As they say, we all are crazy. We all have that craziness within us. It is just a matter of how we deal with our differences and extremities that we are able to handle our craziness. Moreover, many ask if mental illnesses really do exist. The English-speaking world has not always used medical language to illustrate the behavior we now label as symptomatic of mental illness. Descriptions were sometimes framed in quite different terms, such as possession. What we now call mental illness was not always treated as a medical problem. Non-English-speaking nations in the West have had changes in their linguistic usage and their treatment of the mentally ill roughly parallel to Anglophone countries. Anthropological work in non-Western cultures suggests that there are many cases of behavior that psychiatry would categorize as symptomatic of mental disorder, which are not seen within their own cultures as signs of mental illness.

However, nowadays, it has been discussed that mental disorders are really existing mental conditions that may be a reason of trouble in a person’s thinking, feeling, mood, ability to relate to others and daily functioning. Just as diabetes is a disorder of the pancreas, mental illnesses are medical conditions that often result in a decreasing capacity for coping with the ordinary demands of life.

Mental illness does not choose an individual to carry the burdens of the disorder. Mental illnesses are not the outcome of personal weakness, lack of character or poor upbringing. Mental illnesses are curable. Most people diagnosed with a serious mental illness can experience relief from their symptoms by actively joining in an individual treatment plan. In addition to medication treatment, psychosocial treatment such as cognitive behavioral therapy, interpersonal therapy, peer support groups and other community services can also be components of a treatment plan and that assist with recovery. The availability of transportation, diet, exercise, sleep, friends and meaningful paid or volunteer activities contribute to overall health and wellness, including mental illness recovery.

Sometimes, recovering from mental illness is quite impossible due to the stigma attached to it by the society one lives in. When the person is treated inside a medical institution, he or she is given sufficient treatment and is treated as if they are normal. They are given proper care and attention so as to promote recovery. However, when they go out into the real world after some time, society, upon knowing their past, would most likely mock them and treat them differently. Society would look at them as someone who still has the mental disorder and consequently, it would make them feel worse and thus, could trigger an occurrence of the mental illness once again.

The feelings of inadequateness would cause problems for a person with mental disorder. He would think that he I not worthy to live in this world given that he could not function properly anymore. However, support from family and friends would be a great help for the patient to view life differently and positively. Thus it is the role of the family to provide the patient with love and care so as to sustain his recovery.

Depending upon the preference of the user and the drugs’ purity. Heroin can be used in different ways. It can be injected into a vein, injected into a muscle, smoked in a standard pipe, mixed in a regular cigarette, inhaled as smoke through a straw, known as “chasing the dragon,” snorted as powder via the nose.

After a single dose, the short-term effects of abusing heroin appears and in a few hours disappear. After an injection of heroin, the user reports feeling a surge of euphoria together with a warm flushing of the skin, a dry mouth, and heavy extremities. Following this initial euphoria, the user goes “on the nod,” an alternately wakeful and drowsy state. Mental functioning becomes clouded because of the depression of the central nervous system. Other effects included decreased and slurred speech, slow gait, constricted pupils, droopy eyelids, impaired night vision, vomiting, constipation.

A certain period of time is needed for the appearance of the long-term effects of heroin. Chronic users may develop collapsed veins, infection of the heart lining and valves, abscesses, cellulites, and liver disease. Pulmonary complications, including various types of pneumonia, may result from the poor health condition of the abuser, as well as from heroin’s depressing effects on respiration. In addition to the effects of the drug itself, street heroin may have additives that do not really melt and result in clogging the blood vessels that lead to the lungs, liver, kidneys, or brain. This can cause infection or even death of small patches of cells in vital organs. With regular heroin use, tolerance develops. This means the abuser must use more heroin to achieve the same intensity or effect.

