Legal Drugs

[Manic Webb]

Before I begin, let me just say that I do not support the use of illegal drugs.

The other day, my grandmother told me to look up information on Relacore. For those of you who haven't seen the commercials, Relacore is a new weight loss product that promises to eliminate cortisol, a chemical the human body produces to store fat. Thus, with the aid of diet and exercise, you'll lose weight faster.

If you actually read up on Relacore (and its competitor, Cortislim), you'll find that it's nothing but a mood elevator. Apparently, your body produces cortisol through stress. If you're relaxed, your body produces less cortisol. Like I said, this product is nothing but a $50 bottle of mood elevators. It makes you "happy" or "high."

I don't do drugs, but I know a place where I can get a "dime" for less than half the price, and has the same affect as this "weight loss product."

My point:
From some of the things I've seen, legal drugs sometimes have the same affects as illegal drugs. They're usually just as addictive, cause people to act the same ways, and come with long lists of side-effects. Look at Paxil.

In my opinion, such drugs are a way of sidetracking the public from illegal drugs. By addicting people to government-controlled drugs, nobody will consider illegal drugs like marijuana. It's profiting from chemical dependencies. While I think there are many people out there who need such products (well, not so much Relacore-- maybe Paxil and some painkillers), there's a possibility of people taking such products unnecessarily.

[poo62.2]

My friend, dan, has to take this medicen that is classed as a drug in sertan countries. If it was banned in england, he would probobly wouldn't be allowed into normal school because he would be violent.

i have been with dan when he has forgotten to take his medication and he is like a totally different person; he tries to bite you and kick you all the time and tries throwing thigs at teachers and once tried to jump out an open window!

[Inari]

In my opinion there are lots of problems in the pharmaceutical industry. Many drugs that they produce have unpredicted long-term side effects that aren?t discovered until the drug has been on the market for a long period of time. I remember hearing something about how people are proposing to reduce birth control pills because they are just now realizing the problems that they are causing for the women taking them and the children of these women. I agree that lots of drugs issued by doctors are highly addictive, (Take codeine or morphine for example!) while marijuana is illegal. I personally am for making marijuana a prescription drug for its various helpful affects on people with things like tremors, but that?s a little off topic.

I think that a lot of times doctors prescribe drugs when they are unnecessary. Drugs like penicillin and other anti-bacterial drugs are often over-prescribed, causing more resistant bacteria. I think that a lot of times when people go to the doctor they expect some kind of a prescription even when it is un-needed. As for all of the weight loss pills out there; I don?t think that people wishing to loose a little bit of weight should use them. These drugs should be reserved for extremely obese people who plan to loose a substantial amount of weight.

[ChibiHorsewoman]

[color=darkviolet]That's an interesting concept Manic I've actually wondered the same thing some times.

I've been off and on Ritalin (off currently) since I was six years old. ritalin as many of you probably know is classified as a controlled substance. Infact you can't go and get a refill at the pharmacy like some of the other drugs I've been on. Instead you have to call your doctor and your doctor has to call in the perscription.

Ritalin can be used as a medication to help in ADD (Attention Deficite Dissorder) and ADHD (Attention Deficite Hyperactivity Dissorder) since it has caffeine which seems to have an opposite affect on children (and people in general) with those types of problems. In this case it would be called a downer. However when used improperly it's turned into an upper. Go figure.

I also have to do the whole weight loss drug thing as well...especially since I tried taking some over the counter stuff while i was back in TExas. I don't know why I bothered. Those things don't even seem healthy. They warn you that if you take any perscriptions for depression you shouldn't take their product in the first place. I don't even think it worked. Maybe next time I'll just go with Lincoln to family day in the Army and do the two mile run with him then go straight to the gym...you know lose weight and collapse the old fashioned way.[/color]

[Godelsensei]

[COLOR=Gray][FONT=Courier New]Indeed, there are many, many people who are addicted to pain-killers, sleeping-pills, and, I imagine, countless other legal drugs.

I wont pretend to know anything about dieting pills, but the main difference between a legal upper and an illegal one would probably be that the side-effects of the illegal upper were extrordinarily worse than those of the legal one.
That's why marijuana is illegal, even though it has the same physical effects as tobbaco; it does a serious take on your brain, which proves unpleasant in the long run.

Also, modern Western society likes to drug up its citizens, especially children. If the body gets used to a certain drug at a young age (because of a slapped-on-without-thought ADD label), it won't be able to function without it for the rest of the person's life.
It's significantly better for your body to simply cut excessive sugars and fats from your diet than to take any number of pills.

Chibbi is very correct about the whole collapsing thing. xD (Even though I wouldn't have the willpwer...haha...)

As an interesting little fact, most of the "illegal" drugs coming into America from Canada, are smuggled by old ladies who can't pay their medical bills... Heh. That's another tick on the "socialist bastards" side I guess.[/FONT][/COLOR]

[DeathBug]

[quote name='Godel']As an interesting little fact, most of the "illegal" drugs coming into America from Canada, are smuggled by old ladies who can't pay their medical bills... Heh. That's another tick on the "socialist bastards" side I guess.[/quote]

[color=indigo][size=1][font=comic sans ms]Nice try, GS, but you won't get an argument from me in this thread. =P

^__~

Anyway, I may be an old vestige in that I refuse to take any sort of pills unless to combat immediate medical problems. My mom's constantly trying to get me to take Vitamins, but I simply don't like the idea of being dependent on non-foodstuffs to be at my physical peak.

