Friend on Hard Drugs

[footballhenry]

So heres the jist. I know this person well but not very well at all. We hang out every couple years due to us living in different states but hes a good friend to me nonetheless. He has now become 'hooked' (even though they always say their not) on cocaine. He hangs out with guys that just got out of jail, felons, and some pretty rough people. Hes done a needle in the past, from what I know but Im not sure how much hes done or what hes done in total, though I imagine it would be everything.

I care for the guy as a friend, and I see what drugs (not marijuana mind you) did to my brothers. One of his 'best' friends let me in on a bunch of crime and drug dealing,etc. that he had done (i suspect with my friend).

How do I help my friend? Hes not the open type at all, from what i can gather and were not as close obviously because of our lack of hanging out. Still, I want to help him. His parents, also good friends of mine, suspect him of hard drugs (he admitted to his mom once, but now says hes better). I would never 'snitch' the boy out but what can I say or do that might help him realize the errors of his ways? I seriously can see the kid getting killed with what Ive seen here. I was thinkin about tryin to get him to watch Requiem for a Dream, to maybe open up the door a bit...

Its a tough situation, one that could turn real bad for him real quick....what can you do as a friend in a situation as this???

[Ignatius J.]

First and foremost, you will never get an addict to quit who doesn't want to. If you go up to him and say man, I really worry about you, it will probably do nothing. He probably has a wall around that issue and if you try to press it he's just going to withdraw more.

Secondly, ask yourself what his habit is really doing to him. Is he stealing to feed the habit? Has he ever been convicted of a crime? Is it damaging his life in any way? How?

If the answer to the second question is yes, then you should try to do something. If he's not too far into it, ie he can go a day without a fix, The best thing you could probably do for him is to try and get him to enjoy other things without drugs. Sitting him down to watch requim for a dream won't work if he's really in it. You have to get him out of it first.

Are there things he enjoys doing without drugs? Try to encourage those things.

Just to clarify I'm basing what I'm saying above on things that have worked with people I know who had serious alcohol abuse problems. Cocaine is different because it is much more addictive. Don't try to do anything drastic (and this includes trying to sit him down to watch requim for a dream) without talking to someone first. ARe you in college? If so there should be somewhere on campus you can go to talk to someone with plenty of experience in this area.

[Bang]

Having been in the same situation a few times, I echo what Ignatius says,, you can't help him until he wants to be helped.

You can state your concerns to him, you can try to be strong on him about it, but the simple fact is this.

Protect yourself, because (as you know fromv past experience) addicts tend to become thieves and liars, and they also tend to bring around an element of undesirables.

There's only so much you can do before your life gets sucked into his whirlpool.

Unfortunately, one of my best friends in the past decided heroin was the way to go. I tried to be the good friend, tried to be the tough friend, and the ultimate result, I don't know where he is, don't know if he's alive or dead, and I don't care either.

In each friend-of-an-addict there has to be the final straw. And you have to know where that is, otherwise, you go down with them. Maybe you don't do their drugs, but the mess their lives become transfers right to you if you don't set limits to how far you're willing to go.

Sounds cruel and cold, but at the same time, he needs that bottom as well. if you or anyone elsev keeps offering him sanctuary and "help", it will become yet another crutch for him to prop up on.

Help your friend, but to a point.

~Bang

[jbooma]

Originally posted by footballhenry

I care for the guy as a friend, and I see what drugs (not marijuana mind you) did to my brothers. One of his 'best' friends let me in on a bunch of crime and drug dealing,etc. that he had done (i suspect with my friend).

Well sometimes it is the weed that starts it all. After getting high on that, then they might turn to something else to get an even bigger high. I have seen my friends turn from the biggest potheads to now hooked on anything, and it is sad.

[footballhenry]

Originally posted by jbooma

Well sometimes it is the weed that starts it all. After getting high on that, then they might turn to something else to get an even bigger high. I have seen my friends turn from the biggest potheads to now hooked on anything, and it is sad.

true, i mean most people i know have smoked weed and your right some (like my friend in this case) have been opened up to the hard stuff. from what i see its a mixture of the environment of its okay to do drugs and the peer pressure that follows.

[Bang]

Well, if you didn't have to buy weed from drug dealers, I wonder how many of them would be offered or tempted by harder highs.