As higher doses are used over time, physical dependence and addiction develop. With physical dependence, the body has adapted to the presence of the drug and withdrawal symptoms may happen if use is stopped. Withdrawal, which in regular abusers may occur as early as a few hours after the last administration, produces drug craving, restlessness, muscle and bone pain, insomnia, diarrhea and vomiting, cold flashes with goose bumps (”cold turkey”), kicking movements (”kicking the habit”), and other symptoms. Major withdrawal symptoms hit the highest point between 48 and 72 hours after the last does and collapse after about a week. Sudden withdrawal by heavily dependent users who are in poor health can be deadly.

Moreover, the withdrawal syndrome from heroin may begin within 6 to 24 hours of discontinuation of the drug; however, this time frame can vary with the degree of tolerance as well as the amount of the last consumed dose. Symptoms may include: sweating, malaise, anxiety, depression, priapism, extra sensitivity of the genitals in females, general feeling of heaviness, cramp-like pains in the limbs, excessive sneezing, tears, rhinorrhea, sleep difficulties (insomnia), cold sweats, chills, severe muscle and bone aches; nausea and vomiting, diarrhea, cramps, and fever.

Like any other cycle of drug addiction, heroin addiction starts with the irregular use of the drug that would then lead to a habit. This is so because it causes some chemicals in the brain to become dependent to the drug. Moreover, the body itself craves for the drug because of its pleasurable effects. It is relaxing, thus the person feels positively about the drug. And even though it gets to the point that the drug is slowly destroying the person, he or she could not get away with it anymore, because he or she has become dependent on heroin. Thus, when the drug intake is suddenly stopped, the person experiences withdrawal symptoms. With this, professional help is needed for recovery.

Cocaine was regarded as a status drug in the year 1970s for the reason that cocaine was pricey. The beginnings of inexpensive crack increased the ease of access of this substance, and crack has become the drug of choice for many drug users, especially for inner-city disadvantaged youth. This has been the beginnings of the growing crack addiction. Crack’s convenience, ease of concealment, wide availability, and low cost has increased its use. The reality that crack is smoked rather than snorted has added to its popularity.

The preconceived notion that drug addiction only happens on the street is largely false. It is a common fact that celebrities have their “shining moments” when it comes to substance dependence. They may look pleasant and very much happy in front of cameras, but their deepest secrets are yet to be revealed. A number of celebrities have already been into rehabilitation to fight their crack addiction, heroin, or even alcohol addiction.

Long before Lindsay Lohan and Britney Spears hogged the headlines with their wild child antics, there was Drew Barrymore. At the age of nine, Drew was already smoking cigarettes. She was an alcoholic at 11, a marijuana smoker by 12, and a cocaine addict by 13. She went to rehab twice and even attempted suicide when she was 14. Right now, that is all in the past. Her wild child days behind her, Barrymore has grown into a sober, responsible and productive woman. Aside from starring in a slew of hits, she has also become a producer, forming the production company Flower Films with friend and partner Nancy Juvonen in 1995. Her company is responsible for hits like Charlie’s Angels and 50 First Dates. Quite a turnaround for a woman with a childhood as messed up as hers.

There are actually two sides to this Oprah-Winfrey-was-a-drug-addict story. On one hand, there’s the memorable TV moment in the 90s when she tearfully told in her own talk show that she had smoked crack cocaine while in her 20s, but never said anything about dependence on the drug or anything else. On the other hand, there’s the more recent accusation made in a tell-all book by a previous boyfriend that Oprah was in reality, a customary cocaine user in the 80s, and was in fact under the influence during her show tapings.

Whatever the truth is, it is clear that Oprah has now overcome whatever her drug demons of the 70s and 80s were. As of September 2008, Forbes has listed Oprah as having a fortune worth over $2.7 billion. CNN and Time Magazine hailed her “arguably the world’s most powerful woman”. She is quite the success story, sordid drug past or not.

