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Lifestyle changes: Ageing out of drugs

#1
C C Offline
https://aeon.co/essays/most-drug-users-s...e-not-poor

EXCERPT: ‘I’m at the point in my life where I’ve been doing this 20 years or so. [It’s been] probably 22, 23 years, and I’m ready to quit,’ said Clyde, a long-time methamphetamine user now in his mid-40s. When we met in 2011, he was beginning to grow weary from decades of partying and staying up for days at a time. We sat in a conference room at a homelessness resource centre in Northern Colorado. From across the table, his pale blue eyes were bloodshot with fatigue.

By the time of my first interview with Clyde (not his real name), I’d been conducting research with active meth users for about three years, so his sentiment wasn’t news to me. After all, the highly potent central nervous system stimulant wears out most people eventually. The lack of sleep, the growing paranoia, the skyrocketing proportion of bad days to good all drive users to seek sobriety.

As with many others I studied, Clyde’s use fluctuated, sometimes dwindling to complete abstinence for weeks or even months; he talked frequently about leaving the drug behind for good. But he always went back. Intermittently homeless and plagued by debilitating and difficult-to-treat mental health issues, his circumstances seemed to lock him into his addiction.

Yet Clyde’s story – the part where he doesn’t quit – is not the norm. Most users, even the majority of those so hooked that we label them addicts, recover on their own without ever undergoing formal treatment....
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#2
Syne Offline
Yeah, it's called rational recovery, or self-recovery. Many people do eventually learn from their mistakes. Rational recovery deems things like AA groups and 12-step programs as needlessly indoctrinating (higher power) and actually detrimental in that they encourage users to relive their addiction through repeated testimonials and association with other former (or if they "fall off the wagon", current) users.
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#3
Yazata Online
I smoked marijuana daily and used quite a lot of psychedelics back in the day (the early 1970's). But I only did it for a few years and drifted away from it pretty quickly. I haven't smoked a joint in probably 20 years.

I will say that if marijuana is legalized here in California and pot-stores open, I'll probably start smoking again a bit. Or not. It depends on how seriously I take the Buddhist precept to avoid mind-clouding intoxicants, I guess.
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#4
Bowser Offline
(Sep 2, 2016 03:07 AM)Yazata Wrote: I smoked marijuana daily and used quite a lot of psychedelics back in the day (the early 1970's). But I only did it for a few years and drifted away from it pretty quickly. I haven't smoked a joint in probably 20 years.

I will say that if marijuana is legalized here in California and pot-stores open, I'll probably start smoking again a bit. Or not. It depends on how seriously I take the Buddhist precept to avoid mind-clouding intoxicants, I guess.

I was a pot smoker for a long time. It's legal to buy and smoke here, but I just don't have any interest anymore. There was a day when I thought my world would be complete when I could buy weed legally. Now that that day has arrived, I don't care. It's funny how age changes our priorities as we grow older.
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