Ecstasy Peter Jennings Special

[cincctx]

Did anyone see the special the other night on Ecstasy, it was hosted by Peter Jennings. If so what did you think? How many of you have tried it?
Cristina

[CoolArtiste]

I saw the show. I haven't tried it but I'd like to. The effects sound similar to prescription antidepressants, but more extreme. More seratonin increases your feeling of well being and liking people and energy level. I wonder if the drug companies are behind the government's anti-ecstasy position. Maybe it would decrease sales of anti-depressants. I think a lot of medical studies are bogus and were either done by incompetent boobs or paid for by people with vested interests. Be very suspicious of all of them. I think the internet is a better place to find true information than establishment organizations.

[Starsprite]

I only saw the first half of the show, but unfortunately fell asleep. So, I don't know what the bad effects of the drug are, just saw all the good stuff about it. I'm in a bad mood and could really use some right now!! LOL!! :)

Sounded wonderful from the part I saw. Did the show go on to show some bad long-term effects from it or addictiveness to it? I had wanted to watch it to see what the bad points of it were as I had already heard about the positive effects from it.

[cincctx]

It seemed Peter Jennings was pro Ecstasy! The show proved that the government did some studies that did end up to be boggus. Think from what I understood was that really no one knows the actual long term effects of it. I have tried it and it was probably one of the greatest things I have ever experienced. I think alcohol and cigerettes are far worse and we know the effects of long term use of those drugs, yet they are legal. It was an interesting report. I am curious to see what others thought.
Cristina

[CoolArtiste]

Starsprite: They said there wasn't any known long term ill effects. They said regular use of ecstasy reduced seratonin by 5% but went back to normal 3 months after stopping usage. I read that it can be psychologically addictive though (not physically addictive). Here's some good info: http://www.ecstasy.org/qanda/index.html

cincctx: how did you get it? How do you get X that isn't contaminated? How did you feel after it wore off? Did you feel depressed?

By the way, I used to take Zoloft, a seratonin reuptake inhibitor. For the first few months, it made me feel good, energetic, and very sociable and outgoing. That sounds like how they describe X, but much milder.

[cincctx]

My friend got it up in Seattle it was pure stuff. He knew someone. I felt great when I took it. I am generally a happy positive person to begin with. The next day I didn't feel so hot but we were at Mardi Gras and started rolling about 10:00pm and didn't get back to our hotel till 8:00am so not feeling so hot could have also been from staying out all night. One thing is for sure though it was my first time to try it and I didn't regret one bit of it. I would like to try it again, its not something you want to take on a regular basis I can't see how someone could get addicted to it. Where I live I wouldn't know who to ask, I guess I don't run with those kinds of circles. Small town of Corpus Christi, Texas not much going on here.

Cristina

[_00_]

I have heard an addiction medicine specialist Dr. Drew Pinsky talking about the long term effects of ecstacy. He says it gradually diminishes your ability to perceive that feeling of well-being. Chronic depression is common among heavy and even many light users. It alters brain chemistry. MAOI medications are prescribed in order to function normally. He has treated lasting effects years later and believes usage results in permanent damage.

[Amaris]

When Ecstacy first came out (some 20 years ago, I think. Certainly 15), it had not yet been classified as a controlled substanced by the FDA, and you could buy it in bars in Arkansas. I didn't take it regularly, but I took it on the occasional week-end when I went dancing. It became illegal shortly thereafter, so I haven't taken it since. I don't remember any problems associated with not taking it, but that was a long time ago and I didn't take it regularly.

as to the results of the addiction specialist -- I'd have to wonder what was the state of the people that were heavy users? For myself, I rarely drink (more than beer with pizza or wine with dinner) or look for other "uplifters" unless I am slightly depressed. I'm sure I wouldn't be a heavy user unless I was seriously depressed. Just my thing, though . . .

Cindy

[_00_]

I'd have to wonder what was the state of the people that were heavy users? For myself, I rarely drink (more than beer with pizza or wine with dinner) or look for other "uplifters" unless I am slightly depressed. I'm sure I wouldn't be a heavy user unless I was seriously depressed. Just my thing, though . . . From what I have heard, there are effects that are the direct result from the use of the drug because it alters the chemistry of the brain. As with any abuse, there will be some people with a predisposition towards depression. There are genes predisposing people to addiction and depression. However, there are also people, often starting when they are young, who use drugs or drink for fun with their friends that do not realize the lasting effects it may have on them. They may never become addicts or habitual users. It only takes a few times with certain substances. Kids often feel invincible and the attraction to testing altered states is grounded in a false sense of security. If damage from alcohol was equal to certain drugs you might see more cases of permanent damage. Alcohol damage occurs over years of abuse, (I am not talking about overdoses of either). More people have gotten drunk a few times in their life than high on a drug. It is so common it is considered part of growing up for many people. It can be that easy to get caught up in the thing, drug or drink of choice, that friends are doing routinely at gatherings. Especially something like ecstacy that is just supposed to make everyone feel good and love each other and started out perceived as safe.