Any kind of substance addiction, be it crack addiction can happen to anyone in all walks of life. Life is largely unpredictable. One time we are laughing with friends living the good life, the next time we know, we are shaking and craving for a drug we never thought we couldn’t seem to live without. People may be aware of the effects of drugs if abused, yet they still give in to curiosity, probably, or to pressure and thus end up living miserably. However, there is still hope for every addict in this world. Life doesn’t end in addiction. Giving up is ends life.

There comes a time that the addict tries to look for help. He seeks for professional help to intoxicate him from the drug. Rehabilitation centers give help to those who have substance use problems. They provide medical help as well as psychological and social reformation. However, rehabilitation may not be adequate for the full recovery of the person. The patient should be prepared with the right values and abilities in facing the real world after rehabilitation.

Different groups that caters to different kinds of people that needs help offers spiritual enhancement and life skills program to people who wish to receive them. Anybody who is willing to change and turn away from such addictions or someone who merely wants to help victims recover form the darkness they were in is very welcome to join the fellowship. Inside this organization, members help each other to recover from their problems. The fellowship believes that the best people who could understand addicts are those who have been addicts themselves. Empathy is not enough. Someone who has experienced any kind of addiction would really understand the feeling of an addict and thus, would be able to offer the right comfort and support.

Such groups does not just rely on spiritual and medical help. They also make use of the twelve-step program. This twelve-step program was first created by the alcoholics anonymous. It consists of twelve steps on how to deal with the addiction, emphasizing acceptance, surrender, and self-awareness. The twelve step program tries to impart that there is one very potent being above us all, and that we should lay down all our flaws to Him and al will be well. Of course, man should do his best to become a better person and God will then do the rest.

Here is an example of the famous twelve-step program from Overeaters Anonymous:

1. We admitted we were powerless over our emotions — that our lives had become unmanageable.

2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.

4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

5. Admitted to God, to ourselves and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.

7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.

8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed and became willing to make amends to them all.

9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.

10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.

11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.

12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

With the twelve-step program, people who have become victims of addiction are given optimism that it is not too late – that life does not end in addiction. In fact, it even opens a new entry, a new episode in our lives in which we should live meaningfully.

In Narcotics Anonymous, the only requirement is a desire to stop using drugs. Moreover, since it is group-oriented, each member tries to help each other. They meet regularly to lend a hand to each other stay clean, clean meaning a complete abstinence form all mood and mind altering substances. A non-profit organization, thus no fees are required to become a member.

Narcotics Anonymous provides a place for drug addicts to recover aside from rehabilitation centers. Normally, addicts first join narcotics anonymous after reaching a “bottom” in their life, a point at which life feels completely uncontrollable, characterized by “unemployability, dereliction and destruction” and centered around the getting and using and finding ways and means to get more drugs. There are different bottoms for every Narcotics Anonymous member. This is when an addict can be anywhere he chooses to stop using substances. In practice, it is drug use and the extreme consequences associated with its abuse that carry most addicts to their bottom many of them sliding along ‘this bottom’ for many years often cannot find their way out.

The fundamental unit of Narcotics Anonymous is their customary meetings. Gatherings are held in a variety of places such as church meeting rooms, libraries, hospitals, community centers, parks, or any other place that can accommodate a meeting. “Open” and “closed” meetings are the two basic types of meetings practiced in Narcotics Anonymous.In open meetings, everybody is welcome while in closed meetings, addicts and individuals who think they have drug problems are the people who can only attend.

Meeting formats differ, but usually include time devoted to the reading aloud of Narcotics Anonymous literature regarding the matters implicated in living life clean which is in print by and for members of Narcotics Anonymous. Many meetings also include an “open sharing” component, where anyone attending has the opportunity to share. There is usually no direct feedback during the ’share’, thus only one person ever speaks at any given time during this share of the meeting.

Each group has only one primary purpose that is to carry the message to the addict who still suffers. As a result, the newcomer is considered to be the most important person in any meeting. Hope is the essential message of Narcotics Anonymous. The basic guarantee of narcotics anonymous is that an addict, any addict, can stop using drugs, lose the desire to use, and learn a new way of life. Through the twelve step program and the twelve traditions, the members are given hope for a new life worth living and fighting for.

