The Basketball Diaries Essay

Jim, a high school all-star basketball player becomes addicted to heroin. He tries to hide his addiction, but it becomes quite prevalent when it begins to overtake his life entirely. To begin with, Jim reflects on his first experiences with heroin and refers to it as a “chippy” habit. He isn’t aware of the addictiveness of this potent drug, which shortly becomes habitual. His addiction leads to him being kicked off the basketball team, out of his own house, and then desperate on the streets of New York City alongside of his friends. This substantially progresses his addiction, resulting in him passing out in the snow one night. Thanks to Jim’s former basketball friend, Jim is forced to withstand from heroin. Jim become extremely agitated from withdrawal and escapes to look for some more. Jim later finds himself in a six-month rehab, which he notes “the

This literature review will focus mainly on the drug use of heroin, the scary numbers behind the drug and the sudden rise of overdosing on the drug across the United States. Issues that will be discussed are what is Heroin, what’s in Heroin that makes it addicting, how it can increase the users risk of contracting other life threatening diseases and where it’s use and abuse are most popular across the United states and we will take a look at multiple studies that show examples of our new drug problem in the United States. While we looked at how homicide rates have dropped while in class, the flip side to that is that the amount of drug usage has risen.

For more than 30 years methadone has been used to treat addiction to heroin and other opioid drugs, including morphine. Like other narcotics, heroin releases dopamine into the bloodstream which activates the brain’s pleasure receptors producing a state of high euphoria. To maintain the same level of pleasure, heroin addicts must take increasing amounts of the drug to maintain a continuous supply of opioid to brain receptors. This produces extreme swings in mood and behavior as the drug peaks and ebbs in the bloodstream.

People that can access prescribed opiates can easily become physically dependent on the high; whereas, an individual who cannot obtain them have symptoms of withdrawal. This causes a broad range of heroin seeking behavior. It has become evident that users who are dependent on

Heroin addicts have the psychological dependence on heroin that leads them into the state of self-destruction and the possibility of leading to death by the extreme use of heroin. Never estimate the poppy flower for its power that withholds the fiends to their mentality enduring the euphoria enslavement of the mind that contained for many centuries. The heroin addiction nation is a self numbing injection and dry approach to have the mind under the state of the greatest feeling of great happiness leaving the pain behind under the spell of heroin. Heroin comes in many forms for addicts to enjoy in their own way. They come in powder and rock like form that is combined with other narcotics. The snorting form for heroin is not

Have you ever encountered a heroin user or even known one? If you did you probably knew very little about what the drug has become to them. No one sets out to be a heroin addict. Janice from New Jersey told reporters about her story, “I was a high-profile model and intravenous heroin addict. I copped on the street. Heroin doesn 't discriminate. It is unbearably wonderful for suppressing pain and generating a false sense of well-being. I loved heroin. Addicts who say "I hate heroin" are lying to themselves. We wouldn 't stick needles in our arms daily if we didn 't love the way it made us feel. But when it wears off, you 're in a hole so big it 's impossible to climb out. No one sets out to be a heroin addict. It 's not a lifestyle

In a controlled experiment they gave rats two options and two environments. They gave the rat’s pure drinking water, and next to it a bottle of heroin infused water. In one cage the rat had a non-stimulating environment, and was isolated. That rat chose to drink from the heroin water, and built up an addiction. He would push the bar up to one hundred times per minute. Since he had no other outside influences he built up a tolerance and needed the drugs more than sleep, sex, and eating which eventually lead to his death.

Heroin addiction is a chronically relapsing disease, usually characterized by tendencies such as drug seeking, drug abuse, tolerance and physical dependence. Substance abuse disorders have increased the levels of morbidity and mortality and with a consequent significant increase in HIV spread across the globe. Heroin increases psychiatric disorders, especially with mood anxiety, impulse control, and imbalance –related disorders.

