The Addiction Help .com

I just found out that one of my block mates has been using heroin to keep her up all night just so she can study for our exams. But I don't think it's doing her any good. I asked her if she wanted to talk about it, but she refused. I would like to help her get out of heroin addiction while she still can.

Your block mate should be grateful to have a friend like you. I think you can best convince her to ditch the heroin by telling her its effects - especially the longterm ones.

After taking heroin, the effects are usually felt quickly. Those which are taken intravenously gives the most intense rush that a user would experience. But when heroin is sniffed or smoked, the effects would usually take around five to ten minutes before they kick in. Aside from these effects, the user may feel a warm flushing of her skin, dryness in her mouth and a heaviness in her arms and legs. After the intense rush of euphoria, she may get either into a state of wakefulness or drowsiness in interval. This may probably explain why your friend decided to try heroin. She wanted to keep herself awake to study.

But she failed to realize that this state of wakefulness would also lead to longterm effects like collapsed veins, pneumonia, respiratory complications and liver disease.

But the most damaging effect of heroin addiction is the addiction itself. The continuous increase in doses would also increase the physical damage it causes and the user's dependence to it, as well.

So I do hope you get to convince your friend to stop and get treatment as soon as possible.

2007-05-29 19:21:39 by Jonnel E

Meet people deep in the throws of a heroin addiction, with no way out.

I want to get information regarding heroin addiction in Kansas, and I want to hear it from the experts themselves, maybe get a few interviews and footages. It's for a project in school, and I really want to do good at this. Any information will be greatly appreciated.

You should check out the links that I have included below. You can inquire from various treatment centers and get information about treatment programs and medications and that kind of stuff. Maybe you can photograph the treatment centers as well. Just make sure to ask for their permission. Good luck!

2007-06-12 18:33:15 by arleen a

Price: $14.00 $11.97

My mom and dad got divorced, and this has been so hard on my sister. Ever since then, she's been in a slump that she can't get out of. She started turning to heroin, and this has not helped her at all. It just worsened her case. How can I help her recover from her addiction?

I'm so sorry for what is happening to your sister.

One thing you can do is convince her to get herself treated. She should undergo drug rehabilitation. Consult a doctor so that your sister will be able to get the medical help that she needs. Remember, though, that drug rehabilitation can only work so far. Your sister still has to make choices once she goes out of the treatment program. She has to have the will and determination to get over her addiction so as not to fall into relapse. Your presence, support, and understanding will really be valuable at a time like this. I hope she gets treated soon. Good luck.

2007-06-29 03:29:13 by aleah s

Price: $25.00 $25.00

I know from the outsiders point of view, due to a boyfriend's addiction, I would like to know a little from those who have personally experienced a heroin addiction and withdrawls.

