Another what would you do ?

[Alf W]

Depends what 'getting into drugs' actually means. Before I'd left school I'd done fags, booze, weed and speed (we even tried growing cannabis in the woods at school). By the end of Uni I'd added coke, 'shrooms, acid and ecstasy (or maybe cheap speed, talcum powder and flower). I've slept under hedges, passed out p1ssed, been arrested and had one night stands. All of which I regarded as part of growing up.

If my son ever does any of the above I'll batter the little basta.......

[MobileCheese]

Coke is very widely avaliable these days though most of it is well cut and weak.

You still got to becareful though with it, I got a mate who had a bit of a habit for years doing it once or twice a month, however in the last year its become daily, even doing it at work not good but he still manages to hold a job down, doesnt matter what I say to him only he can decide when to give up.

At 17 I would guess its a phase and about wanting to look cool. If it was herion though that would be a different matter, my sister was a herion addict for 7 years, she is clean now but for everyone involved it a 7 year nightmare. If it were herion I would be talking to the parents now.

[Paula]

Shock horror - teenagers take cheap drugs!!!

Oh my god, they'll be having sex before marriage next!!


Sandy, Coke is no big deal, it really isn't. Just let this other lass get on with it. It's none of your business what she gets up to anyway - and you going to the school or her parents will really stitch your daughter up, aswell as this lass.

Most kids do it, most of them are fine. Much like drinking.

Spoken like a true coke addict, coke is not cheap or harmless. Most children do not do coke. If it's 'no big deal' the parents should be told anyway

[Diver]

Shock horror - teenagers take cheap drugs!!!

Oh my god, they'll be having sex before marriage next!!


Sandy, Coke is no big deal, it really isn't. Just let this other lass get on with it. It's none of your business what she gets up to anyway - and you going to the school or her parents will really stitch your daughter up, aswell as this lass.

Most kids do it, most of them are fine. Much like drinking.

Three local teenagers have died from drug overdoses in the past year. I know the parents of two. They would be horrified and disgusted to hear that comment, as am I.

So when/if you have a child and that child is doing Cocaine or Heroin, are you just going to laugh and say carry on, it's no big deal ?

All Drug Dealers and Pedophiles should have their throats cut (slowly)

[Denny]

The short-term physiological effects of cocaine include constricted blood vessels; dilated pupils; and increased temperature, heart rate, and blood pressure. Large amounts (several hundred milligrams or more) intensify the user's high, but may also lead to bizarre, erratic, and violent behaviour. These users may experience tremors, vertigo, muscle twitches, paranoia, or, with repeated doses, a toxic reaction closely resembling amphetamine poisoning. Some users of cocaine report feelings of restlessness, irritability, and anxiety. In rare instances, sudden death can occur on the first use of cocaine or unexpectedly thereafter. Cocaine-related deaths are often a result of cardiac arrest or seizures followed by respiratory arrest.

Various doses of cocaine can also produce other neurological and behavioural effects such as:

dizziness

headache

movement problems

anxiety

insomnia

depression

hallucinations

----------

Doesn't seem that harmless to me. That's why it's illegal and an A category drug.

I'm surprised at some of the liberal views expressed on this forum about Sandy's situation with her daughter's friend and drug taking in general. Taking Coke is hardly the same as having a secret puff of a cigarette behind a bike shed or the odd underage alcopop session. This is what I would consider normal experimental teenage behaviour. Taking class A drugs are not in that category. Taking hard drugs is a sign that something is wrong and needs dealing with. There's nothing cool about it at all.

Let's hope this girl doesn't try Meth (a concentrated form of Speed). Then she really will be in trouble. It's highly dangerous, addictive after using it just once and very cheap to obtain. Yet the effects of it are devastating not just for the users but for the environment in general.

[Diver]

The short-term physiological effects of cocaine include constricted blood vessels; dilated pupils; and increased temperature, heart rate, and blood pressure. Large amounts (several hundred milligrams or more) intensify the user's high, but may also lead to bizarre, erratic, and violent behaviour. These users may experience tremors, vertigo, muscle twitches, paranoia, or, with repeated doses, a toxic reaction closely resembling amphetamine poisoning. Some users of cocaine report feelings of restlessness, irritability, and anxiety. In rare instances, sudden death can occur on the first use of cocaine or unexpectedly thereafter. Cocaine-related deaths are often a result of cardiac arrest or seizures followed by respiratory arrest.

