Out of all my friends, I think I’m the only one who has never tried any illicit drugs. I don’t look down on casual pot smoking and such, but have never been tempted to try it myself. Never even took a puff from a ciggarette. Heck, I’m not even sure I just spelled ciggarette correctly…
Besides not being tempted, I was afraid of potential damage to my body. I’ve always been very physical, and never wanted to impair my senses.
So who else has never tried, and why?
i’m with you. i take enough allergy meds, no need to through more stuff into the mix.
I’ve never tried anything stronger than alcohol (which I don’t like the taste of) and have never even been drunk.
I regret it occasionally (I’ve occasionally wondered what being high would feel like, and it would be good research for a fiction writer) but never enough to risk damage to my body or mind (my drug of choice is chocolate, thanks!) or legal repercussions. Looking back I wish I’d tried it in high school or college when that sort of thing is more accepted, but now I guess I’ll just have to deal with being boring and square. 
Yeah, no surprise about me. I’ve never tried drugs and I don’t like the taste of beer. It always seemed unpleasant to me. Drugs are like medication, and I don’t like to be sick and have to take it. I’m just an “all-natural” kind of guy, I don’t want any chemical effects going on inside me. To each his own, but I’ve never been able to understand the appeal.
I can count on my 2 hands the number of times I have been drunk, smoked approximately 1 pack of cigarettes total, and never smoked pot, or done any other kind of drug. Never had the urge to, and I don’t think I’m missing out on anything.
I drink in moderation (read: drinks that don’t taste like alcohol when I’m hanging out in a bar with my friends) and have been drunk exactly once (I wanted to know what it was like (terrible)).
I once tried to smoke a cigarette but couldn’t inhale. I later discovered that I am intesely allergic to cigarette smoke.
And I have never done drugs. No way, no how.
Dale, funny we should both be posting in this thread on such a similar-type topic ;). I have been trying hard to change my views on drugs. All the stuff I have read has shown me that pot, at least, is pretty harmless. But I still hate it when my best friend smokes up. And the night my boyfriend did 'shrooms, I cried for hours. Not everyone shares the same views as me and I make an effort not to impose my views on them (within safety limits, obviously).
I came of age in the late 60’s/early 70’s and tried pot exactly twice. First time I got very ill. Tried once more, mostly out of stupidity and stubborness–turns out I’m literally allergic to it. So much for high wild times, the munchies, floating, etc. By the second try I wasn’t just throwing up, I itched with hives for 2 days. Just another giddy party animal.
I never tried any other illegal drugs for several reasons. They are illegal and it’s doubtful any momentary high could compensate for the grim, lingering consequences of being caught. They’re expensive. I don’t want a monkey on my back. I drink, lightly and discriminatingly, but have battled tobacco long enough to learn chastened respect for the power addictions can hold.
But mostly I don’t want stuff screwing up my mind. Coping with the world is daunting enough for me without willfully induced chemical filters in the way. The real world will still be waiting anyway. I don’t want to clobbered with the reality double-whammy after obsessively chasing down filters to make it all bearable.
It just hasn’t been a road I want to venture down.
Veb
nope, nothing. not even alcohol. at all, whatsoever.
Aside from alcohol (and caffeine), no drugs. Never smoked, because I have asthma, and a beloved grandmother who was the only heavy smoker in our family died of emphysema. Never felt the least inclination to try pot or anything harder. I just never got to the point where I said to myself "Gee, my life would be so much better if I started smoking pot/sniffing coke/shooting heroin, or whatever!
Oddly, it has occured to me that I could probably give up alcohol if I had to. It would be much harder to give up caffeine!
Uh, no thanks. I can lose my grip on reality and make a complete ass of myself without the aid of drugs, thank you very much.
Good question. I have often wondered how many people my age (41, meaning that like Veb, I grew up the 70s) have never used drugs at all. I used to drink more than I do now. When I was in my early 20s, 4 drinks was my limit and I drank about every two weeks or so. Now 4 drinks in one evening would prolly kill me; I average 4 drinks a year these days.
Other than alcohol, I have never tried drugs–no tobacco, no marijuana, nothing. I was even at parties (given by a professor, no less) in which pot was passed around, but I never tried it. The act of smoking was part of it, as the very thought of smoking is repulsive to me. Maybe if they had passed pot brownies, I would have tried them, but I doubt it. I think I just had an inner sense, even at 18, that drug use was not part of who I am.
I am curious, for the rest of you, what age you are.
Brynda, I’m 16.
Never tried anything, with two exceptions: Took one drag on a cigarette, immediately realized it wasn’t for me (almost vomited); drank one mouthfull of beer, immediately realized it wasn’t for me (almost vomited, again).
Never saw any value in any of it, let alone marijuana or coke.
I’m John and I’m 16. I’ve never tried drugs, alcohol, or smoking. I never had any intrust in doing any of that. I’ve had all kinds of opportunities to do so, but I didn’t.
No drugs.
No cigarettes.
No hard liquor.
A teaspoon of beer.
A few sips of champagne at weddings.
…love sex though.
does that count?
First of all I just want to say that I think it’s great the number of people who stood by their own values. And even greater to see the teenagers on the board who are doing the same.