~Bang

[Ignatius J.]

I have never had a dealer even mention harder drugs to me.

And what's with society's demonization of dealers anyway? They have to take huge risks in todays society to help out people whose rights have been stripped away by the government.

edit: and I'm sorry henry that this thread has now been hijacked. Go talk to a professional if you want to help him.

[chomerics]

Originally posted by jbooma

Well sometimes it is the weed that starts it all. After getting high on that, then they might turn to something else to get an even bigger high. I have seen my friends turn from the biggest potheads to now hooked on anything, and it is sad.

No Booma, the "weed" didn't get him hooked on higher drugs, as there is absolutely no statistical proof that MJ is the gateway drug people always surmise it is. Alcohol would be the better example of the gateway drug.

Now, if MJ was legal, could you still come up with the same defense?

[SkinsHokieFan]

Hey Henry PM me

He needs help

I just dealt with something like this in the past year with my best friend and unfourtantley it ended up in death.

Show him this site if you have to

www.brianchrist.com

[Cdowwe]

I think MJ is a gateway drug just because thats what kids or even grown ups use first. I dont really think you smoke weed and youre like, "I need some cocaine now", its more like now Im around people that do drugs, so its easier to get.

[jbooma]

Originally posted by chomerics

No Booma, the "weed" didn't get him hooked on higher drugs, as there is absolutely no statistical proof that MJ is the gateway drug people always surmise it is. Alcohol would be the better example of the gateway drug.

Now, if MJ was legal, could you still come up with the same defense?

well he did say if he never did pot he would have never tried other things so please tell me who is right the stats or what the person says :doh:

alcohol doesn't get you that "high" like weed does, there is a difference

[TD_washingtonredskins]

Originally posted by Ignatius J.

And what's with society's demonization of dealers anyway? They have to take huge risks in todays society to help out people whose rights have been stripped away by the government.

That is the funniest question I've seen posed on this site in quite some time.

Drug dealers are being demonized by society?? Are you kidding me??

Usually people who break the law and get young people involved in breaking the law are considered bad folks. I guess we should stop referring to all criminals as "evil" because someone can spin it to make it sound they are doing honest work.

Hilarious.

[OrangeSkin]

chomerics, How the hell is alcohol a gateway drug in the same vein as pot? I started drinking at about 17 or 18 as did virtually all of my friends at the time. If you look at the stats, about 75% of kids 17-18 have no qualms about drinking. If asked, most would say "I don't do drugs, I just drink."

In no way does alcohol use lead to harder drugs. Kids usually get booze from some dopey irresponsible older person, like an uncle or family friend. Alcohol providers would stick out like a sore thumb if they went into Central Baltimore looking for some heroin.

Weed dealers DO associate with the hardened, been in jail, coke snorting types. Perhaps not ALL of them, but many do. Once the kid gets tired of pot (which is inevitable) he'll just have to ask his weed dealer for a hook up, or alternately, the dealer can simply introduce him to some coke and he'll soon be a regular user.

Now compare that to Uncle Billy Bob who goes down to the local Food Lion and buys his 18-year-old nephew and his friends a few cases of beer. Where is the power of introduction in this scenario?

[chomerics]

Originally posted by jbooma

well he did say if he never did pot he would have never tried other things so please tell me who is right the stats or what the person says :doh:

alcohol doesn't get you that "high" like weed does, there is a difference

Booma, I can give you boatloads of evidence which states everything you are claiming to be false. It is just hearsay and false testimony put out by propaganda channels to make you think this way. It is not your fault, but you should really read or even watch reefer madness and look at the effects of the drug.

There is a difference between alcohol and weed, alcohol can kill you weed can not. You can overdose on alcohol by haveing just over 4 times the legal limit inyour blood stream, you need to smoke 40,000 joints to kill a person with weed.

Alcohol leads to almost EVERY single addiction on hard drugs. Your buddy says "If I never smoked weed I wouldn't be a drug addict" is a defense mechanism by which he associates a lack of control on his behavior to a drug. It makes him far less responsible then admitting the problem and fighting it. It is a cop out and a way to stay addicted yet feel no guilt. It isn't MY fault, it is the drugs fault. :doh:

[Cdowwe]

And the potheads come out to defend their drug habits

[TD_washingtonredskins]

The fact remains that pot is not as harmless as the users try to make it seem.