Heroin is a widely used opioid, a study done in 2007 by the National Survey on Drug Use and Health found that there are 153,000 heroin users in the United States, however other studies have found this number to be much higher (Foundation for a Drug-Free World.). Heroin can be in a powder or liquid form ranging in color from white to black (Heroin Facts. (2017, August)). Heroin comes from the Opium Poppy plant, once it grows it is cut open and a white liquid comes out of it which is later turned into Morphine by adding hot water. After the morphine is mixed with other substances to make the drug Heroin (C. (2016, October 12)). The plant Opium Poppy has been around since the Mesopotamian and Sumerian cultures. The First Opium War in 1839

Although there are thousands of highly potent psychoactive substances, why has this specific product, heroin, and diacetylmorphine, become the anti-social, "the dropout drug, "the drug addict's drug. Opiates are clearly the most extraordinary of any of the anesthetics we know of. They're also the most extraordinary of analgesics. Heroin, like morphine and opium, has a soothing effect on everything that is felt by the subject, on both external sensations and internal sensations. All pain, all suffering is relieved-- physiological, physical suffering, as well as mental suffering-- depression, anxiety, etcetera. Since thomas de quincey came out with his confessions of an english opium-eater back in the 19th century, many others have written about their life under the influence of drugs. In 1961, the scottish novelist alexander trocchi published a book about his life as a heroin addict, which inspired the american channel nbc to film him in action. Well, i'm going to take a shot now just to show you what it's like. In america, i've seen peoples take overdoses and come very close to death. Alexander trocchi died of an overdose at the age of 60. It's my hope that neurobiological and psychological models of dependence will enable us to rethink, in a much more global way, all the problems related to mental suffering and psychological disorders. I think these approaches will enable us to revolutionize psychiatry. We'll have a more dialectical

Diacetylmorphine or known as heroin is an addictive schedule I drug. Heroin was introduced from boiling morphine, which comes from the seed pod of the Asian Opium poppy plant. Opium was originally for illness and severe pain such as coughs, sleepiness or injuries; the substance was used in different types of groups, for example, mothers and their babies. Heroin was projected as non addictive but in reality it was. Due to the chemistry of Diacetylmorphine it created a population to use it medically and recreationally but because of its short term and long term effects, such as it being extremely addicting is the reason why it should be monitored and remain on the Controlled Dangerous Substance list.

Chronic users may develop collapsed veins, infection of the heart lining and valves, abscesses, cellulites, and liver disease. Pulmonary complications, including various types of pneumonia, may result from the poor health condition of the abuser, as well as from heroin’s depressing effects on respiration. Street heroin may have additives that do not dissolve resulting in clogging the blood vessels that lead to the lungs, liver, kidneys, or brain. This can cause infection or even death of small patches of cells in vital organs. With regular heroin use, tolerance develops. Abusers must use more heroin to achieve the same intensity or effect. Higher doses are used over time, physical dependence and addiction develop. With physical dependence, the body has adapted to the presence of the drug and withdrawal symptoms may occur if use is reduced or stopped. Withdrawal, which in regular abusers may occur as early as a few hours after the last administration, produces drug craving, restlessness, muscle and bone pain, insomnia, diarrhea and vomiting, cold flashes with goose bumps (“cold turkey”), kicking movements (“kicking the habit”), and other symptoms. Major withdrawal symptoms peak between 48 and 72 hours after the last does and subside after about a week. Sudden withdrawal by heavily dependent users who are in poor health can be fatal.

Heroin is a short- acting opioid. In other words, it takes effect rapidly, however, it leaves the bloodstream quickly. The NHTSA estimates that heroin withdrawal symptoms start within six to twelve hours of the last dose and it lasts five to ten days in total. There are dozens of symptoms Heroin causes. Symptoms may only last a week approximately, however symptoms can be severe. Some of these include bad teeth, cold sweats, weakening of the immune system, coma, loss of memory, etc. There are a collection of other symptoms but those are the most common.

“Heroin builds a tolerance. It takes more and more to get high,” said Brooks. “It becomes an issue of an illness if they don’t do it.”

This creates long term damage in neuronal and hormonal systems that most likely cannot be reversed. Deterioration of the brain’s white matter affect decision making abilities, the ability to regulate behavior, and responses to stressful situations. Heroin is also very addictive. The body gets used to the drug and withdrawal symptoms happen very quickly if a person stops using the drug immediately. Examples of withdrawal symptoms are restlessness, muscle and bone pain, insomnia, diarrhea, vomiting, cold flashes with goose bumps, and leg movements. Major withdrawal symptoms peak between 24-48 hours after the last dose of heroin and subside after about a week. Sometimes people still show withdrawal symptoms months down the road (National Institute of Drug Abuse,