In The News Today...

Quote: Evenbob

Aren't you the guy who used and
abused everything in his life to the
point that, in your 30's you have
the physical problems of a man
in his 70's? Wore down, wore out,
in pain all the time. You admit to
taking and abusing every drug
under the sun at one time, and
look what it's got you.

I am that guy, but you wrongly conflate my issues. It's not a bad topic to look at...

I am unaware / only partially aware of what-if-any damage my drug use has caused, though what I do know leads me to label that damage as "negligible". I've no lasting effects from hallucinogens. I still have an intact septum and have had a number of heart tests since the coke days, and me heart's 5-by. I do not know if I've burned part of my brain up with MDMA, but I would suspect that any damage caused there would pale in comparison to the effects of TBI. Really, the part of my drug use that would cost YOU, my fellow citizen, is the increase in health and auto insurance rates when I rolled my car through the trees (alcohol), and whatever ailments totally legal tobacco has in store for me in my future. Oh, and whatever-if-any damage was done to my liver from 12 solid years of completely legal Vicodin use (acetaminophen).

What's f#$%ing killing me, what I bitch about constantly, and what has me living the life of a 70yr old man (an accurate description, btw) is regular ol down home good ol boy Americanism that every one of you would (and arguably should) support. I ripped my dominant arm off my body my 13th year of baseball. The other arm at my employ where I bust ass 6 days a yr. My back, the real life killer, was snoboarding. My knee, four wheeling. My hips, hockey. My hands, a mix of 3-5 different sports. I'm on a first name basis with two different ER's, have had over 15 MRI's of my head alone, and will live a life of needing constant, ever present medical attention for the rest of my days, all from simply being "All American". 37 concussions that will likely have me in assisted living by my 50's, and ONE of them, the car through the trees, was a result of drugs.

I don't argue your premise. There is no doubt that legalization will allow for abuse, and abuse will carry a cost we all will have to pay. My desire is that we can be reasonable and honest about it.

Quote: Face

I am unaware / only partially aware of what-if-any damage my drug use has caused, though what I do know leads me to label that damage as "negligible".

So you think your life would be
exactly like it is right now if you
had been totally drug free.
You haven't thought this through.

Quote:

all from simply being "All American". 37 concussions

I'm as all American as you and
I've never had any of the ailments
you describe. You have them
because you push everything you
do to the extreme, you don't stay
within your limitations, and the
universe punishes for that almost
immediately. It's a shame because
you're such a smart guy.

The question is, with you being
smarter than I am, which you
obviously are, why did I know all
of this at an early age and you
did not. The only answer is you
have psychological problems I
don't have, because I always
knew what my limitations were
and paid attention to them.

For you the question is 'why'.
What makes you like this.

Quote: Evenbob

So you think your life would be
exactly like it is right now if you
had been totally drug free.
You haven't thought this through.

Oh, god no. I said "no lasting damage", not "no effect". I would not be here if not for the crutch of narcotics. I've journals that go back to the 90's, except for the 7 page will I wrote the week I planned to end it. If not for "not caring anymore" enough to toss away my Puritan views on drugs and starting to smoke weed, I'd not have made my 18th birthday. And hallucinogens showed me things that cannot be forgotten; my life is irrevocably changed as a result. I just find all of these things to be almost universally positive. It's given me actual knowledge and understanding that gives me ammo, should a friend or loved one find themselves slave to one of them. It's given me perspective on the drug issue in America, and why certain things would or would not work to combat them. It's opened my mind to an entirely different way of viewing existence. Some of that existential stuff can be argued pro or con, but the real knowledge aspect is inarguably positive. And I managed to get through it without any adverse health effects, or any damage to my criminal or moral record.

I'm not championing drug use or prescribing it for a full life. I'm just pointing out that the blanket statement "cost to society" isn't entirely genuine on its face. There's nuances to each one, all of which should be debated openly and honestly.

Quote:

I'm as all American as you and
I've never had any of the ailments
you describe. You have them
because you push everything you
do to the extreme, you don't stay
within your limitations, and the
universe punishes for that almost
immediately. It's a shame because
you're such a smart guy.

The question is, with you being
smarter than I am, which you
obviously are, why did I know all
of this at an early age and you
did not. The only answer is you
have psychological problems I
don't have, because I always
knew what my limitations were
and paid attention to them.

For you the question is 'why'.
What makes you like this.

TBI. It's the only thing that fits. It explains my ADD like traits, despite no family history. It explains my rage issues, which have been present since loooong before any exposure to drugs or alcohol. It explains my depression, anxiety, memory loss, and all of the other mental issues that I have that don't exist anywhere else in my family.

