Drugs

What is more important, the feeling of being in control of my life, or actually being in control?  What is more important, being happy or feeling like I am happy?  What is more important, the feeling of power or actually being powerful? 

Drugs make you feel happy, in control, and powerful.  You may be in danger, out of control, and powerless, but you don’t feel that you are.   When you consider the behavior of a madman, you see someone ranting at high volume, with exaggerated arm motions, extreme facial expressions, and completely out of context for his surroundings.  Despite how we see him, he feels like he is in control and powerful.  Furthermore, he thinks he has something important to say. 

A drug user once explained to me that methamphetamine makes you feel so wonderful you cannot feel that way without it.  This sets you up, when sober, to feel less than fantastic by comparison.  It creates a misleading standard which cannot be matched in real life.  This is a false economy.  Just because I had a filet mignon once, should not make me despise a good hamburger.   When I see a great action movie, that doesn’t ruin my enjoyment for watching a one-hour, TV show on cooking.  Those comparisons are from real life.  The drug experience powerfully ignores reality. 

Experiencing the birth of your first child is a-once-in-a-lifetime feeling of joy.  You cannot replace it.  There is no substitute for it.  This is just one example of extreme happiness.  A drug which could make you feel as special as the birth of your first-born is a non-organic, fake substitute which is both unnatural and unsustainable.  Drugs beg for repetition.  The drug, at the very least, becomes habit forming.  At worst, it becomes an addiction.  Beyond that, it begs to be replaced by “an even better drug.” 

I remember when loco weed was illegal, someone would say, “I only smoke marijuana.  It’s not like I take the hard drugs like cocaine.”  Now the bar has been moved and someone can say, “I only take cocaine.  It’s not like I use heroin or meth.”  When the bar is moved, the attitude about the items above and below the bar are impacted.  

Fentanyl laced drugs account for more than 50,000 drug overdose deaths per year.  It is added to make other illicit drugs more powerful so the user wants to come back for the better “kick.”  The mix is created, not by pharmacists, but added by profiteers in the illegal drug trade, often in their kitchen. One use can kill you.  Yes, just one.

Since 2017, the number of emergency room visits by senior citizens using grass, and incidents related to its use, has increased by 2,000 percent.  Pot users are twice as likely as non-users to develop a psychosis such as schizophrenia.  And, yes it is a gateway drug to more addictive and potentially dangerously-laced drugs.  There is no longer a gate.

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