Category: LGBTQ

Designer and Synthetic Drugs

Designer and Synthetic Drugs

Articles, Australia, Education, International, LGBTQ, Malaysia, Understanding Addiction, United Kingdom, United States

Designer and Synthetic Drugs. As if the long list of dangerous and illegal substances was not enough. There is now a whole host of synthetic chemicals which have flooded the Australia in recent years. Many of these substances have already established a foothold in the United States and Europe. Frequently lumped together under the name of “bath salts”. These synthetic and so-called designer drugs go by names like kronic, K2, spice and flakka, to name just a few.

These chemicals are synthetic compounds manufactured in China and Pakistan. They are designed to mimic the effects of more popular but illegal substances. Since the chemicals have not come under regulatory scrutiny, they are technically legal.

Collectively, the designer and synthetic drugs are meant to induce similar effects as cocaine, methamphetamine, and LSD. Since they are not tested or regulated in any way, their effects have turned out to be disastrous in many instances. There are numerous cases of young people committing suicide while under the influence of some of these drugs. The overall health effects are largely unknown. What is certain is that all of these synthetic drugs have proven to be dangerous to users and to the public.

The United Nations office of Drugs and Crime has taken notice of these synthetic drugs. The UNODC reported that there has been a “multitude of new psychoactive substances” that have emerged across the world in the last five years. They also stated that these drugs have spread rapidly as they find increasing markets worldwide. This same report stated that over 3000 new chemical substances has emerged to compete with illegal drugs which are difficult to obtain and are expensive. These synthetic designer drugs are also specifically engineered to circumvent existing drug laws and regulations.

Control of these substances is difficult. As one chemical becomes known and comes under regulatory scrutiny in any given nation, the manufacturers are able to alter a small part of the chemical makeup of these chemicals and render them undetectable again. This makes any kind of reasonable understanding of the chemicals impossible for the time being.

The nightmarish scenarios associated with these drugs are numerous. Cases of suicide and bizarre acts of violence have been attributed to the use of these drugs. The overall effect of most of the designer drugs is a combination of aggression, hyper-stimulation and hallucination and this is potentially deadly. Since these chemicals are not regulated, they are easy for young people to obtain. For this reason, younger people have been the victims of these drugs.

Education seems to be the most effective way of combatting the use of these chemicals. An untested and chemical is simply dangerous. No matter the how “legal” the drug may be, it is an unknown and unregulated mind-altering chemical and should be avoided.

The simple conclusion regarding designer and synthetic drugs is avoid them. There is no such thing as a safe drug. Even aspirin has side effects and to imagine that a chemical designed to induce intense stimulation and hallucinations is safe is just not reasonable.

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Cocaine Addiction

New Information on Cocaine Addiction

Articles, Australia, Celebrity Rehab, Education, International, LGBTQ, Malaysia, Understanding Addiction, United Kingdom, United States

It is widely known and understood that cocaine is dangerously addictive. Cocaine addiction can be fatal. Prolonged abuse of cocaine causes heart attacks, among other catastrophic consequences. The long term health problems associated with cocaine use are devastating. Once thought to be the “harmless” recreational drug, cocaine emerged after the 1980s as especially deadly and addictive. New research suggests that cocaine is even more addictive the people once thought.

Even now, there are those who believe they can use cocaine more or less recreational. That casual use of cocaine is not necessarily addiction to cocaine. A recent study at McGill University in Montreal, Canada has shown that signs of addiction to cocaine arise as early as the first use.

Researchers demonstrated even after using cocaine one time, subjects of the study responded to visual cues of cocaine use with the same responses as those who were fully addicted. When casual cocaine users were shown visual signs of cocaine, the presence of the drug for instance, their bodies released dopamine in the areas to the brain responsible for driving cravings.

Dopamines are the pleasure-inducing chemicals which drugs generally stimulate in our brains and nervous systems. For people who are addicted to certain types of drugs such as cocaine, the release of dopamine in the brain plays a massive part in the cycle of craving and increased drug use. Thus the cycle of addiction is a circuit of release and craving stimulated by dopamine. That casual users of cocaine exhibited this response is reason for concern.