It's not a drug thing, or rather, drugs didn't turn me into a reckless individual. I've been cliff diving and jumping off roofs and hitting BMX triples and Jesus, the 3 wheelers... remember those death dealers?... for a full decade before I was even exposed to drugs period, let alone have been in a position to have been offered some. That's just simple learned behavior. We (my fam) do these things. And I'd see someone get hurt. And they'd be out for months, surgery, rehab, whatever, and then it was over. Simple equation, is X amount of glory worth Y amount of pain. If yes, DO IT! And for 24 years I did just that, with 24yrs of positive reinforcement proving to me over and over again that, yup, worst case ~3 months of pain, then right as rain. A whole lifetime of proving the constant with 100% success rate, and proving it often. Oh my gods, so often. And then, one day, it didn't get better.

But why always crank it to eleventeen and snap the knob off? I dunno. It's fun up there. Was just explaining why I wanted that idiotic supercar the other day. There's just something about being on the edge. It transcends reality. It forces you into a focus the likes of which you can't experience elsewhere, it completely shatters ego and leaves your entire being as a pinpoint completely focused on One Thing. It's a beautiful moment, not unlike the tearing of reality you find on a good acid trip. It's a Nice Place to Be. Holy, almost.

But WHY? No f#$%ing clue, mate lol. Been like this roughly since the date of my first serious concussion. 12/25/87, I had just turned 7. Tearing ass earned me the first and I been tearing ass ever since. You tell me.

Quote: aceofspades

Quote: Aussie

Quote: AZDuffman

Stop ignoring the brutal downside of legal pot

Interesting opinion piece on marijuana legalization. The pols are ready to become either the largest dealers or the gangster collecting the street tax of the local dealers. Meanwhile, same pols who are worried to death that kids might smoke a cigarette overlook the downsides of the stuff.

Looking at the tax rates this seems if even unintentionally to be a way the lower classes will stay lower class. Buy some dope with that lottery ticket every week and wonder why you never have any money. If government would run payday loan shops they would have the entire cycle.

Downside or not, why should the government be telling someone what they can and can’t do to their own body?

Cocaine, meth, heroin, ecstasy -- all should be legal then, right?

Absolutely they should be.
I have no desire to take anything but if I did want to why should someone tell me I can’t? Regulate the market: tax it to provide government funding for programs and law enforcement to mitigate the negative effects, ensure legitamate businesses produce the stuff so that the consumer knows what is going into their body instead of the guess work through some scumbag criminal. There are plenty of things that would/could be done in the unlikely event of legalisation.

Quote: Face

not unlike the tearing of reality you find on a good acid trip. It's a Nice Place to Be. Holy, almost.
.

It's called attempted self destruction
and living thru it. It's relief you feel,
like those people who like to be
strangled into unconsciousness
during sex.

It's like you're punishing yourself
for something. That's why you have
the rage, why are you so angry at
who you are that you want to
destroy yourself. It's a cliche, you
know, those guys who pedal to
the metal on everything, burning
up 80 years of life in the first 40.

What do they all have in common.

Quote: Evenbob

What do they all have in common.

….uhh???

Dunno, I don't follow. I assume you mean a history of drugs? If so, I still don't know what to tell you. A vast majority, pretty much all hijinks minus the street bike, allll came well before I had even seen weed or so much as sampled a single cig or drink. Sending it up hill climbs when I was too stupid to know you had to let off the gas at the top. 20' straight into the air and just let go, full on dream panic of falling to your death. Land on your feet but from so high you still smash your face on the ground, even though you're on your feet. Was about 13 then. Or flogging the balls of it just to find, ooops, there's a chain fence at the end of this fire road. And grab the binders but have no racing experience, so when it slides sideways you just keep em clamped, until it catches, sends you flying, and you snap that fence pole off with the back of your thankfully helmeted head. That, laughably, might have been the same day as the hill climb. Jumping a car with a car, throwing my dog up a cliff so she don't fall, but falling 20' onto my face myself. On and on and on...

Drugs gave me a 5-6 yr hiatus on all that physical punishment lol. I didn't need to run from my demons by going 120 everywhere. I could just smoke a bowl and be fine, so driving 50 became acceptable. I could take a bump and get the exact feeling that doing 170 down I-86 gave me. I didn't ride, didn't race, didn't stunt, all I did was play a lil hockey and go snoboarding. Then I got clean, had enough money for a bike, and no source of hyperstimulation. So back to beating the s#$% out of myself we went.

This isn't a pro drug rant. I'm juuust saying that the $50k cancer treatment or $250k bypass that would be your "cost to society" I incur by my irresponsible drug use (in this case, tobacco) I have already eclipsed by being an active, physical, competitive boy.

And not for nothing, but the real War on Drugs... this is where it should be fought. Addiction is a DISEASE. It's a mental illness, or, as it may be in my case, a symptom of mental illness. That we throw these people in a cell to rot is not only barbaric, but just kinda really flat out stupid.

Quote:

What do they all have in common.

Quote: Face

… I didn't need to run from my demons.

Why do you have demons, I never had
any demons, most people don't. Why
the constant headlong race into self
destruction.

