposite effects occur. The user is depressed and tired (2).
I am committed to achieving this goal because I once doubted that I would ever get to this point in my life. I struggled to always push myself in my undergraduate studies, but now at this point as I am older I am now able to stay committed and get things done. I am excited that I am getting closer to being a clinical counselor. I have always enjoyed listening and helping others out and, being a practitioner scholar in the field of psychology is something I know I will enjoy
cocaine is by far one of the most addicting drugs out there, it's been engulfing
Cocaine, a powdered narcotic derived from the leaves of the cocoa plant, has been a curious participant in the history of several contemporary cultures. Its ubiquity is an outgrowth of its unique and highly effective properties. While cocaine is commonly known as a highly popular recreational drug, its underlying chemical properties, chemical mechanisms, and chemical effects on the human body, offer an understanding of why the drug remains a resilient participant in today’s culture. We explore these chemical characteristics further.
Have you ever felt trapped in your worse nightmare? Do you think you will ever have what it takes to overcome it? I can assure you it is hard but after what I experienced I believe anyone is capable of doing so. When I was younger I didn’t know what the word “psychedelic” meant, or ever thought I would come in contact with one. When I was 16 that naïve way of thinking changed. One of my closest friends Sarah, which I hadn’t seen in months told me she had one of the best experiences of her life trying a psychedelic that goes by the name of LSD. Little did I know I was being introduced to a whole new world. Being young and impulsive, I was intrigued by her story and wanted to experience what she did. I unfortunately made the hasty
The use of cocaine in the United States has declined over the last twenty years while the use of crack has increased. Many people avoided the use of crack because of the harmful chemicals used in creating the drug. One of the reasons why crack became popular is because of not needing to inject the drug hence less risks of being infected by the AIDS virus. Carroll (2000) states cocaine is the most powerful stimulant of natural origin. Most users snort or inject the drug to enable a quicker “high.” Cocaine use brings on many health problems. Fatal complications occur from regular use, for example, liver damage, seizures, elevated blood pressure causing stroke, heart failure, or heart attack.
Cocaine is a powerfully addictive drug of abuse. Individuals who have tried cocaine have described the experience as a powerful high that gave them a feeling of supremacy. However, once someone starts taking cocaine, one cannot predict or control the extent to which he or she will continue to use the drug. The major ways of taking cocaine are sniffing or snorting, injecting, and smoking (including free-base and crack cocaine).
This experience helped me to recognize the internal struggle that a substance abuser faces on a continuous basis. In addition, I know that an individual can have a difficult time changing their behavior even when they have a strong desire to change; the smallest thing can cause a person to relapse.
The first thing we will look at is what drug abuse is. Drug abuse is a condition that results when a person ingests a substance, such as cocaine, or heroin, that can cause pleasure, but the continued use of which becomes compulsive and will start interfering with everyday life, such as school, work, parenting responsibilities, or relationships. Addicts are not generally aware that their own behavior is out of control and are usually oblivious to the problems that they are causing to themselves and to others.(“What is Addiction?” 2014) The longer the addiction and addictive behaviors persist, the worse the person will become, and the more dependent they will become on the drug. The reason it is so hard for an addict to change their ways is because the brain’s chemistry is altered from addiction.
A girl named Sarah who was interviewed by channel 6 “true life on ecstasy “ had done ecstasy for 3 years. However, the mistake in her part was that she had done it almost EVERY day. When she had gotten her brain scanned, she had a brain of a 75-year-old woman who had multiple strokes. Sarah at the time was only 25, but take into consideration that she more than “abused ” the drug.
Many people today view alcohol and drugs very differently than how they were portrayed years ago. In earlier years, there were not that many drugs that were used to save lives as the several different types of drugs that are used today. Today there are drugs used for different treatments for all kinds of diseases. Drugs are a business in which makes billions of dollars, both legally and illegally. Society views drugs majority of the time as something for saving lives, helping society for the better, but many don’t realize the millions of lives it’s destroying. Substance abuse from alcohol, illegal drugs to over the counter drugs and cigarettes can go from a casual once and a while thing to becoming an addiction. Substance abuse can be a huge gateway to addiction that can escalate very quickly. A lot of the time we convince ourselves that people chose to do these drugs so frequently, that addiction is a willing option they do to them-selves. Substance abuse and addiction are more than an individual problem it is a social issue.
This has been a very important lesson for me and my views on addiction because I was “raised” in a facility that promoted twelve step groups and implanted in me that their way was the only way, that the disease concept was real and that medically assisted treatment was the devil. I have watched countless people die because this belief was instilled on them as well, today I work in a medically assisted treatment facility, and as I said before no way if the right way, it’s the path of the
Drug abuse dates as far back as the Biblical era, so it is not a new phenomenon. “The emotional and social damage and the devastation linked to drugs and their use is immeasurable.” The ripple of subversive and detrimental consequences from alcoholism, drug addictions, and addictive behavior is appalling. Among the long list of effects is lost productivity, anxiety, depression, increased crime rate, probable incarceration, frequent illness, and premature death. The limitless consequences include the destruction to personal development, relationships, and families (Henderson 1-2). “Understandably, Americans consider drug abuse to be one of the most serious problems” in the fabric of society. And although “addiction is the result of voluntary drug use, addiction is no longer voluntary behavior, it’s uncontrollable behavior,” says Alan Leshner, director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse (Torr 12-13).
Growing up in Reading, Pennsylvania being raised in a lower class neighborhood by my maternal grandmother, I did not realize how different my life was from those outside my community. It was normal for me to see empty drug baggies on the ground, people coping drugs on the corner, condemned/ abandoned homes, and crime. As I got older and my network of people grew, I started to notice some differences. However, it was not until I left the area at age 18 to attend college did I fully realize that my "normal" was not the "normal." Most people I knew growing up were struggling with finances and had one or both parents addicted to drugs or alcohol and mines were no different. The 80s crack epidemic hit my family hard and by the end of that era my mother and 6 of her siblings were all addicted.