Posted by shasling on January 15, 2006, at 21:12:42
In reply to Concerned ex-meth abuser, posted by idolamine on December 29, 2005, at 20:42:11
The bad news: I was a long term heavy addict (tho not a smoker) in the late 80's. When I quit, I had a seizure disorder I didn't have when I started. I was depressed to begin with, and was depressed when I quit, so who knows the difference on that? In the past 5 years or so I have become a zombie from dopamine dysfunction, and my memory is going like I have Alzheimers - sometimes I can't remember things like how many days are the in a year. I am 45 now. To this day my brain's chemistry is super-duper actuated to anything which affects noradeneline and/or norepinephrine, like Wellbutrin, Provigil, etc. It wasn't like that before I did all the meth. Who knows what the future holds for me.
So the bad news is, it can change the chemistry of your brain permanently and f you up for life.
The good news is you don't have to do it again, and you didn't do it for very long, so maybe you have dodged a bullet.
To be fair, the NIH has done studies that show that with time, normal function returns and you'll be okay. It just didn't happen in my case. Maybe it depends on the amount used. Google "NIH methamphetamine" and read up.
Good luck. Don't let it eat up your life worrying about it, but worry enough to stay away. Its truly a bad bad drug.
poster:shasling
thread:593251
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/subs/20051211/msgs/599468.html