Reader experiences: The readers respond

See my previous post for the lowdown. Much thanks to all who emailed me. If you have not, you are still welcome to do so. I'll keep posting these things until the cows come home. And trust me, cows do not come home. They just wander around and eat grass. And excrete. Anyway, dig these drug/poison stories:

When hospitalized for a serious (and ill-gotten) ankle injury that had required immediate surgery, I was given Demerol. To cut a long and disgusting story involving a rather bothersome absence of renal function short, that night I threw up 22 times before I lost count. It took the hospital staff approximately 6 hours to notice, and when they finally did, they switched me to morphine. Morphine caused me to feel as though there were ants crawling all over me under my skin, and also caused the dots on the ceiling (I still don't know if those were even real) to pulse and move around a bit. That made counting them difficult.

- Toaster

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I love reading your blog... I'm a freak that way.

Lessee... in the drug department how about my personal fave... Rebif (or for that matter any of the other interferons used to treat Multiple Sclerosis? Interesting crap to shoot as far as I am concerned. Nobody knows how it works, or even if it is working on one, but theoretically it decreases the frequency of attacks. It sure costs a pretty penny. I think the best part about Rebif is that if you look closely at the box it comes in, in tiny letters it says "Made from Chinese Hamster Ovaries." I love that part. In a very stand-up comedy technique I always comment that if that's the case... you would think that it would be in HUGE BLOCK PRINT all over the box, but go figure.

In the poison department how about Methyl Isocyanate? I really enjoyed reading about the Bhopal disaster in the book "Five Past Midnight in Bhopal" by Dominique Lapierre. I have an interest in the relation of human error and behavioral psychology and that one's a doozy.

Thanks,
Bob Berger

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SSRIs (originally Zoloft and now Lexapro) have been effective at treating my crippling social anxiety. I think it's fair to say that they're the best thing that's ever happened to me.

As for recreational drugs, I've tried most of the common ones but only really enjoy the occasional bit of ethanol, N2O, dextro-methylphenidate and theobromine.

- Steve

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I tend not to take much in the way of drugs; a bit of alcohol now and then and that's about it.

Some years back I needed a some outpatient surgery. They weren't going to put me under, just give me a some IV Valium to take the edge off any anxiety I might be experiencing.

I'm all preped for the surgery; shaved, cleaned and local adminstered. They slid a needle into my ACF vein and asked me to count back from 100. "Just like the movies" I'm thinking - what a joke... "100, 99, WHOOAAAHHHH!" Like drinking a 6 pack in 1 second. Total head rush. Eyes dialate, world gets all light and warm, head is tingly..
wheeeeeeeeee....

Daddy LIKE!

As good as the initial rush was the fact that there was no hangover.
Drunk...not drunk... Sweet!

I am SO glad this stuff isn't sold in stores otherwise I'd be high all the time.

Modern medicine; you gotta love it.

- Doug