Various doses of cocaine can also produce other neurological and behavioural effects such as:

dizziness

headache

movement problems

anxiety

insomnia

depression

hallucinations

----------

Doesn't seem that harmless to me. That's why it's illegal and an A category drug.

I'm surprised at some of the liberal views expressed on this forum about Sandy's situation with her daughter's friend and drug taking in general. Taking Coke is hardly the same as having a secret puff of a cigarette behind a bike shed or the odd underage alcopop session. This is what I would consider normal experimental teenage behaviour. Taking class A drugs are not in that category. Taking hard drugs is a sign that something is wrong and needs dealing with. There's nothing cool about it at all.

Let's hope this girl doesn't try Meth (a concentrated form of Speed). Then she really will be in trouble. It's highly dangerous, addictive after using it just once and very cheap to obtain. Yet the effects of it are devastating not just for the users but for the environment in general.

[Paula]

Sandy, have a read of this

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/article658100.ece

In buying coke you are handing over money, power and legitimisation to the most violent and corrupt forces in Latin America and, increasingly, to the drug gangs that roam and kill in this country. Put simply, your coke pleasure is built on other people’s pain and misery.

I’ve always known that the coke trade was run by dodgy people. But last week the extent of it came home to me when I read about Olinda Giro, 20, a Colombian who at the age of 17 lost her sight when she stepped on a landmine, planted by a cocaine cartel to protect their crops. It’s something that happens often in Colombia. In Britain in 2003 a seven-year-old girl, Toni-Ann Byfield, was shot dead by a gunman who had just killed her coke-dealing dad. A life for a few lines?

Coke’s modern fashionability began with the success of the film Easy Rider in 1969. It featured two motorcycle-riding dealers played by Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper. As a result of that film we all thought coke was cool — the outlaws’ drug.

But we had no idea that one day it would spread so contagiously and wreak such devastation. People like me are being mugged so addicts can pay for a drug I once thought was cool. So in the spirit of the season of goodwill to all men I thought I might try to do a little bit of good by getting people to join me in my ethical stand to stop taking coke.


So I begin with the moral case. I point out that last year more than 1,000 innocent people were killed or maimed by cocaine production related landmines and that 65% were children. “As a mother,” I say, “don’t you have a moral obligation not to give money to people who kill children?”

“Of course,” she says. “But when you’ve had three glasses of champagne at a party, landmines don’t exactly come to mind.”

“Okay,” I tell her, “what about stopping on health grounds? They spray terrible pesticides on coke crops, and even cancer-causing chemicals like phenacetin. And listen to this — Professor John Henry, a leading drug expert, has said, ‘People need to know that not only can you die from first use but that you’re also going to end up with arteries like a 60-year-old and have brain damage’.”
Mummy seems moved. “How awful! I don’t see why they can’t make organic cocaine. And thank heavens no man will ever see the state of my arteries!”

My final point was to try to appeal to her as parent. “If you take coke what will you say to your children when they say, ‘Mummy, you took it, so why can’t I?’”

My last attempt is with someone I shall call the Idealist. He is in his twenties — a student of politics, with dreadlocks and various face piercings. The Idealist is against capitalism, globalisation, free markets, George Bush and “mindless consumerism” — but loves “to get off my face on coke”.

I point out to him that when he buys cocaine he is financing Colombia’s right-wing death squads who prey on and exploit the poor. How can he justify that? “Look, it’s the Americans who have been financing death squads in Latin America since the 1980s — they’ve got blood on their hands, not me.”

[Diver]

Hear Hear

[BrilloPad]

I have never taken cocaine or heroin - but if it got me out of my back pain I would happily do so.

Luckily Cannabis works fine. phew...

[Churchill]

We're all OD'ing on your boring and unfunny comments! I need to jab a needle in my arm first to muster up the enthusiasm to read them.

I'm glad you keep making the effort, it makes my day.
(Btw, someone thought it was funny!)