Thinking of replacing alcohol with GHB

[anethema]

Hey guys. I made a post on reddit but thought I'd post here too and see what you bluelighters thought too

Just been doing a ton of reading about GHB lately and it truly sounds like a wonder drug with a few caveats of course.So it seems to just be booze with more euphoria and a steeper dose response curve. I've seen the whitepapers on addiction and that seems almost impossible (daily doses every 3 hours for months, yeesh)I of course mean strong physical addiction with bad withdrawal, not psychological addiction which can happen with anything great.

Nor more than alcohol itself at least..

Anyways, booze seems expensive, unhealthy, and with more consequences (hangover etc)I've done some googling for people with similar goals but the posts often seem to say that you will just get addicted etc.So let's say I were to replace booze with GHB.

To preface this I'll say I believe myself to have a very low addictive personality. I've done many drugs, including heroin/opiates. Some of some time. I did cocaine recreationally for a couple years until I basically grew distant from that group of friends. I never felt cravings to do it, and never experienced any problem stopping. Just one day never bothered again. I do MDMA (every other month or so) and know redosing is bad so despite the strong desire due to the mood drop, I've never had my brain convince me otherwise.

That being said I enjoy alcohol quite a lot. I'd say I have a beer/drink every day after work when I sit down at my computer, it feels satisfying. I have a few drinks a night with the wife every weekend night. I NEVER drink to get drunk, to sleep, to numb emotional problems (I'm a generally happy guy). I'm not having any problems with alcohol and health, my liver seems fine, and I'm not a big fat mess. I also understand to NEVER mix GHB with respiratory depressants.So if I replaced booze with GHB I have a couple questions:

1. Is this viable? Could it be replaced by GHB? GHB seems to be about half the price of hard liquor for an evening (3-4 hrs) of fun. No calories. Similar addiction problem as booze which I think personally is fine.
   
2. Assuming the answer to one is a yes..one of the things I enjoy about alcohol is the yum drinks you make. Could I do the same with GHB and drink it more slowly? Like for example instead of downing a 3-4g sludge of salty orange juice, could I put 500mg in a 'drink' of some kind and sip it like booze. Keep doing that throughout the night and maintain a kind of buzz (This would be at home of course, not risking anyone else drinking it). The half-life seems a bit shorter than alcohol but I could tailor the dose appropriately ?
   

Anyways I'm generally a fairly cautious person with drugs and honestly think I wouldn't 'go nuts' with it, any more than I do with booze (like a 500mg drink after work while playing video games..couple/few grams a night while hanging out with friends or the wife) etc.Am I out to lunch here? This honestly sounds like a drug that, if you're not a fiend, is just a happier, more euphoric alcohol, with no potential for hangover.

 

[Edaw'Naflagn]

Hey guys. I made a post on reddit but thought I'd post here too and see what you bluelighters thought too

Just been doing a ton of reading about GHB lately and it truly sounds like a wonder drug with a few caveats of course.So it seems to just be booze with more euphoria and a steeper dose response curve. I've seen the whitepapers on addiction and that seems almost impossible (daily doses every 3 hours for months, yeesh)I of course mean strong physical addiction with bad withdrawal, not psychological addiction which can happen with anything great.

Nor more than alcohol itself at least..

Anyways, booze seems expensive, unhealthy, and with more consequences (hangover etc)I've done some googling for people with similar goals but the posts often seem to say that you will just get addicted etc.So let's say I were to replace booze with GHB.

To preface this I'll say I believe myself to have a very low addictive personality. I've done many drugs, including heroin/opiates. Some of some time. I did cocaine recreationally for a couple years until I basically grew distant from that group of friends. I never felt cravings to do it, and never experienced any problem stopping. Just one day never bothered again. I do MDMA (every other month or so) and know redosing is bad so despite the strong desire due to the mood drop, I've never had my brain convince me otherwise.

That being said I enjoy alcohol quite a lot. I'd say I have a beer/drink every day after work when I sit down at my computer, it feels satisfying. I have a few drinks a night with the wife every weekend night. I NEVER drink to get drunk, to sleep, to numb emotional problems (I'm a generally happy guy). I'm not having any problems with alcohol and health, my liver seems fine, and I'm not a big fat mess. I also understand to NEVER mix GHB with respiratory depressants.So if I replaced booze with GHB I have a couple questions:

1. Is this viable? Could it be replaced by GHB? GHB seems to be about half the price of hard liquor for an evening (3-4 hrs) of fun. No calories. Similar addiction problem as booze which I think personally is fine.
   
