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Before and after pictures of methamphetamine users:
www.oregonlive.com/news/ore...llery.ssf
www.oregonlive.com/news/ore...llery.ssf
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Re: Sick Sad Meth
Sun, January 30, 2005 - 12:10 PMJezus Christ.
I read that it is a growing epidemic in rural areas. -
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Re: Sick Sad Meth
Sun, January 30, 2005 - 2:26 PMI know it's really bad around here. I can't tell you how many kids I've worked with who know adults/parents/friends with meth labs. It's like these really uneducated people making these really bad drugs from stuff they read on the Internet. Not good. And it's true, a lot of it is from out of town rural areas, although I think it's really bad in Memphis, too. Lots of poverty here. -
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Re: Sick Sad Meth
Sun, January 30, 2005 - 2:30 PMwww.prescottaz.com/meth/danger.htm
Jeebus...
"Three stations will air the five-part feature "Meth in Tennessee" next week (Jan. 24-28) during the 8 a.m. hour of "Morning Edition." According to the Drug Enforcement Agency, the number of methamphetamine lab seizures in Tennessee tripled in the past three years. The state accounts for 75 percent of the labs seized in the Southeast, and up to 600 children might be removed this year from homes doubling as meth labs." -
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Re: Sick Sad Meth
Sun, January 30, 2005 - 5:27 PMThat's damn sick and sad alright.
I saw a bilboard when I was in Stockton put up by the sheriff's department:
"Know the location of a meth lab? Call us!" -
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Re: Sick Sad Meth
Tue, February 1, 2005 - 8:07 AMmy god
that is horrifying... -
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Re: Sick Sad Meth
Wed, August 17, 2005 - 7:53 AMStart here:
flickr.com/photos/mmokr.../photostream/
Keep clicking next until you see the whole series. -
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Re: Sick Sad Meth
Wed, August 17, 2005 - 10:10 PMOkay, devil's advocado time. Correlation is not causation. What other lifestyle choices are these people making?
Not saying that meth didn't do it, but... -
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Re: Sick Sad Meth
Wed, August 17, 2005 - 10:54 PMOK sure. Um, what other things do that to people. Yes, it's correlational that people on meth don't eat, but then sometimes correlational things correlate because of the causation. There are so many of those photo series. I've been thinking about it a lot because I've been working with a former meth addict. And there really is a screw loose with this woman. She was telling me today that "Oh, BTW, there was another DUI. I had a flat tire. I tried to fix it. I couldn't, so I went to sleep in my car. The police officer woke me up. I happened to be drunk so I got a DUI." She says she's off the meth now, but her ability to think is so bizarre. Her lies are bizarre. But then, I didn't meet her before.
Meth is freaky stuff. It's really bad here. I've had to test more than one kid who was in foster care because their home was a meth lab. The Sudafed isn't put out so people can pick it up. There are cards with the description on them, and you have to bring them to the pharmacist.
I took a picture:
proactivebusybody.com/images/...1047.jpg -
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This is the maximum depth. Additional responses will not be threaded.
Re: Sick Sad Meth
Wed, August 17, 2005 - 11:03 PMIt is, indeed, freaky, but I've known a great many meth users who haven't turned out looking like the Crypt Keeper. I always get a little antsy when worst-case scenarios are presented as typical.
But I hear you. From what I understand, it is getting a little unhinged in the heartland. -
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Re: Sick Sad Meth
Thu, August 18, 2005 - 4:55 AMDo you know many meth users who aren't addicted? The word on the street is that casual use just doesn't exist, that once people start with it, they just don't stop. -
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Re: Sick Sad Meth
Thu, August 18, 2005 - 12:58 PMI know a good many people who are occassional meth users and only one or two I'd say who have an obvious problem.
As with any drug, it's about your usage pattern. There's a big difference between doing a few bumps on Friday night and smoking out every day just to make it through life.
