Legitimate questions on illicit drugs. . . aka "I've never done 'em, so I don't know"

[River_Hippie]

FWIW, back in the day when I did such things, we discovered that filling the bong with hot water was better (made the smoke less harsh) than cold/ ice water.

[Tripler]

I thank you all for the honest responses. It’s actually kind of cleaing up a few misconceptions I had, and if you give me a day or two to ponder 'em, I’ll be asking a few more questions. . .

. . . like this: Just what the hell is the big deal about methamphetamines? I’ve seen all the hype about not doing them, but what sort of high does it give you that none of the other stuff does? I can completely see the law enforcement side of things* that they don’t want meth labs all over the place, but what makes meth so damn good that it seems to be the ‘latest fad’ in drugs?
[Personal appeal for the sake of knowledge]

• A big reason I started this thread, is that while we all are taught to “trust” the police, I know they put their spin on things. I’m not looking for culprits, I’m just looking for the damned honest truth. Thus, I figured asking a naive question here would get some honest results–and I thank you all for them! That being said, and being afeared of raising the ire of the mods, please don’t feel obliged to indicate if you’ve used drugs before. You’re knowledge is good enough. Your personal experience might be a little too much. . .
  [/PAFTSOK]

Tripler
No, I haven’t been asked by the mods to post that. Call it “preemptive”.

[II_Gyan_II]

@Tripler

Just what the hell is the big deal about methamphetamines?

From the excellent The Consumers Union Report - Licit and Illicit Drugs

The first use of intravenous amphetamine, Dr. Kramer notes, is “an ecstatic experience,” and the user’s first thought is, “Where has this been all my life?” Dr. Kramer goes on, “The experience somehow differs from the effects of oral amphetamines not only quantitatively but also qualitatively.” After this first experience, the user mainlines intermittently for a time; “doses probably equivalent to twenty to forty milligrams per injection may be taken once or a very few times over a day or two. Days or weeks may intervene between sprees. Gradually the sprees become longer and the intervening periods shorter; doses become higher and injections more frequent.” 6 The sequence recalls Dr. von Fleischl-Marxow’s experience with cocaine in Vienna in the 1880s. “After a period of several months,” Dr. Kramer continues, "the final pattern is reached in which the user (now called a ‘speed-freak’) injects his drug many times a day, each dose in the hundreds of milligrams, and remains awake continuously for three to six days, getting gradually more tense, tremulous and paranoid as the ‘run’ progresses. The runs are interrupted by bouts of very profound sleep (called ‘crashing’) which last a day or two. Shortly after waking … the drug is again injected and a new run starts. The periods of continuous wakefulness may be prolonged to weeks if the user attempts to sleep even as little as an hour a day. "
. . .
the large doses taken during speed “runs” produce profound anorexia (lack of appetite). “Users uniformly lose weight during periods of abuse. Appetite suppression may be so profound that users may find the very act of swallowing difficult.” 11 Some users force themselves to take small amounts of highly nutritious foods or beverages, or inject themselves with vitamins and dietary supplements. Upon awakening after a prolonged speed run, a riser may eat large amounts. But even so, “undernutrition and malnutrition result, and undoubtedly complicate all the other effects of high dose amphetamine use.” 12

Sleep deprivation similarly exacerbates and complicates the direct pharmacological effects of the drug. “The observation that many of the physical and psychological symptoms are largely dissipated after sleeping for a day or two suggests that the insomnia alone is a major contributor to the syndrome,” Dr. Kramer notes. But, he adds, “the fact that some symptoms persist after weeks or months of abstinence indicates that sleep deprivation is not alone responsible. Considering that the usual pattern seen during well-established high dose abuse is of three to six days of wakefulness followed by one or two days of sleep… users spend about one-fourth of their time in sleep, about the same proportion as non-users only distributed differently.” 13

A paranoid psychosis, similar to the cocaine psychosis, is the almost inevitable result of long-term, high-dose, intravenous speed injection. This psychosis “can be precipitated by either a single large dose or by chronic moderate doses,” 14 Dr. Kramer adds.

Typical features of the speed psychosis include feelings of persecution, feelings that people are talking about you behind your back (delusions of reference), and feelings of omnipotence. * Unlike paranoid schizophrenics, however, “speed freaks” are usually aware that these feelings are drug induced; that is, they retain insight. “High-dose intravenous users of amphetamines generally accept that they will sooner or later experience paranoia. Aware of this, they are usually able to discount for it.” Nevertheless, Dr. Kramer adds, “when drug use has become very intense or toward the end of a long run even a well-practiced intellectual awareness may fail and the user may respond to his delusional system.” 16 Dr. Kramer cites others as believing that the drug merely brings into the open preexisting paranoid tendencies. On the basis of his own experience with a large number of high-dose users, Dr. Kramer expresses the opinion, which he agrees is not testable, that despite differences in vulnerability to the paranoid effect, “anyone given a large enough dose over a long enough time will become psychotic.”

There’s also long-term toxicity of the dopaminergic system in the brain, as well as risk of cardiovascular outcomes.

[John_Mace]

Bongs are so last year, man. You have to vaporize now!

[askdemetri]

lets talk from experience.smoking crack causes you to lose things.your wife,kids,job,car,and anything else you own,if you keep it up.ive known lots of users,all will tell you the same.it aint worth it