It is generally accepted that cocaine users, those who have not become fully over-run by the cycle of addiction, are safe with respect to sign of addiction. That a cocaine user can stop using the drug until they have consciously decided to use again generally indicates that this person is not addicted. This study by McGill University forces us to question this assumption.

 At this stage, this study does not suggest that casual users of cocaine are necessarily dependent on the drug. What the study does show is that the patterns of addiction are in place long before people begin to show more obvious signs of addiction. The real benefit to this study is to facilitate a more heightened awareness of just how addictive cocaine can be.

Those who feel they may have a trouble managing the so-called recreational aspect of cocaine may wish to consider that dependence may be taking hold more quickly than they once thought. Certainly those who provide treatment for cocaine addiction would need to consider this study as they evaluate how far advanced a patient’s addiction may be. It seems likely that, where we once may have assumed a short out-patient treatment would have been sufficient, a more long-term and comprehensive in-patient treatment could be warranted in more cases than previously thought.

The simple conclusion to all of this is that cocaine is far more addictive than anyone realized. Far from the “safe” drug of the 1970s, cocaine is insidious in the way it manipulates brain chemistry, and it creates addictive patterns much easier than anyone imagined.

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Violence and Ice Addiction

Violence and Ice Addiction

Articles, Australia, Education, International, LGBTQ, Malaysia, Understanding Addiction, United Kingdom, United States

Ice, or methamphetamine, remains a persistent problem in Australia. The epidemic numbers of people addicted to ice in Australia has created a plethora of social issues beyond the obvious health crisis these drugs cause. The impact on families and communities branches into all aspects of life. Of the many problems that attend ice addiction, the tendency for some addicts to become violent is a very real worry.

The violence associated with ice abuse and addiction stems in some measure from the desperation of the drug addict who struggles to maintain his or her dependency as their resources dwindle. This can be true of all addiction, especially addiction to illegal street drugs. Yet, ice seems to have a stigma at least of being associated with violent behavior.

Some of this violent behavior is attributable to the particular nature of methamphetamine. Ice has the effect of depriving users of sleep to such an extreme degree that the psychological toll can become on the order of psychotic episodes. Being sleep deprived for days at a time, coupled with the manic effects of the drug itself has fueled psychological problems which inevitably turn violent.

In addition to the side effects of prolonged sleep deprivation. Ice directly and negatively effects the function of the limbic system which plays a role in controlling anger. Methamphetamine seriously compromises the proper function of the limbic system so that ice users, who are already in a severely debilitated state, have little control over their responses to stress and frustration. All of this obviously tends to lead to violent outbursts.

However, the general problem of violence and ice addiction is largely due to the direct effects of the drug itself. Methamphetamine is simply dangerous on all counts and leads to psychotic and violent behavior. One study showed that as many as one fourth of ice users had experienced psychotic episodes while using the drug or coming down form the drug in the last year. These episodes are characterized by extreme paranoia and desperation. Many of them leading to acts of violence.  

Authorities throughout Australia have expressed concern over the violence which attends widespread ice addiction. Just the sheer drive to keep using the drug seems to fuel the violence associated with it. Dealing with the violence remains one challenge among many but these are the effects of the drug. Treating addiction to methamphetamine would interrupt the problem altogether.

Methamphetamine is dangerously addictive. But there are highly effective treatment programs available to get people out of the nightmare of this drug. Beginning with medically assisted withdrawal regimens designed to alleviate the complex of withdrawal symptoms, to a long-term program of recovery, effective treatments are easily accessible to Australians.

DARA Drug and Alcohol Rehab of Thailand is easily reached from Australia. Working with state of the art and medically proven techniques for full treatment, DARA helps people break the cycle of ice addiction and guides people to life free of addiction. The best way to stop the violence associated with ice addiction is to treat the addiction.

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Relapse Prevention

Mindfulness and Relapse Prevention

Alternative Treatment, Articles, Australia, Education, International, LGBTQ, Malaysia, Treatment, Understanding Addiction, United Kingdom, United States

Moving beyond initial treatment is both a blessing and time of anxiety. As we move on from the first steps toward living free of addiction. We can feel the weight of addiction off of us. Most people are tremendously relieved to think of a life that will not involve the endless machinations required to obtain drugs, to have enough money, and to just survive. On the other hand, this new life is frightening. How will we deal with the triggers and temptations which lie before us?