2. Assuming the answer to one is a yes..one of the things I enjoy about alcohol is the yum drinks you make. Could I do the same with GHB and drink it more slowly? Like for example instead of downing a 3-4g sludge of salty orange juice, could I put 500mg in a 'drink' of some kind and sip it like booze. Keep doing that throughout the night and maintain a kind of buzz (This would be at home of course, not risking anyone else drinking it). The half-life seems a bit shorter than alcohol but I could tailor the dose appropriately ?
   

Anyways I'm generally a fairly cautious person with drugs and honestly think I wouldn't 'go nuts' with it, any more than I do with booze (like a 500mg drink after work while playing video games..couple/few grams a night while hanging out with friends or the wife) etc.Am I out to lunch here? This honestly sounds like a drug that, if you're not a fiend, is just a happier, more euphoric alcohol, with no potential for hangover.

I mean it could be done and done without more problems but you are more prone to black outs and memory problems as I experienced. It's kinda like a more safe liquid version of Xanax. It's up to you man, just be safe and take it slow; seems like you know what you're doing so I don't see you harming yourself.

 

[BurritoJimmy]

You sound like youre a moderate drinker which is correlated with linger life expectancy so what youre doing is healthy. So long term moderate drinking is probably good for you. GHB is a risk because we dont know the outcomes, although obtaining illegal drugs in itself is a risk factor. Also you only know you dont have an addictive personality in regards to the substances you have already taken. It may be completely different with a different drug. If you want to try it then Im not saying not to, my point is dont fool yourself into thinking this is a healthy alternative to your level of drinking because it isnt.

 

[Burnstein]

woops

I have never tried GHB but I know getting dosage right is tricky. If you know how to dose and your source is pure you sound safe. I personally hate alcohol but GHB is a substance I'd like to sample. Just don't go too crazy because alcohol makes you do dumb things with other drugs. Example: Took a wee bit too much GHB and forgot how many beers your drinking or decide to pop that Xanny you have because you "feel amazing". This leads to blackouts or death.

 

[anethema]

1-2 drinks every day plus 6-9 on weekends seems a bit more that moderate to me. That's for me and the wife so double that for our family consumption. We probably spend $500/mo or more on alcohol so it is actually a bit chunk of expense.

$200 seems to buy a damn lot of GHB.

It's never felt much like an addiction since we don't drink many days, and often go on vacations where we don't end up drinking for weeks, and there is no withdrawal or cravings.

I just figured it would be a BIT healthier, mostly in terms of weight/calories.

I hear you on the addictive part, but I'm fairly confident that if I start some crazy 24/7 dosing schedule I'd be able to just stop and go back to my social drinking without too much trouble. Just have to see i guess!

You sound like youre a moderate drinker which is correlated with linger life expectancy so what youre doing is healthy. So long term moderate drinking is probably good for you. GHB is a risk because we dont know the outcomes, although obtaining illegal drugs in itself is a risk factor. Also you only know you dont have an addictive personality in regards to the substances you have already taken. It may be completely different with a different drug. If you want to try it then Im not saying not to, my point is dont fool yourself into thinking this is a healthy alternative to your level of drinking because it isnt.

 

[anethema]

True! Thought booze is similar and if I've had more than a couple beer I have no trouble telling myself not to be taking xanax. I guess my 10g will be a test.

 

[Solipsis]

Yes and no... it's tricky to answer. I've been there (dependent on GHB after an extended period of intensive use, did not raise my tolerance and dosage like most do, kicked it 2-3 times after each period with the use of things like gabapentin and was able to quit completely before I repeated the whole thing more seriously)...

Both are disinhibiting and both are gabaergics but have additional effects that are different from each other. Both are addictive and can have apparently innocent habit-forming at the beginning. Both can be quite dangerous to withdraw from if you'd happen to get addicted.

Yeah GHB can certainly be cheaper especially when you or someone close to you prepares it from an affordably procured solvent. They just have different upsides and downsides, and it's not easy to weigh them, not should you just switch to GHB thinking that it has mostly upsides...
Yeah with GHB you can get pretty wasted without getting toxic metabolites like acetaldehyde in your system, and intestinal bacteria passing into your bloodstream releasing toxins that make you really sore among other things. GHB even promotes human growth hormone..
But, if you'd take as much GHB to get as wasted as you would have gotten drunk, then you run different risks like blacking out quicker, aspirating, getting more disinhibited cause you feel less limited to go further. And there are similar risks that pop up instead of alcohol's risks with chronic use or abuse. The sodium for example if you take GHB, the issues with sleep that start our great but can eventually turn against you, and more.

With GHB you tend to have a pleasant experience if you watch all the rules (like with gremlins), but if you break them you can be so much worse off than you'd been with alcohol. Unless you were swigging 70% absinthe that is.