Life should not be put to waste because a man has much potential. He or she may fail, as in becoming enslaved by worldly things such as drugs, but an individual is also capable of standing up from the fall and looking forward once again. Thus, the Narcotics Anonymous, focusing on those who are victims of drug addiction, speaks to these people of how wonderful life still is and that addiction does not mean the end, it is just a middle stage for a new and better life.

Narcotics Anonymous are now based in different areas in the world. The organization is trying to make a difference. These groups have but one message to get across, that in times of darkness, such as falling into the pit of drug addiction, you are not alone in this battle. The Narcotics Anonymous is there to support you and help you stand up and fight for your life.

Life Threatening Risk: Cocaine Laced with Levamisole

** ALERT **

We always do our best to provide information and help to all of our readers from an unbiased and non judgmental standpoint. In that spirit, we want to make sure that if you or someone you care about is using Cocaine or using Crack that they be aware of the following information and they should seek professional medical help immediately.

Alcohol and other drug programs across California should be on the lookout for a dangerous substance levamisole that is showing up with increasing frequency in illicit cocaine powder and crack cocaine, most recently in San Francisco and Los Angeles.

Levamisole is a veterinary anti-parasitic drug and it severely reduces the number of white blood cells in humans leading to an acute condition called agranulocytosis that should be treated at a hospital. Ingesting cocaine mixed with levamisole suppresses immune function and the body’s ability to fight off even minor infections. People who snort, smoke, or inject crack or powder cocaine contaminated by levamisole can experience overwhelming, rapidly-developing, life threatening infections.

Agranulocytosis manifests the following symptoms:

infections that won’t go away or get worse very fast, including sore throat or mouth sores; skin infections; abscesses; thrush (white coating of the mouth, tongue or throat); pneumonia (fever, cough, shortness of breath)

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) began alerting medical professionals, substance abuse treatment centers, and other public health authorities in September about the risks.

Used in veterinary medicine, levamisole is currently approved for use in cattle, sheep and swine as an anti-parasitic agent. Formerly used in human medicine for treating autoimmune diseases and cancer, it is no longer approved for human use.

SAMHSA is working with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), the Food and Drug Administration, the Office of National Drug Control Policy, and other federal and international organizations, as well as state agencies to monitor the levamisole issue. CDC will publish a case report analysis in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report and will work with state health departments to systematically collect information on cocaine-associated agranulocytosis cases. Information from this effort will be used to guide treatment and prevention initiatives to address the public health concern.

According to the DEA and state testing laboratories, the percentage of cocaine specimens containing levamisole has increased steadily since 2002, with levamisole now found in more than 70 percent of the illicit cocaine analyzed last July. In addition, a recent analysis in Seattle, Washington, found that almost 80 percent of individuals who test positive for cocaine also test positive for levamisole.

ADP is asking all providers to report suspected and confirmed cases of agranulocytosis associated with cocaine abuse to their local health departments. Cases can also be reported to local Poison Control Centers (1-800-222-1222), which may assist in clinical management and additional reporting. For further medical/technical information, contact Nicholas Reuter, SAMHSA Nicholas.reuter@samhsa.hhs.gov

This Cocaine Related Health Alert was sent to us to help keep you informed. The SAMHSA stands for Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). If you or a loved one need help with cocaine addiction or abuse please call the number on this site, or if you require medical attention contact a medical professional right away.

Will, or the drive to do something is an ability that every people are capable of having but they are yet to discover it. Will power is the skill to defeat laziness and procrastination. It is the ability to control unnecessary impulses. It is the ability to carry out a decision and follow it with perseverance until its successful accomplishment. It is the inner power that overcomes the want to indulge in unnecessary and useless habits, and the inner strength that overcomes inner emotional and mental resistance for taking action. As they say, it is one of the corner stones of success, both spiritual and material.