[meeeow2002]

I did it on three occasions; The first time I took it with my boyfriend at his house I took 1 pill the went on to take 3 more in the space of 2 hours. It was great, I felt really nice and floaty and shivery, we talked and *other stuff* all night, I ended up blurting out my whole life story to him (even things I didn't want him to know) Apparently it has been used by governments as a truth drug. This I can belive.
When I woke up the next day I had a really sore tounge and a dry mouth and felt pretty delicate. (not even as bad as a hangover)

The next time I did it was in Belgium, with my boyfriend again, we parked up in what looked like a private countryside area went up a wooded hill layed in the sun and took a pill each, the e took effect and we decided that as it was so nice and sunny and secluded we would get naked and fool around! We were also smoking a joint.

Suddenly We hear voices and 'i'm thinking oh no please don't let it be a family and kids' We see 2 hats appear first followed by two belgian police men!

luckly I managed to dicard the joint and wrapped myself in boyfriends coat b4 they saw me naked but it was pretty obvious what we had been doing! They took my boyf and left me to follow them back down the hill. I was really buzzing ,wearing only a huge puffy coat, sliding down a steep hill falling on my arse and giggling non stop.

Luckily boyf can speak fluent french (from maritius) and when the police men see that its his birthday the next day on his passport they start laughing, say happy birthday and leave us!!
The next day felt very ill.

The third time I took it, It made me feel cold, shivery in a bad way, anxious and nausious. this was three years ago and havn't taken it since. one of my friends used to take it every weekend. every time he stopped taking it a week or so later he became depressed, so he stopped.

The real bad drug for me was magic mushrooms which I tried once when I lived in Amsterdam,never again.
I felt like I was mentally i'll, I was staggering around like I was drunk and flicking cigerette ash on the floor, then thinking 'why am I doing this i'm not drunk' I decided to read 'les enfants terribles' which was a real bad idea as I was stuck in a room at the time with my brother and boyfriend. my boyfriend was huddled up crying, shouting "the matrix is real" periodicly and eating handfulls of vitamin c tablets and trying to give them to me and my brother. It lasted for 8 hours!!! I was so scared that I wasn't going to go back to normal again. It was really horrible and I will never do it again. It actually took me about a year before I felt totally normal again although this may have been psycosematic.

please note i am not a raging druggie but of a curious nature, when i was younger i decided to try every drug once out of curiosity.
I am sorry about the essay but I love the sound of my own typing ;)

[scandia3815]

I wrote a paper for college back in '93 on MDMA (Ecstasy) and the use of the drug in clinical settings to treat psychological issues. The research back then was disturbing, but not well connected to humans (most of it was conducted on rats). Not sure what recent developments have shed new light on the issue of long-term damage to Seratonin uptake centers.

But I do remember that MDMA is not easy to make, requiring quite a few steps to produce correctly (far more then just straight methamphetmine). For this reason it seemed at the time the greatest risk of MDMA was not the direct effects of the drug, but the possible exposure of users to other chemicals and impurities introduced by underqualified producers bent on cashing in on the latest drug craze. Maybe times have changed, and the manufacture of the drug has become much more sophisticated and generally of better quality, but studies at the time (late 80's) conducted on confiscated tablets found that something like nearly 1/3 of them were mostly MDA... which is a few steps short of MDMA but easier to make. MDA was banned in 1970, has somewhat similar effects, and was established as being neurotoxic to the human brain, a finding that has not really been disputed since.

So as with all little white pills that you may encounter, the real question is not what you think your taking, but what you are really taking, what it has been cut with, and how it was produced. Because buying copious amounts of chemicals needed to manufacture controlled substances will usually raise an eyebrow at the DEA (or equivalent agency in your country), and because several controlled substances are needed to manufacture MDMA, most of the ingredients are often distilled from other commerically available products that also contain many substances toxic to humans (or any living creature). To make matters worse, many of the chemicals used in these seperation steps are themselves highly toxic. How effectively the producer seperates the toxins from the chemicals he/she is after determines how much residual you end up swallowing. So my advice (applied to all unregulated manufacture of synthetic psychotropic substances) is to use at your own peril.

I did try it--back in college, just once-- a fun experience, but not something I would do again...made me a little too loopy for my taste.

Aaron.

[meeeow2002]

I forgot to mention this..
in Amsterdam they have pill testing stations which are free, they test your pills to see that they are pure (therefore eliminating risk of death.)
I have never been to one as I didn't take any extacy in Amsterdam.
In holland the attitude seems to be.. we can't stop people taking drugs,but we can make sure they are safe!

[_00_]

I forgot to mention this..
in Amsterdam they have pill testing stations which are free, they test your pills to see that they are pure (therefore eliminating risk of death.)
I have never been to one as I didn't take any extacy in Amsterdam.
In holland the attitude seems to be.. we can't stop people taking drugs,but we can make sure they are safe!
They had something like when I was in the States during the 70's. Definitely more covert by necessity than in Amsterdam, people sent in their samples anonymously with some sort of code name. The results were broadcast over college radio stations. It went something like, "Daffy Duck the chemical makeup of sample consisted of ____% _____, _____ and _____." I don't know why it stopped at some point. Last I heard it had not made it to the 80's.