People wouldn't be lobbying for it to be legal and defending it so much unless they had developed a dependency on it. I personally don't care if it's legal or not, but I don't see why people think it's such a travesty that it's illegal.

[jrockster21]

Originally posted by Bang

Having been in the same situation a few times, I echo what Ignatius says,, you can't help him until he wants to be helped.

You can state your concerns to him, you can try to be strong on him about it, but the simple fact is this.

Protect yourself, because (as you know fromv past experience) addicts tend to become thieves and liars, and they also tend to bring around an element of undesirables.

There's only so much you can do before your life gets sucked into his whirlpool.

Unfortunately, one of my best friends in the past decided heroin was the way to go. I tried to be the good friend, tried to be the tough friend, and the ultimate result, I don't know where he is, don't know if he's alive or dead, and I don't care either.

In each friend-of-an-addict there has to be the final straw. And you have to know where that is, otherwise, you go down with them. Maybe you don't do their drugs, but the mess their lives become transfers right to you if you don't set limits to how far you're willing to go.

Sounds cruel and cold, but at the same time, he needs that bottom as well. if you or anyone elsev keeps offering him sanctuary and "help", it will become yet another crutch for him to prop up on.

Help your friend, but to a point.

~Bang

I agree....I reached the breaking point with my best friend from childhood as well. He was beyond help; in and out of juvenile detention, rehab centers and AA. When he turned his back on me and tried to rob me, it was over. You can only do so much before they self-destruct.

Not saying you should turn your back on your friend, but you can only do so much. Try to get the help of a professional, if you can. And don't try an intervention without the supervision of a professional; you may piss him off even more and end up causing a binge and utter self-destruction.

[chomerics]

Originally posted by OrangeSkin

chomerics, How the hell is alcohol a gateway drug in the same vein as pot? I started drinking at about 17 or 18 as did virtually all of my friends at the time. If you look at the stats, about 75% of kids 17-18 have no qualms about drinking. If asked, most would say "I don't do drugs, I just drink."

Every single case of hard addiction, well I shouldn't say EVERY, but well over 98% of all addicts started out with alcohol. It is a statistical fact that a person who abuses a hard drug started out with alcohol almost in every single case.

Put it this way, there are MANY addicts of cocane, heroin, crank et all that don't smoke pot, and neve have, yet they do hard drugs. It is always from alcohol. Go to NORMAL's web site to read more, but there is a vast bounty of statistical evidence out there.

In no way does alcohol use lead to harder drugs. Kids usually get booze from some dopey irresponsible older person, like an uncle or family friend. Alcohol providers would stick out like a sore thumb if they went into Central Baltimore looking for some heroin.

Statistics and facts do not back up your argument, they do mine.

Critics claim that marijuana is a "gateway drug." How do you respond to this charge?

There is no conclusive evidence that the effects of marijuana are causally linked to the subsequent use of other illicit drugs. Preliminary animal studies alleging that marijuana "primed" the brain for other drug-taking behavior have not been replicated, nor are they supported by epidemiological human data. Statistically, for every 104 Americans who have tried marijuana, there is only one regular user of cocaine, and less than one user of heroin. Marijuana is clearly a "terminus" rather than a gateway for the overwhelming majority of marijuana smokers.

For those minority of marijuana smokers who do graduate to harder substances, it is marijuana prohibition -- which forces users to associate with the illicit drug black market -- rather than the use of marijuana itself, that often serves as a doorway to the world of hard drugs. The more users become integrated in an environment where, apart from cannabis, hard drugs can also be obtained, the greater the chances they will experiment with harder drugs.

In Holland, where politicians decided over 25 years ago to separate marijuana from the illicit drug market by permitting coffee shops all over the country to sell small amounts of marijuana to adults, individuals use marijuana and other drugs at rates less than half of their American counterparts.

www.norml.org

A new study by the RAND Drug Policy Research Center casts doubt on claims that marijuana acts as a "gateway" to the use of cocaine and heroin, challenging an assumption that has guided U.S. drug policies since the 1950s. However, the study does not argue that marijuana should be legalized or decriminalized.

The theory that the use of marijuana by young people causes some to graduate to harder drugs, often called the "gateway effect," has been used most recently to counter efforts to relax marijuana laws in several states. Earlier it was used to justify the imposition of tough penalties against the possession of even small amounts of marijuana.