In the conditions when one wants to alter behaviors, willpower is the most useful process. Everyone possesses some addictions they wish they could overcome, such as smoking, excessive eating, laziness, procrastination or lack of assertiveness. To overcome these habits or addictions, one needs to have will power and self discipline. These two makes a great difference in everyone’s life, and bring inner strength, self mastery and decisiveness.

People may ask how they are able to have willpower most especially with all the influence of media nowadays. Commercials have attempted to position their products as a substitute to willpower. They start by saying that willpower doesn’t work and then attempt to sell you something “fast and easy” like a diet pill or some wacky exercise equipment. Often they’ll even promise impossible results in a dramatically short period of time.

But actually, willpower does work. Willpower is a concentration of force. You gather up all your energy and make a massive thrust forward. You attack your problems strategically at their weakest points until they crack, allowing you enough room to maneuver deeper into their territory and finish them off. To be able to apply willpower, one should first choose an objective. Then, create a plan of attack, and finally, execute the plan. A successful method for developing and improving these abilities is to do certain activities, which you would rather avoid doing due to laziness, procrastination, weakness, shyness, etc. By doing something that you do not like doing or are too lazy to do, you overcome your subconscious resistance, train your mind to obey you, strengthen your inner powers and gain inner strength. Muscles get stronger by opposing the power of the barbells. Inner strength is reached by overcoming inner resistance.

Willpower, however, cannot be attained right away. It takes time for you to fully acquire this capability. Furthermore, practicing your capacity to have willpower in trying to do the things that you hate to do. In your everyday dealings with things such as having to wash the dishes, cooking a healthy meal instead of ordering fast food, and having to wake up in the morning to run a mile or two, you can put into practice willpower, resisting the temptation and evil caressing hands of laziness.

What’s more, in more serious cases such as quitting smoking, the first step is having the willpower and determination to change and quit the bad habit. In rehabilitation centers, patients are trained and encouraged to practice their willpower and take control over their lives, over their addiction.

One of the very potent thing is willpower. When people possess willpower, they will be able to do the things that in the first place they are very unwilling to do. It is like with willpower, you are fighting your resisting mind.

The sex and love addiction anonymous was founded to cater to those who have been a victim of this addiction to sex and love. This was founded by a previous Alcoholics anonymous member. Though, he had been sober, he was unfaithful to his wife for a period of time. He founded sex and love addiction anonymous as an try to stop his compulsive sexual and romantic behavior.

“Bottom-line behaviors” are persuaded to be identified on members of the organization. The organization recognizes these behaviors as “any sexual or emotional act, no matter what its initial impulse may be, which leads to loss of control over rate, frequency, or duration of its occurrence or recurrence, resulting in spiritual, mental, physical, emotional, and moral damage of oneself and others.”

To aid their group members on the road to recovery, Sex and Love Addiction Anonymous utilizes the 12-step program and the 12 traditions. The excellent thing with the organization is that since everyone is a victim, they are empathic about each other’s experiences and feelings. Thus, they claim to understand what the other person is going through and are able to offer support through sharing and meetings. To quote, “we found in each other what we could find nowhere else: people who knew the depth of our pain. Together we found hope and the care of a loving Higher Power. Our commitment is to help others recover from sexual addiction, just as we have been helped.”

The twelve step-Program of Sex and Love Addiction Anonymous states that:

1. We admitted we were powerless over sex and love addiction – that our lives had become unmanageable.

2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood God.

4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.

7. Humbly asked God to remove our shortcomings.

8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.

9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.

10. Continued to take personal inventory, and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.

11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with a Power greater than ourselves, praying only for knowledge of God’s will for us and the power to carry that out.

12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to sex and love addicts, and to practice these principles in all areas of our lives.