I drink. I used to smoke cigarettes. But I’ve never touched marijuana or any other “hard” drug. I don’t think I’ve ever even touched a joint. I once got a contact high at a party, but that was pretty mild.
Why didn’t I try the many things available at said party? Many reasons. First and foremost I was afraid of what it would do to me. Second, it’s illegal. Third, mommy and daddy said that drugs are bad for me.
Ok, I’m going to get on a soap box for just a minute. You’re kids ARE listening to you, whether you realize it or not. If you don’t tell them you think something is a bad idea, they’ll assume you think it’s ok.
<steps down off soap box>
I’m a lot older than 16, too.
No drugs, no smoking, no alcohol. Never really had the inclination, as others above have described.
Also, as a teenager I had wisdom teeth removed. They used sodium pentathol to knock me out. For about five hours after I supposedly “woke up” I had no sense of time, couldn’t make my eyes focus, could hear only snatches of conversation, couldn’t sit up, and kept throwing up. The ill effects persisted in some form or another for nearly a week.
I said, Well, if THAT’S what drugs and drunkenness are like, then I sure as hell don’t need it.
(But I do swear, sometimes. And I like sex real well, too.)
Never tried smoking or an illicit drug, and I’m 29. I don’t drink more than one beer a month.
I’m no square. It’s just not my thing.
I won’t comment on my own choices… But I would like to point something out to those of you who have yet to enter the bastion of available diversions that is college. Be sure you ask yourself why you are choosing not to and what you actually consider as the pros and cons of doing these kinds of things. I say this not to change your mind by any means, but I’ve seen SO many people spend all of high school talking about how horrible drugs (including alcohol) are and adamantly expressing why they will NEVER do anything like that to themselves… What’s more they scorned those who made different choices, both vocally and subconsciously. Then college comes around and guess what? Some of them are suddenly awe-struck by the choices around them and either cast off all their previous inhibitions (including some that may still be beneficial) or simply become hypocritical (“God I hate those slutty alcoholic sorority girls… hey <random hookup’s name> pass me a drink!”)
So choose what you will. There are plenty of good reasons not to use drugs (though some of the one’s mentioned thus far in this thread are questionable). Just keep in mind that things change, and opinions/attitudes along with it, so if you have real reasons to avoid these things, explain them to yourself, just so you can remember later on.
RickJay brought up something interesting with his “I’m no square” comment - I wonder why so many people look down upon those who don’t do drugs?
I don’t do drugs and I don’t drink. I have in my life had one sip of champagne, one sip of Kahlua in chocolate milk which I thought was just chocolate milk (imagine my surprise when I, who am not fond of the taste of either alcohol nor coffee, find myself drinking that!), and 4 ounces of brandy someone put into my hot cocoa at a party, thinking it would be “funny”.
I have my reasons for both - I’ve seen a lot of alcoholics in my family and I know that if I’m not careful I could end up like that myself, so rather than chance it and try to drink “socially”, I just don’t. I don’t find it a difficult lifestyle to maintain, as the negative reinforcement I’ve seen in my own family is more than enough to deter me, and I don’t like the taste of alcohol anyway. The drugs thing is just an extension of that - if I’m likely to get addicted to alcohol, I’m more likely to get addicted to something even more inherently addictive. And I’ve been “high” from Tylenol 3 before, and I didn’t particularly like it.
I don’t date guys who drink, smoke, or do drugs, either - the night my Australian came home and asked me to pardon his typing because he’d had a few drinks at a party, I cried, a lot. I love him and I didn’t want to leave him for it, and I was quite willing to try to accept it, but it was going to be difficult … I told him the whole story of why I didn’t like alcohol and why I felt I couldn’t be around a guy who did drink, but how I would also try to overlook it or work around it for him. He promptly quit drinking and hasn’t had any alcohol since, something that apparently wasn’t too difficult for him considering most of his friends do drink. He says he was only trying things to see if there was anything he did like, and hadn’t found one yet, so giving up drinking alcohol made as much sense to him as giving up drinking mud. This is one of the many reasons I love him … sighs happylike
Er, anyway, I’m wild and crazy and have lots of fun, I just prefer to be fully aware of what I’m doing whilst doing it I’ve heard the, “You never know until you try it once” shtick before, and I find it to be bunk. I know without trying it, for example, that garlic-banana fettucine in white chocolate sauce is pretty nasty. nods
EXACTLY. I don’t know what they used to knock me out when I got my wisdom teeth out (just last summer), but christ did I feel awful. Then for pain meds they gave me vicodin. I took one and felt awful all over again. Exactly what snac decribed. Out-of-it & miserable & vomity. Uhg. No thanks.
I’ve never done any kind of illegal drugs. Never had more than a sip of alcohol, maybe 5 times in my whole life (don’t like the taste), never smoked a cigarette. I don’t even like to take OTC stuff, like allergy medicine, cos it always makes me feel worse. I’d rather be “sick.” I think of it like my body is just so damn healthy that some foreign invader like medicine just throws everything out of whack. I shudder to think what would happen if I were to take a “real” drug; the strongest drug I ever take is tylenol.
I’m 22, by the way.