Evidence supporting claims of marijuana's gateway effects has been found in many epidemiological studies of adolescent drug use. For instance, these studies found that marijuana users are up to 85 times more likely to use hard drugs than those who do not use marijuana, and few hard drug users do not use marijuana first.

"We've shown that the marijuana gateway effect is not the best explanation for the link between marijuana use and the use of harder drugs," said Andrew Morral, associate director of RAND's Public Safety and Justice unit and lead author of the study. "An alternative, simpler and more compelling explanation accounts for the pattern of drug use you see in this country, without resort to any gateway effects. While the gateway theory has enjoyed popular acceptance, scientists have always had their doubts. Our study shows that these doubts are justified."

The study demonstrates that associations between marijuana and hard drug use could be expected even if marijuana use has no gateway effect. Instead, the associations can result from known differences in the ages at which youths have opportunities to use marijuana and hard drugs, and known variations in individuals' willingness to try any drugs, researchers found.

The RAND study and a series of commentaries about the report are published in the December edition of the British journal Addiction, a peer-reviewed scientific publication.

"The people who are predisposed to use drugs and have the opportunity to use drugs are more likely than others to use both marijuana and harder drugs," Morral said. "Marijuana typically comes first because it is more available. Once we incorporated these facts into our mathematical model of adolescent drug use, we could explain all of the drug use associations that have been cited as evidence of marijuana's gateway effect."

"This is a very important study with broad implications for marijuana control policy," said Charles R. Schuster, a former director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse and now director of the Addiction Research Institute at Wayne State University. "I can only hope that it will be read with objectivity and evaluated on its scientific merits, not reflexively rejected because it violates most policy makers' beliefs."

RAND researchers say it is unlikely that any study will be conducted that definitively settles the marijuana gateway debate. But the authors say their study should raise questions about the legitimacy of basing national drug policy decisions on the assumption that one of the harmful effects of marijuana use is the increased risk of using more dangerous drugs.

"If our model is right, it has significant policy implications," Morral said. "For example, it suggests that policies aimed at reducing or eliminating marijuana availability are unlikely to make any dent in the hard drug problem. When enforcement resources that could have been used against heroin and cocaine are instead used against marijuana, this could have the unintended effect of worsening heroin and cocaine use."

However, the study does not conclude that marijuana should be legalized or decriminalized. "Even without the effects of a marijuana gateway, relaxing marijuana prohibitions could affect the incidence of hard drug use by diminishing the stigma of drug use generally, thereby increasing adolescents' willingness to try hard drugs," Morral said. "Moreover, marijuana itself can be a serious problem for those who become dependent on it."

Other authors of the report are Daniel McCaffery and Susan Paddock of RAND's Drug Policy Research Center, a joint program of RAND's Public Safety and Justice Program and RAND Health.

RAND researchers tested the marijuana gateway theory by creating a mathematical model simulating adolescent drug use. Rates of marijuana and hard drug use in the model matched those observed in survey data collected from representative samples of youths from across the United States. Without assuming any gateway effect, the model produced patterns of drug use and abuse remarkably similar to what is experienced across the nation, showing that a marijuana gateway effect is not needed to explain the observed behavior.

The black market in marijuana in the United States is estimated at $10 billion per year, and more than 700,000 people are arrested on marijuana charges each year. Some states have passed laws easing penalties for marijuana use. Voters in several states rejected ballot propositions in November that would have approved similar changes.

A series of commentaries by other addiction researchers that accompany the RAND study discuss some of the implications of the research and whether there is any way to create a study to unequivocally answer the marijuana gateway question.

http://www.rand.org/news/press.02/gateway.html

Weed dealers DO associate with the hardened, been in jail, coke snorting types. Perhaps not ALL of them, but many do. Once the kid gets tired of pot (which is inevitable) he'll just have to ask his weed dealer for a hook up, or alternately, the dealer can simply introduce him to some coke and he'll soon be a regular user.

Now compare that to Uncle Billy Bob who goes down to the local Food Lion and buys his 18-year-old nephew and his friends a few cases of beer. Where is the power of introduction in this scenario?