You want to loose weight and feel good? Exercise. Your kid constantly acting like a little animal in public? Spank his arse a couple of times and he'll stop. You need a mood elevation? Eat a big tub of ice cream. (You can afford it, because of all of that good exercising and spanking you'll be doing.)

The sad fact is, most folks today are too impatient to want to get results the old-fashioned way, and would rather try pills as a quick fix.[/color][/size][/font]

[Roxie Faye]

[color=#9933ff]I agree with deathbug. In regards to American society, I think we're a little too pill happy. I swear, you go to your doctor, they look up your symptoms on a chart, and give you a pill for it. Where are the days when your doctor gave you a band-aid, a lollipop, and suggested plenty of fluids for a minor ailment? I use that one all the time, and it works for me!

I agree that people are so spoiled (especially Americans) and too impatient to wait for anything! (Why do all of you use DSL or cable? What's wrong with waiting for a page to load?!? Okay, bad example.)

That's not to say that pills are a bad thing. If my mom didn't have allegra, for example, she'd be having an athsma attack everyday (I'm serious), but there are probably poeple on it, that shouldn't be.

It's especially a problem with learning disorders such as ADD and ADHD. Partially it's because of doctors who don't know what they're doing (i.e.: haven't been to a medical conference on the drugs), and diagnose the child incorrectly and over prescribe medication. There are tons of normal, healthy kids who are just a little rambunctious, and they're percieved as ADD! It's also partially because of parents who don't want to accept their child as they are, and so pressure the doctors for some "quick fix." A little studying never hurt the child. How many people do you know on pills like Rittalin or Aderol, who act loony anyways? (Or is that just me and my school?)

I guess I'll just wrap up my post with the old philosophy: middle of the road. Ther are plenty of people who legitimately need some of the prescription drugs out there. However, there are plent who don't need it at all - and could take the longer route *gasp* and do things the normal way.

Does that make any sense?[/color]

[ChibiHorsewoman]

[quote name='MistressRoxie][color=#9933ff']It's especially a problem with learning disorders such as ADD and ADHD. Partially it's because of doctors who don't know what they're doing (i.e.: haven't been to a medical conference on the drugs), and diagnose the child incorrectly and over prescribe medication. There are tons of normal, healthy kids who are just a little rambunctious, and they're percieved as ADD! It's also partially because of parents who don't want to accept their child as they are, and so pressure the doctors for some "quick fix." A little studying never hurt the child. How many people do you know on pills like Rittalin or Aderol, who act loony anyways? (Or is that just me and my school?)[/color][/quote]

[color=darkviolet]The rambunctiousness that you're refering to would probably be classified as ADHD and not ADD. Trust me, I've read enough books and lived through it myself long enough to know.

I was diagnosed with ADD when I was six, but my pediatrician and quite a few psychologists gave me an insane amount of tests (ie: ink blot, the one with the pictures where they want to know what you think is going on in the picture, the one with the patterns, the one with the blocks ect ect ect ) from the time I was 4 until the middle of 1st grade. I was hardly hyper active.

I'm not saying that there aren't cases where a child who is just a bit over active at times is misdiagnosed with either ADD or ADHD I'm just saying that there is such a thing. I think the best way to check if your kid has either problem is to give them something with caffiene in it since children (as well as adults) with either condition will have a reverse reaction to caffiene (ie: they'll fall asleep or calm down instead of becomming hyper.) Trust me before I got pregnant I drank 3 cans of regular coca cola to fall asleep every night.

The vitamine thing is really scary. My grandma thinks that since they're natural they're automiatically better than the medications that her regular doctor (not her quack herbologist) prescribed so she actually won't take full doses or she'll just skip the medicines that have been proven to help treat things like the stroke she had last week or the swelling in her feet. Hell, she had her herbologist and herself diagnose that she had a UTI last year and instead of going to her doctor to get it checked out she listened to her herbologist her told her to take huge doses of vitamin C until it gave her diarreah. I'm serious. Of course, this is the same woman who when one of her children had spinal menigitous she only gave the child 1/2 doses of the medicine and 1/8 doses to the other children rather than the full doses that the pediatrician recommended. (she's also the reason my dad is sterile...but that's another story) So what should I expect?

Herbs and vitamins in small doses are fine, but most of the stuff hasn't been FDA approved so they shouldn't be considered the cure alls that some people take them to be. Some (like Fever few which is usually brewed in tea to reduce fever) can't be taken by pregnant women at all. And others (like Eccincacea) can interact with other medications prescribed by your doctor so you should ask before you use them. Many of the herbal teas that they sell in health food stores and in the natural food section of grocery stores also have warnings on them about how the results have not been proven by the FDA and if you're pregnant to consult a physician (not my granma's herbologist either) who knows about herbs before taking them.

In short- natural doesn't mean safe (which is why when putting down Mandrake Root in my book of shadows I added [b]DO NOT EAT[/B] in large letters). Before you decide your kid has either ADD or ADHD give them some coffee and see what happens. And drink more orange juice.[/color]