Quote: Evenbob

Why do you have demons, I never had
any demons, most people don't. Why
the constant headlong race into self
destruction.

Sorry folks, please stand by while EB attempts to shrink me...

It's brain damage, man. I've been self-shrinking for 23 years, it's the only thing that fits. There's not a single mental pathology in any of my immediate or extended family, save that Pops gets the same winter blues and has the same lone wolf gene that I do. The depression, the psychosis, the phantom sounds/shadows, the emotional upheaval, the rage,... not a single bit of it is found anywhere in my family, and every bit of it is a symptom of traumatic brain injury and chronic traumatic encephalopathy. And it all began on 12/25/87 at 7 yrs old. Just sledding down the hill pretending to be race cars like we always did. Cousin wanted to go fast, I refused to push him. He threw my sled down the hill. I went to get it and he ran and dove at me to smash me because he was mad. Hit the back of my ankles, feet went up, first thing to hit was the back of my head on the frozen street. Cracked my head, and from that crack hatched a demon.

That's why, EB. That's why everything. The "urge" or whatever, the draw towards competition and motorsports and the like, that's normal. That's how I was raised. We were "being race cars" that day because that's what we did. All summer every summer our whole lives, we were at the races. All spring, on the ball field. All fall, on the gridiron. That's normal. The turning things up to eleventeen and snapping the knob off, that's the mental. I'm not "a druggie". I'm a f#$%ing square, dude. I'm a dork. I was never into that, into being popular, into destruction. I'm a f#$%ing ray of sunshine always, to the point it's bloody irritating. That's why I get so personal on here; I don't give a s#$% about being embarrassed, my ego isn't that precious. But I might be able to help someone, be some flotsam a drowning man could cling to, I could help, ya know? Cuz at the core, that's what I am. A good person. A quality dude. Or at least, that's why I try to be.

But I'm not strong. Not as invincible as I claim or have proved to be over the last 25 years. I cannot take this s#$%, or I should say "that" s#$% because I'm starting to come out of it. I know what true emptiness feels like, I know what FrG means when he said "purgatory is the absence of God's love". And the words simply don't exist to describe how much that emptiness hurts. And a mother's love cannot penetrate it. A father's love cannot penetrate it. Can you imagine what it is to look at your son, know in your mind you love him, but in your heart feel literally nothing? And to top it all off, know that there's is NOTHING on this planet that can save you from it? That you just have to BE this, because this is what and who you now are? Forever?

That is why, after all those years of abuse followed by 6-ish years of being completely clean, I am back smoking weed. It's self medication, it's "drug abuse", but it's also the only thing that lets me feel anything at all. It's not noble and it sure ain't efficient to remodel this house pied to the gourd, as I'm spending 30% of my time looking for the hammer I JUST put down. But without weed, I would have (and I have all winter) spent all that time laying on the floor 1,000yd staring at the wall. All the therapy in the world can't help, none of the 6 or 7 psyche meds I've tried helped (and a fair amount made things worse), we're not even to the point we can test and confirm what's wrong with me as the tech just isn't there. I just gotta… figure it out. Every bit of all of the weed, the coke, the acid, the MDMA, the heroin, the crack, the Darvocet, the Percocet, the psilocybin, all of it came by way of the pursuit to just f#$%ing feel again. Well, almost all of it. Mushrooms are a genuine good f#$%ing time lol ;)

Driving 50 is mindless. You can do 100's of miles without even remembering them. Driving a '93 Subaru Legacy 130 through the canyons Richard Burns style, that plugs me in. It's....it's like... Jesus, it's breakthrough time.... The "outside brain", the cortex. This is where humanity is. Social interaction, advanced planning, ability to think about the future, that's all on the "outside", the top layer of the brain. And I f#$%ing scrambled mine. Probably why I hate people and can't seem to wrap my head around "If you try to jump this, it's gonna hurt for 30yrs". Then there's the "middle layer", the limbic system. Emotions, mood, memory, and it appears I've scrambled that up pretty good as well. Then there's the third. The reptile brain. Eat, fight, f#$%, defend territory, keep safe. Maybe all my recklessness is just my brain's way of plugging into the only part of itself that works correctly these days.

Maybe I just miss myself and that's the only place myself exists anymore.

Quote: Face

Sorry folks, please stand by while EB attempts to shrink me...
.

Why, do you get tumescent when reading
my posts? I'll read the rest later, I'm wrestling
a deep freeze by myself out the back door.

Quote: Evenbob

Why, do you get tumescent when reading
my posts? I'll read the rest later, I'm wrestling
a deep freeze by myself out the back door.

Self awareness. This is a News thread that went to drugs, and from sharing my personal experience it has become about me. I am not "news", and as such, feel mild embarrassment for abducting the thread. I didn't mean to imply that YOU were the issue by shrinking me, rather that I was the issue by needing to be shrunk.

Apologies.