All you are using is anecdotal evidence for your defense, but it is devoid of basic general scientific research. All of the research done has solidified my position, and I have not read an article or publication yet where there is a successful link proven scientifically. If you want to go and dig up the papers, I can tell you what the fundamental flaw is in the study, but it is almost always from leaving out alcohol statistics to further the agenda.

[OrangeSkin]

chom, 98% of hard drug users have used alcohol because virtually EVERYBODY has used alcohol at some point in their lives.

That's like saying 98% of rapists started off by drinking alcohol. There is really no link.

And more people have gone from alcohol to hard drugs because so many more people drink alcohol than smoke pot. There are more murders in the US than in Iceland because there are more people here. It's all about proportion.

You have stats, but they're twisted, illogical, and basically flawed.

[chomerics]

Originally posted by Cdowwe

And the potheads come out to defend their drug habits

No, the people who are responsible adults who want to act in a mature manner and smoke a joint every now and then come out.

Maybe if your infantile remarks were kept to a minimum you would be taken seriously on this board, but untill the merits of your posts improve, you will continus to stay on the scrap heap of ignorance.

[@DCGoldPants]

I guess I'm wondering why we need a reason for something to be legal, opposed to the need for it to be Illegal.

Pot isn't harmless, neither is boozing. But one is legal, and the other isn't.

http://www.cdc.gov/ncipc/duip/spotlite/3d.htm

Impaired driving will affect one in three Americans during their lifetime. In 2003, 17,013 people died in alcohol-related motor vehicle crashes, accounting for 40% of all traffic-related deaths in the U.S. (NHTSA 2004).

December is National Drunk and Drugged Driving Prevention Month (3D Month) by Presidential Proclamation.

Quick Facts About Drunk and Drugged Driving

An alcohol-related motor vehicle crash kills someone every 31 minutes and nonfatally injures someone every two minutes (NHTSA 2004).

Drugs other than alcohol (e.g., marijuana and cocaine) are involved in about 18% of motor vehicle driver deaths. These other drugs are generally used in combination with alcohol (NHTSA 1993).

Each year, alcohol-related crashes in the United States cost about $51 billion (Blincoe et al. 2002).

Most drinking and driving episodes go undetected. In 2002, about 1.5 million drivers were arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol or narcotics (NHTSA 2004). That’s slightly more than one percent of the 120 million self-reported episodes of alcohol–impaired driving among U.S. adults each year (Dellinger et al. 1999).

To further decrease alcohol-related fatal crashes, communities need to implement and enforce strategies that are known to be effective, such as sobriety checkpoints, 0.08% BAC laws, minimum legal drinking age laws, and "zero tolerance" laws for young drivers (Shults et al. 2001, Shults et al. 2002).

[chomerics]

Originally posted by OrangeSkin

*edit*

Sorry, posted after your response above, chom.

NP, LOL. . .

Damn, I gotta go, hopefully I will continue this discussion tomorrow. There is a lot of statistics out there for the case of it NOT being a gateway drug, you should research it some tonioght, you will be suprised at what you find. . .

Just wanted to add, MJ is a tremendous drug for helping the terminally ill. I have given some nugs to people on chemo and with MS, they swear by it.

:2cents:

[Cdowwe]

Originally posted by chomerics

No, the people who are responsible adults who want to act in a mature manner and smoke a joint every now and then come out.

Maybe if your infantile remarks were kept to a minimum you would be taken seriously on this board, but untill the merits of your posts improve, you will continus to stay on the scrap heap of ignorance.

Turning to drugs because your girlfriend hates you is not mature, as you said you did in earlier posts. And the only merit as of late that I have is pointing out your ignorance on basic Civics in an earlier thread about McCain.

Here is what you said..."Actually Riggo, McCain is in the Senate, not Congress and he does NOT have one of the most conservative voting records."

Here is what I said..."Com on Chomerics, I thought you were an educated man. This is basic Civics.....McCain is in the Senate and Congress....Congress consists of the House of Reps and the Senate"

Then people laughed at you.

[footballhenry]

Guys with all due respect all this bickering really doesnt help the issue at hand. i appreciate the advice and would love to hear any thing else that i could use to maybe help my friend, thanks...

[footballhenry]

Oh, and I may have missed it but i havent heard if i should tell his parents or not....or anything along those lines...would it help at all??...i dont like playin the snitch role though...but if it saves his life int he long run