Meanwhile, these are their Twelve Traditions:

1. Our common welfare should come first; personal recovery depends upon S.L.A.A. unity.

2. For our group purpose there is but one ultimate authority — a loving God as this Power may be expressed through our group conscience. Our leaders are but trusted servants; they do not govern.

3. The only requirement for S.L.A.A. membership is the desire to stop living out a pattern of sex and love addiction. Any two or more persons gathered together for mutual aid in recovering from sex and love addiction may call themselves an S.L.A.A. group, provided that as a group they have no other affiliation.

4. Each group should be autonomous except in matters affecting other groups or S.L.A.A. as a whole.

5. Each group has but one primary purpose — to carry its message to the sex and love addict who still suffers.

6. An S.L.A.A. group or S.L.A.A. as a whole ought never to endorse, finance, or lend the S.L.A.A. name to any related facility or outside enterprise, lest problems of money, property, or prestige divert us from our primary purpose.

7. Every S.L.A.A. group ought to be fully self-supporting, declining outside contributions.

8. S.L.A.A. should remain forever nonprofessional, but our service centers may employ special workers.

9. S.L.A.A. as such ought never to be organized; but we may create service boards or committees directly responsible to those they serve.

10. S.L.A.A. has no opinion on outside issues; hence the S.L.A.A. name ought never to be drawn into public controversy.

11. Our public relations policy is based on attraction rather than promotion; we need always maintain personal anonymity at the level of press, radio, TV, film, and other public media. We need guard with special care the anonymity of all fellow S.L.A.A. members.

12. Anonymity is the spiritual foundation of all our traditions, ever reminding us to place principles before personalities.

Alcohol is one teratogen that could greatly affect the woman’s pregnancy. People may not know of its danger and still allow a woman to drink alcoholic drinks during her pregnancy, but the effect of this would be carried by the baby for the rest of his or her life. Alcohol is one of the known causes of mental and physical birth defects specifically in the United States. Though, this is only a probability, the rate is high.

For one, Fetal Alcohol Syndrome is a disorder that can occur to the embryo when a pregnant woman ingests alcohol during pregnancy. Alcohol crosses the placental barrier and can stunt fetal weight, create distinctive facial stigmata, damage neurons and brain structures, and cause other physical, mental, or behavioral problems. The main effect of FAS is permanent central nervous system damage, especially to the brain. Developing brain cells and structures are malformed by prenatal alcohol exposure, often creating a collection of primary cognitive and functional disabilities including poor memory, attention deficits, impulsive behavior, and poor cause-effect reasoning, as well as secondary disabilities for example, mental health problems, and drug addiction.

There are different indications that can appear when one is diagnosed to have fetal alcohol syndrome. These indications include low birth mass, small head circumference, developmental delay, organ dysfunction, facial abnormalities, including smaller eye openings, flattened cheekbones, and indistinguishable philtrum (an underdeveloped groove between the nose and the upper lip), epilepsy, poor management, poor socialization skills, such as difficulty building and maintaining friendships and relating to groups, lack of curiosity, learning difficulties, including poor memory, inability to understand concepts such as time and money, poor language comprehension, poor problem-solving skills, behavioral problems including hyperactivity, inability to concentrate, social withdrawal, stubbornness, impulsiveness, and anxiety.

As said earlier, damage of the central nervous system is the main feature of fetal alcohol syndrome. Central nervous system damage can be evaluated in three areas such as structural, neurological, and functional impairments. Structural deficiencies includes microcephaly (small head size) of two or more standard deviations below the average, or other abnormalities in brain structure. During the first trimester of pregnancy, alcohol impedes with the migration and organization of brain cells, which can make structural deformities within the brain. During the third trimester, harm can be caused to the hippocampus, which plays a role in memory, learning, emotion, and encoding visual and auditory information, all of which can create neurological and functional CNS impairments as well.