My casual observation is that meth pushes people toward a tipping point. You feel down, life seems complex and hopeless, you take a little meth, you feel better, more optimisitic, everything is great, you come down, you want that feeling back, you do a little more meth. Eventually, you get to a point where not only does life seem complex and hopeless, but now your refrigerator has been disassembled and turned into an art car, so you do a little more meth and decide that it's really cool to have an art car in your kitchen.
This pattern doesn't necessarily emerge if you've got a good job, like your life and feel generally good. Taking meth in these circumstances probably won't send you into a spiral because you're not running from misery.
I don't buy the analysis that the drug itself (like heroin) is so compellingly seductive that it can suck your life away. Rarely do I hear the "my life was great, I was really happy, then I started doing meth..." story. Usually, it's "my life sucked, I started doing meth, I felt better, and now my life sucks even worse." -
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Re: Sick Sad Meth
Thu, August 18, 2005 - 5:40 PMI don't think it's because the drug is seductive that people are so very addicted. I think it's because it's an incredibly addictive drug, in a more chemical way. I'm not one for mind over matter when it comes to addiction. I've seen that one fail too many times. I just always wondered why one would try heroine, or try meth, drugs notoriously known for their addictive and life-ruining qualities. Yes, cigarettes are just as addictive, but they don't tend to ruin your entire life in the same way. I can tell you read that epidemic-of-bike-parts-all-over-the-place article, too!
But then, I know that at the very center of what we're talking about, I'm fairly anti-drug (not in a moral sense - more an into-keeping-my-wits-about-me sense), and you're not, so I'm much more cautious and conservative. You're more open-minded. And not to get COMPLETELY off the topic here, but I think it has a helluva lot to do with the differences in our baseline brains. You work hard to stop concentrating all the time. And I'll do anything to start!
So we've pretty much gotta acknowledge that you're going to me skeptical about the pictures you saw, and I'm going to be skeptical about the meth-is-fine-for-weekends point. Plus, and this is a biggie. I live in Memphis, one of the many Meth Capitals of the World! You're in SF. Totally different planets.
(slate.msn.com/id/2124051/)
Forgive my lack of eloquence. I'm tired. I finished my Ph.D. today. I get slacker forgiveness points: proactivebusybody.com/2005/08...the-phd/ -
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Re: Sick Sad Meth
Thu, August 18, 2005 - 6:37 PMI'm not saying that the chemical isn't addictive. What I am saying is that usage/abuse patterns vary and that other elements in your overall lifestyle have a tremendous impact on effects of substance abuse.
There are a lot of heroin users who just smoke it on the weekends. There are a lot of drinkers who have two drinks a night. Or get shitfaced on Wednesday but no other day of the week. And there are also a lot of hopeless alcoholics who drink a fifth or more a night, every night.
Alcohol is certainly addictive, but I believe there's more than just brain chemistry that differentiates social drinkers from functional alcoholics from train wrecks.
The problem is that when we tell kids that one drink, one puff, one bump, one hit is going to propel them into an addicted nightmare and then they try a little booze, or grass or meth or junk and it DOESN'T immediate transform them into Gollum, then we've lost credibility on the real message, which is that these substances exacerbate the very problems those who abuse them are trying to avoid in the first place, which leads to a deadly spiral.
But if those problems are not present in your life, you will have a lowered probability of becoming hooked.
Also, realize that when you come at substance abuse from a social intervention angle, you're introducing a selection bias. You're seeing the situations that end in crisis. If someone has a few bumps once or twice a month, they're not likely to seek out help.
I hear you about the working hard to stop concentrating. Without admitting to anything illegal, I will cop to having self-medicated to differing degrees at different stages in my life. And I think you are a little bit country (ADHD) and I'm a little bit rock and roll (OCD) and that may impact our perspectives on substance abuse. There are times I just want my brain to stop working and leave me alone for a minute.
Godamn Japanese number puzzles. Who's warning the kids about THEM? HMMM?!?
On the subject of meth in particular, tho, I'd be interested in seeing the real statistics. What is the use frequency distribution and lifestyle impact across ALL meth users, not just those who end up needing help? -
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Re: Sick Sad Meth
Thu, August 18, 2005 - 8:52 PMSudoku got you? No danger there for me!
