Cocaine Withdrawals
Cocaine, when taken in a manner that gets the drug into the bloodstream quickly and in high concentrations, produces a feeling of euphoria and happiness that makes its use appealing and addictive.
However, this feeling of elation doesn’t last very long, somewhere between fifteen minutes to three hours, depending on the amount taken and the type of administration. When the cocaine wears off, most people feel a low that is as equally as bad as the “high” felt good and since human’s don’t tolerate painful feelings well, most cocaine users are looking for more of the drug to eliminate the negative feelings.
Effects
Every time a person uses cocaine, there is a change in his neurochemistry that accounts for these high or good feelings. The euphoria from cocaine use is caused by the drug impacting on the nerve centers which receive dopamine, the natural chemical creating energetic feelings. But cocaine use and abuse interferes with the re-absorption of dopamine. The excessive accumulation of dopamine makes for a higher than normal amount of the chemical in the brain is what accounts for the high feelings of euphoria. The later depletion of dopamine accounts for the “crash” or depression that follows cocaine abuse.
Chemical Mechanic
In lay terms, some of these chemicals are part of man’s mechanisms to give him the needed energy and abilities to respond under stress or attack and others are the way the brain and hormones work to relay feelings from one area of the brain to another. When these chemicals are stimulated artificially by cocaine or other similar drugs, such as methamphetamines, these processes and their metabolic outcomes are exaggerated, which accounts for the extreme feelings of elation or euphoria that makes these drugs so addictive.
Change their Life's
When a person is overly stimulated, they no longer view their environment in the same fashion. A personal relationship that they might have found unlikeable before they took the cocaine will later seem to have a much higher affinity. This distortion of one’s reality enables the cocaine user to minimize the physical, emotional, or legal threat or consequences of their behaviors, which leads the cocaine addict into conflicts and problems that he would not have encountered if he wasn’t seeing his world through rose-colored glasses.
Behavior
This distorted reality keeps the cocaine user from limiting his behaviors and they find themselves doing irresponsible and even illegal activities that are outside of their personal moral codes and would be considered quite alien to them if they were not being deluded by the effects of this drug.
One of these delusions that inevitably ruins many lives is the drive to continue getting the cocaine high long after a person can no longer afford to purchase any more of drugs. The euphoric feeling drives the user to criminal activities to get the cocaine that they are seeking without ever questioning the rational of their actions.
Why They Keep Taking It?
Once these “feel good” chemicals are no longer being overly stimulated by the influence of cocaine, the body goes into a correction phase to regain a standard balance in these systems. The absence of these chemicals causes the opposite of elation and euphoria, which is gloominess and depression.
Man’s nature is to be anxious when he is feeling depressed, which usually will lead to the kinds of actions that will relieve the depression. In this case, the person knows that taking more cocaine will relieve the depression and bring back the “high” that he fondly remembers and has assigned to this feeling, an unrealistic positive value which draws the user back to repeated use and addiction.
“Payback”
When a person starts to withdrawal from cocaine, they can count on having periods of “payback” for their cocaine stimulated highs. As time passes, these chemicals in the brain readjust back to normal levels and actions, which takes away the depression and exhaustion that one experiences soon after a “run” of cocaine. However, it is well documented that many people will have cocaine cravings long after the neurochemicals are normalized and there is plenty of space and time since their cocaine use and abuse.
These cravings can go on for literally years after someone has stopped using this drug. Many past cocaine addicts will attest to feeling a cocaine-like high after they exercise. The basis for these long-term cravings lies in the fact that cocaine is a fat soluble chemical that isn’t totally eliminated from the body by the usual mechanisms of the liver and kidneys, but actually lodges in the fat tissue of the body. When physiological circumstances change and some of this fat is metabolized, the cocaine molecules are released back into the bloodstream. This not only causes the ex-addict to crave more of the drug, but it also brings back those memories of euphoria and the psychological cravings for more of the drug.
Detoxification
It is this phenomenon that accounts for many people believing that cocaine addiction is a chronic an progressive disease. These strong cocaine recalls can be very confusing to a recovering cocaine addict and are the main reason for relapses back to uncontrolled use. The Narconon New Life Detoxification Programs is a key treatment modality that addresses this problem by a time-tested method of getting the cocaine out of the body in a controlled environment and thoroughly so that the ex-user will no longer have these overpowering urges causes by re-experiencing minute amounts of cocaine long after the person has re-established his ethics and moral code to eliminate even the idea of ever using cocaine again.
Removing the idea that an ex-cocaine user has a disease that is progressing over time, frees up one’s strength to have the resolve to stay away from this drug that will manipulate one’s feelings and seduce them into disastrous behaviors. Anyone that has had a history of cocaine use or has a loved one with this past, should contact the Narconon Drug Rehabilitation to learn more about this thorough detoxing and treatment.