The evaluation of neurological deficiencies will take place when structural deficiencies do not exist. Neurological problems are showed as either diagnosable disorders, such as epilepsy or other seizure disorders, or soft signs. Soft signs are broader, nonspecific neurological impairments, such as impaired fine motor skills, neurosensory hearing loss, poor gait, clumsiness, poor eye-hand coordination.

When structural or neurological impairments are not observed, all four diagnostic systems allow CNS damage due to prenatal alcohol exposure to be assessed in terms of functional impairments. Functional impairments are problems due to prenatal alcohol exposure (rather than hereditary causes or postnatal insults) in observable and measurable domains related to daily functioning, often referred to as developmental disabilities.

No evidence exists that can determine exactly how much alcohol ingestion will produce birth defects. Individual women process alcohol differently. Other factors vary the results, too, such as the age of the mother, the timing and regularity of the alcohol ingestion, and whether the mother has eaten any food while drinking.

Alcohol easily passes the placental barrier and the fetus is not at all equipped to get rid of alcohol than its mother, so the fetus tends to obtain a high concentration of alcohol, which lingers longer than it would in the mother’s system. this is the reason why the child is the one largely affected when in fact it is the mother who consumes the alcohol. This such a sad truth.

The addict finds it very difficult to quit using meth because of the occurrence of withdrawal symptoms. Both physical and emotional symptoms are hugely evident with chronic use of crystal meth. The effects of methamphetamine are primarily related

to its action as a powerful central nervous system stimulant affecting the body’s mechanisms for regulating heart rate, body temperature, blood pressure, appetite, attention, mood, alertness and alarm responses.

Meth can be taken in a number of ways: swallowed, snorted, smoked, injected, anally and through the urethra. Techniques which boost the brain’s uptake of the substance have been rising; snorting is faster than swallowing, smoking is faster than snorting, etc. The drug alters the mood in different ways, depending on the route of administration. Right after injecting meth intravenously, the user experiences an intense rush that lasts only a few minutes and is described as extremely pleasurable. Swallowing meth resulting in euphoria, described as a high but not a rush. While the effects of smoking and IV injection are instantaneous, smoking meth produces effects within 3 to 5 minutes and oral injection can take up to 20 minutes to produce a high.

The pleasurable effects of crystal meth disappear even before the blood concentration of the drug falls significantly; in other words, it just stops working. To maintain the high, increasing frequency of use is a requirement. Users indulge in binge behavior for days at a time; foregoing food, hygiene, sleep and other necessities. In addition, side effect associated with meth overdose include brain damage, meningitis, neurotoxicity, sensations of flesh crawling with bugs, compulsive picking and infecting sores, severe headache, muscle breakdown and kidney failure.There are currently no medications available to treat methamphetamine overdose.

Communities have now been on the move to preventing meth use among the people. Family-focused prevention efforts have been found to have greater impact than strategies that focus on parents only.

Moreover, during treatment, detoxification would entail the removal of toxins caused by the drug from the body. Because of this, withdrawal is also treated by way of providing certain drug that would copy the effects of meth but not as destructive as meth. Withdrawal from methamphetamine is normally characterized by intense drug cravings, depression, insomnia, and increased appetite.

When carried out on long term, there are several cognitive behavioral intrusions designed to help in modifying the patient’s thinking and behaviors, and to increase coping skills related to various life stressors. The support from family and loved ones is still the most important ingredient in treating meth addicts. Knowing that he or she is loved and cared for would give confidence him or her to fight for her life despite the discouraging effects of meth. With the realization that the individual feels important in the family and also in the society, he can cope up form the darkness.

Moreover, no matter what kind of treatment the patient gets, the key is the determination and will to change and do away with crystal meth. Cognitive therapy is hugely helpful in allowing the person realize that life does not revolve around the drug, that there is more to life than meth. The person would then be taught coping skills and new perspectives in dealing with temptations and starting a new life as the person recovers form the battle with meth.

One should always be prepared to face crystal meth addiction. Be always ready to call for help.