Hee hee. Now why can't the ADHD be the rock and roll? That would be way funner.
The hardest part of me *really* understanding this comes down to having a brain that is generally hopped up all on its own. I certainly get the issue of using drugs to blot out the icky parts of ourselves we don't want to face. I had a few adult clients this year who had been using for their whole lives, so they'd never had the opportunity to develop the coping mechanisms necessary to deal with the stressors of life. They'd used drugs to cope for so long that they didn't know how to deal without them, and learning later in life is HARD. Every few sessions, this one woman would say something along the lines of, "The meds aren't working. Isn't there a pill that can {fill in the blank}?" I was glad I didn't have prescription privileges at those times. I wouldn't have used them, but it was nice that I never had to "go there" with her.
Anyway, what worries me and what I don't understand are intelligent friends of mine with anxiety issues who get high daily. Again, I don't have any moral problems with it. I don't care about the legality. What worries me is that they are missing years of social and emotional skillbuilding .
It's like learning to live alone so that you can have someone around because you like them, not because you'd be lost without them. I feel that way about drugs and alcohol. If you are completely fine without them, then a little dabbling once in a while seems OK. But I don't find that people who are seeking out heroine, meth, etc, are sometime-dabblers. If you're needing that level of high, then clearly there wasn't enough going on with the "gateway" drugs. It just worries me. -
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Re: Sick Sad Meth
Thu, August 18, 2005 - 8:58 PM -
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Re: Sick Sad Meth
Thu, August 18, 2005 - 10:45 PM"Anyway, what worries me and what I don't understand are intelligent friends of mine with anxiety issues who get high daily."
Because getting hiiiiiigh feels goooooood.... :)
What's not to understand? Anxiety is unpleasant and recreational drugs alleviate the symptoms. True, the symptoms come back worse when the drugs wear off, but no plan is perfect.
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Re: Sick Sad Meth
Fri, August 19, 2005 - 6:15 AMI guess you could argue that me taking Concerta every day to address ADHD symptoms is no different than someone getting high every day. I mean, you could, if you'd done no research whatsoever. Anxiety is very responsive to non-drug intervention. Symptoms of ADHD are not. And lawd knows I tried to do without for years and years.
I went to the beach once with my friend Renee and her parents. Her normal weeknight at the time involved getting high, cross-stitching, and watching shows like Melrose Place. I never had any concerns about her getting high until I saw her when she couldn't get high for a week. It was the week from hell. She was a cranky biotch. Although one could argue that it was the lack of Melrose Place. That is, if you'd done no research whatsoever. :P -
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Re: Sick Sad Meth
Fri, August 19, 2005 - 11:52 AMI think that Meth is unsual in its ability to seduce the mind. Every come down is a form of chemical depression thus enabling the addciton cycle.
I played with it 14 years ago. It was a weid few months and I have no interest in being around it again.
Unlike most recreational drug use, the damage this does to the brain is not reversable. Its instant severe effects on the immune system out last the high and this all suggests to me there can be nothing "re-creational" about using this particular drug.
and if you had gone to the beach with me and my parents for a week you woudl see me a cranky bitch too...and I didn't get high in high school! -
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Re: Sick Sad Meth
Mon, August 22, 2005 - 9:08 PMIona - that's the same stuff I've heard. It's not recreational in the way other drugs are because of the speed at which it does damage and its irreversibility. Messy, messy, messy. -
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Re: Sick Sad Meth
Tue, August 23, 2005 - 5:25 PMDon't get me wrong: habitual speed use will fuck you up faster than an upfucking machine set on high.
But Iona illustrates my point: tried it, used for a bit, didn't like it, stopped. No dark spiral of Lifetime movie of the week hell. Or, if there was such a spiral, she came out of it looking pretty damn good. You know. Considering the spiral and all.
This story is far more common than people think, even for hardcore stuff.
But it is seductive, oh yes, because the drug makes you feel better about the bad decisions you make while you're on the drug, so coming off the drug is an immediate psychological motive for getting back on the drug. Combine that with chemical depression and, well, it do get ugly.
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