It really depends on how you use it, how often, how you get it, the quality....

This plan would work if you really and truly limit yourself, both acutely and chronically... but it would possibly be worse than alcohol if you go too far with it. There are special clinics in my country for tapering GHB because it's so dangerous to stop cold turkey. It's dangerous to stop when you're heavily addicted to alcohol as well, but part of the GHB addicts didn't see it coming quite as much as the drunks...

I guess it is a little comparable perhaps to RC alcohols, that are not broken down into toxic metabolites either, but are so potent and can seem so ideal, and the potency can amplify a lot of the effects so much that things can escalate quicker. Make sure you avoid all the traps that would be there instead of the traps that exist with alcohol (-some are more or less the same).

Yes you can drink a more diluted beverage with GHB, but it's not pleasant in the same way that drinking a beer is (also a dilute, though alcoholic mixture).. it tends to be a little harder to keep track of your dosage because the increments of taking sips can be a bit confusing. In my opinion, yes you can control your buzz more steadily instead of going up and down like taking a roll, but it's not yum imo. Yea ok at some point you develop a taste for it like with anything you associate a pleasant high with, but it's a little different with G. Don't be expecting to make cocktails, it's still more like making a mocktail you wash down your dose with.

 

[Keif' Richards]

It's a tough one, because almost anything is better than Alcohol. Heroin, GHB, Ketamine or what have you. They're all comparatively quite healthy compared to Alcohol. So I guess my point is, from a Harm Reduction standpoint, this would be advisable, provided you can moderate your intake properly.

 

[anethema]

Ya what could go wrong with daily heroin use hehe.

EDIT: Didn't mean to be snarky, I just don't think heroin applies because even someone who has a very non addictive personality couldn't take constant heroin and not get addicted I think heh.

GHB on the other hand seems like you have to have that sort of personality, or actively try, dosing 24/7 for months to get a physical addiction.

 

[Keif' Richards]

Ya what could go wrong with daily heroin use hehe.

EDIT: Didn't mean to be snarky, I just don't think heroin applies because even someone who has a very non addictive personality couldn't take constant heroin and not get addicted I think heh.

GHB on the other hand seems like you have to have that sort of personality, or actively try, dosing 24/7 for months to get a physical addiction.

This is actually a pretty typical response to a statement like the one I made and it's an attitude that we here at Bluelight are really trying to change. This notion that someone who uses drugs is helplessly lost, a ghoul, a thief, a junkie and on the verge of death is inaccurate, including Heroin. I'm not proud to say this, but I have a great job that I love and excel at and I've been an Opioid addict for the latter part of my childhood and all of my adult life.

Heroin is a less harmful substance to the body than Alcohol. It's just how it is. Nobody ever wants to accept that their precious, socially accepted Alcohol is actually of the worst drugs ever used by man in terms of physical and psychological damage. Opioids can be used consistently, infinitely even, with the most pervasive negative side effect being constipation, which granted, can sometimes be severe, but is generally correctable.

It's propaganda and we're not going to have it here. We are going to approach drug use from a scientific, unbiased, uninfluenced position. Everything the D.A.R.E program and your Mother told you growing up about Heroin has got to go. It will take time to correct an entire country's though process. It might even be fucking impossible, but we're gonna try.

I don't think I know everything either, but on this subject, I have a firm belief that this propaganda and associated opinions of drug users is part of what makes it so hard for us to survive and live in this country.

 

[Red Moon]

Sure, heroin is a less harmful substance than alcohol... if it's not off the street and you're careful about your dosing. It's way too easy to overdose on street heroin, especially when people are insane enough to be mixing it with fentanyl or its analogues without telling the people they sell it to. You do not know the potency of what you are getting. You DO know how many deaths and near-deaths have ocurred as a result of heroin/opiate overdose, I hope. A lot of those are accidents, not suicide attempts. I get what you're saying, but please do not make heroin out to be some harmless drug that you should encourage daily use of. It seems like it escalates to IV use all too often, too, and that opens a huge can of worms on its own.

Just some wisdom my mother gave me growing up. She's an actual medical professional (a nurse who formerly worked in the ER, and I believe she was an EMT for a time as well) who has actually dealt with these things.

 

[anethema]

Heroin is less HARMFULL for sure. But not many people do casual heroin. The rate of addiction per capita is vastly higher for opiates than alcohol.

Heroin is probably totally healthy for your body until you OD or lose your friends/family.

Just because something isn't as toxic doesn't mean it's ok.

Either way, thats a bit off the rails haha back to GHB!