I shot heroin for three years and am about to celebrate 1 year of sobriety on May 16, thanks to God and the steps of AA. So, I have been to hell and back because that is what heroin addiction and withdrawals are HELL.
I guess I can explain addiction to you first and then what its like to withdraw from heroin. Addiction is like the most illusive and baffling thing on the planet because when you are an addict your mind does things that normal minds wouldn't do. In early using your mind tells you that you have found the thing that makes you feel normal and happy. You have found the thing that you have been looking for your whole life. Something to allow you to feel comfortable in all situations, like nothing can make you feel bad again, just as long as you have your heroin. Social situations are more comfortable, you know longer worry about what people think about you and if they are judging you or not. Events from the past (Traumatic or trivial) that have been haunting you are no longer of any matter. Life feels livable. At this point in my addiction I like most others could have stopped on my own power, but why do it? This early in addiction, I had not yet experienced any consequences and life was great. As time progressed though, my addiction progressed as well. This is the time that there is no turning back because it is too late. Now I need heroin everyday and I will do anything to get it. I have made a pact with myself that I will never go without heroin because I need it to live and deal with life. Plus by now I have experienced what going without feels like and that is not something that I want to experience again. So, I lie, cheat, steal, manipulate, do whatever to get dope. By this time I am losing my family, getting in trouble with the law, losing material items, physically looking like shit but it was all good because I had a steady supply of what made me feel good on the inside. So losing exterior things didn't matter. This is why family and friends cant get the people they know, who are using, sober. Because no matter what, even if the addict loves the person more than life itself, that person doesn't mean more to them than the drug. The addict needs the drug and will put it before anything else in their life. This time in addiction continues for a little while longer, depending on the person, until the end comes, which for a heroin addict is death or sobriety. At this end point, heroin had stopped working, it stopped filling that whole inside me. It had worked perfectly for so long and now it didn't. So I saw my life as impossible to live off heroin and impossible to live on heroin. It was a horrible spot to be in. My solution to life was done, and I just wanted to die. Then by the grace of god I got in touch with a way to get sober, and that is a whole different story. But just to quickly say, I needed to find a new solution to life and it had to be something other than drugs. I truly believe that for people like me this is the only way to get off and stay off heroin. Now I don't worry about drugs anymore, they just are not something that I have to deal with. I don't think about getting high anymore and that is a miracle.
But to answer your other question, before I got sober I had to detox off heroin and that was the most horrible experience of my life. I didnt go to a medical detox or rehab either. I did it medication free and I did it on my couch. What people call "kicking", detoxing off of heroin is hard to understand unless you have done it. It begins 12-24 hours after your last use and it feels like you are being brought as close to death as possible without actually dying. Your body begins to sweat because you feel hot but then at the same time you need a blanket and the heater boosted because you feel cold. The only thing you can do is lay down and try to focus your mind. But you cant get comfortable in any position and your mind is running a million miles a minute but thinking about nothing legible except how much pain you are in. The pain that hurts the worst is your legs. Your legs hurt so bad and seemingly for no reason at all. They are restless but no matter how much you move them the pain wont go away. So, this leads you to kicking and thrashing, flipping and turning all in search of a more comfortable spot, which never comes. I liked to switch from couch to couch to my bed to the floor to attempting to stand up straight to sitting up all in search of a better spot. So, while this is happening, you are also throwing up every couple of minutes or maybe longer depending and not normal vomit like you would think. It was just straight bile, a kind of yellow version of acid, that wasn't to pretty. This made for a quite upset stomach. Something that also happened to me was that if my stomach was hurting, my legs werent hurting so bad, but if my stomach wasnt hurting my legs really hurt. I assume this has to deal with how the brain interprets pain but I just remember wishing for one to hurt when the other one was, just so I could get a break. By this time you also begin to smell like something died. This has to do with the sweating, probably the leftover vomit still on you, and now that you don't have heroin in your system anymore (which makes you constipated) you are now defecating on yourself pretty much on a regular basis. Just purely because it has a mind of its own and sometimes you can move quick enough to get to the bathroom. Sleep comes in 30 min teases maybe every couple of hours, if at all. In the first week of detoxing I don't think I slept for more than a couple of hours. Some resemblance normal sleep doesn't return, at least i didn't for me, until a month or more after using. There is of coarse no eating at least for the first week or more, I could barely make it to the kitchen to get water, which was very important because you can definitely die from dehydration while detoxing. The only thing, and I mean the only thing that helped while I was kicking dope was taking showers. If you turn the water up as hot as possible and aim it towards the back of your neck, it makes you feel better. But this seemed like only a brief relief from the torture that I was feeling once I got out. So, you can imagine I took like 20 showers a day during that first week. Which still surprisingly didn't make me smell any better. But the showers were the only thing that made me feel any better and I would usually run out of the shower without drying off back under the covers and the change in temperature from hot to cold would put me asleep for one of those horrible 30 min tease naps. But eventually it got better and those symptoms started to subside and eventually I was back to feeling physically normal. My mind on the other hand needed something and thats where the spiritual plan of action took place. Thats what got me to stop thinking about using, because probably the worst part of detoxing was the thought of how I knew what would make me feel better in seconds and how I couldnt do it but that I wanted too so bad. I almost obsessed myself to death and even after the physical pain was over I was still obsessing about using even though I had just gone through the most horrible experience of my life and I knew that heroin caused it, but still all I wanted to do was get high. Its the sickness that I and other addicts have to go through in early sobriety but thank God, there was another answer for me that assured me that I wouldn't never have to use again if I just did what I needed to do to keep in contact.
Well I have been writing forever but I hope this helps describe what its like to be an addict, go through detox, and even though I didn't get into the recovery part as much, there is a way out as well. So, I don't know if your boyfriend is still using or not but if so, I just want you to know that there is still hope out there but unfortunately he will have to seek it for himself for it to work.
Hope this helps.......good luck

2009-04-19 15:55:18 by Dncn_Andee

I am a student filmmaker and I am in the process of filming a short dramatic piece about heroin addiction.

Plot: A young girl is abused by her father, runs away...ends up on the streets and addicted to heroin. She is then in a recovery facility, but can't take the withdrawls anymore so she leaves the facility and shoots up one last time. Which ends up being fatal.

Anyone have a good name I could attach to this piece?

Thanks!

hmm...


"Chains."
how bout that?
or

"Imprisonment"/'The Prison"

representing her figurative prison.

2008-11-24 21:19:17 by iliketoplayguitar123