All treatment programs will offer training on relapse prevention. There are as many programs for preventing a relapse as there are treatment programs. One of the emerging ideas in relapse prevention which is gaining serious traction in mindfulness.

Mindfulness involves a program of meditation and general awareness which seeks to free people form the negative judgments and reactions which are programed into us. All of us have a lifetime of personal and social expectations as to how we are supposed to respond to things in life. Even as we experience our own internal thoughts and feelings, we assign judgments to those thoughts and feelings. Mindfulness seeks to re-direct those judgments.

In the early days of sobriety we are likely to encounter situations which offer triggers. These are situations which make us want to use, and as addicted people, we generally use without any reflection at all. As we apply mindfulness to these moments, we are asked to take time to go ahead and experience the mix of feelings and thoughts. Rather than attempting to control those thoughts, mindfulness asks that we simply allow them to flow through our minds.

It seems that by relaxing our judgments in these situations. We are able to experience negative feelings and thoughts which are the substance of triggers in such a way that the power of these triggers is taken away. If we can work with techniques of meditation and quiet thought, the triggers do not overwhelm us.

What practitioners of mindfulness offer is a program of relaxation and meditation. This requires some training and practice. But over time, we can internalize these practices such that they become our immediate response to stressful or negative situations.

The idea here is that we cannot change our behavior until we change our minds. Changing our minds requires a program of exercise just like working our muscles. The types of reactions we have to stressful and negative situations are learned behaviors. We were not born to treat anxiety with alcohol, for example. Given this, we can learn new ways of thinking about situations in life and this will inevitably lead to new behaviors. Behaviors which do not involve drugs and alcohol.

As we move beyond treatment and rehab we can take the methods and practices of mindfulness with us. These practices do not require counselors or support groups, although there are groups who support and practice mindfulness. We need only learn the meditation techniques and develop the habit of applying these the moment we encounter triggers and difficult situations.

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dealing with cravings

Dealing with Cravings

Articles, Australia, Education, International, LGBTQ, Malaysia, Treatment, Understanding Addiction, United Kingdom, United States

Dealing with Cravings – The nagging problem of cravings is familiar to anyone who has ever dealt with addiction. This is the central rub for addiction. People can tell themselves again and again that they do not want to use. They know if they use that there will be consequences, maybe even death. However, there is something that flares in the minds of addicted people which drives them to use in spite of their own wills to not use. However much they want to be sober, the craving for alcohol, for heroin, for any substance will not relent.

Treatment and counseling will address this problem first off. Inpatient treatment in some ways is specifically designed to lift a person out of their environment and create a space where those cravings can be met with something other than the substance. Some treatment options remind people that the cravings do fade over time. The severity and immediacy of the craving will eventually go away. However, many people report that the cravings return, sometimes many years later. Addicted people need a real method for dealing with cravings.

One method involves using a specific understanding of exactly what constitutes a craving. One researcher and counselor suggests that we can handle cravings by understanding them. The craving is in reality a thing of the past. Its present weight and immediacy is an illusion.

Whatever drives the craving comes from something we did or experienced long ago. We started using because of a trauma or some form of abuse, for example. Without diminishing those moments, we can also remind ourselves that those things are not happening now and the behaviors we developed to handle those terrible times and feelings are equally in the past.

Either with a counselor, in a group, or with a therapists patients in treatment are encouraged to experience the moment of craving then taught to allow that feeling to slide along a continuum of time. Reaching back to all the times one experience the craving, all the way back to the kinds of feelings and experiences which led to substance abuse. By doing this patients can begin to see that the craving is part of something else. The craving is no longer an undeniable drive to use. It becomes a part of long series of moments and feelings none of which are actually bearing down on them at that time. The moment of craving can be re-directed.

It would seem that this insurmountable craving is not quite an inevitable feature of sober life. Many people fear recovery because they cannot imagine a life that is not characterized by a constant “need” to use. Facing the cravings without using becomes the very thing which prevents proper recovery. By addressing the fact of cravings in a way that takes the mystery, inevitability, and pain out of cravings, patients can see recovery for what it is: relief from suffering rather than a different form of suffering. What is more, this method of recognizing and dealing with cravings can be taken well beyond the time of initial treatment. It is a skill that can be learned and carried throughout a sober life. 

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