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Long term effects of alcohol and prescription medications

Blossom

Bluelighter
Joined
Aug 15, 2010
Messages
52
Location
SF
I will give you a little bit of my back story. I am a 21 year old college student who is dealing with some anxiety issues, bulimia, depression OCD...I was misdiagnosed with Bi-polar disorder and ADHD as a child (yeah what the hell?) and have been on and off psychiatric medications for almost half my life.

I am currently prescribed (and taking regularly) Prozac (fluoextine), Klonopin (Clonazepam) and Wellbutrin (Bupropion) SR. This medication regime seemed to be lessening the number of binges that I would have as well as some of the OCD stuff. Last week I turned 21 (and have been drinking for the last 3 weeks socially). I have started summer school, and am not taking a full load of classes in hopes that I could further recover from my ED and stabilize. Unfortunately, today after class I went on ANOTHER binge, they seem to still be happening very frequently. What was different was that I took the Klonopin as soon as I noticed my OCD symptoms getting worse but I continued to binge and did not want to stop. I am in supportive care, so I called the psychiatric emergency number that I am supposed to use when I get "sick". Good news is I didn't use any laxatives, or vomit which is worse for my body and instead went on a long walk to clear my head.

My question, fellow bluelighters has to do with the long-term effects of alcohol and prescription medication. I know about the short-term effects of consuming alcohol with these drugs, including having the worst hangover EVER after I did consumed hard liquor but I do not know about the long-term effects. I have a nagging feeling that the alcohol consumption may have had some interactions with my medications that have carried into the middle of the week. Does anyone have any experience with this? Does the alcohol make the prescription medications not work as well? Any information will be well received!
 
Wow. There's too much going on here to give you a precise answer. Maybe a team of doctors and so forth could. I can't.

I can reassure that at the current you've almost certainly not done any irreparable damege to yourself with adding the alcohol. I can also say for sure that if you drink, and continue to drink heavier, and turn into an alcoholic like me, you will do some serious damage to yourself, physically, psychically, socially, etc.

Just in case it's an option for you, DO NOT take another AD, and MAOI, extacy, or anything else in addition to what you're on. This could cause serotonin syndrome. Very serious.

So, now I'll try to answer your questions to the best of my humble knowledge and in my humble opinion. I am no authoritative source, so consult someone who is if you decide to make any decisions based on what I say. That was a disclaimer. :-)

The alcohol won't make your scripts work less well necessarily but it could alter their effects. Hangovers increase anxiety and that can worsen depression, so consuming more than moderately could have any number of negative or maybe just inconsequential results. It's normal IME to feel the effects of a big drunk for days to a week, esp if on meds. I take clonazapem now and for a while also took burpopion SR. I didn't notice too much of anything with the WB, but klonopin + alcohol = danger and blackouts. Serious danger. Esp if you get to feelin all nice and think you want some more klonopin to make you EVEN mellower. This is the kind of thing that leads people to the Big Sleep, i.e., never waking up. Proceed with extreme caution when mixing the two. Scratch that. Do not mix these.

My advice, stay away from the alcohol at least for a few more days until you level out, and then if you do drink, do so in moderation, and do not mix with the klons. Even if you took your klons earlier in the day, since its half-life is so long, you may think it's outta your system and still have enough in your blood stream to make the alcohol addition turn into a black out or worse. In other words, even with no noticeable klonopin effects being experienced at any given time, you may have enough in you o amke what you think is a moderate amount of alcohol kick your ass.

I hope you feel better. I don't have your same diseases/problems, but I am for sure a fellow sufferer of the family of addictions of disorders that try to prey on you. I wish you strength, health, and peace. Besides all else I've said to you, maybe more important, but at least AS important: be kind to yourself.

And if no one has told you they love today: I do.
We all do. (well most of us on BL. haters are rare here)

peace,
podsnomo
 
In my opinion add meds are the best antidepressant perhaps you could switch to that considering you have a hitory of add/adhd. Also dont take melatonin or any partial opiate agonists, they cause seratoin sydrome too.
 
The long term effects of any pharmaceutical will be a net vitality loss. It would really get worse from there, depending on the drug, and combinations of drugs. The industry would have you believe that these things help you. The industry would also like to have you as a chemically dependent asset for the rest of your life.

Dont think of the labels that have been assigned to you by the medical industrial complex as permanent, or even real at all. You are a unique creature with unique gifts, and in a world that was not so schizophrenically split from its natural existence, you wouldnt have any problems that every other human wouldnt have. Simply because you fail to fit the mold for a most obedient worker bee in this contemporary human society does not mean you have any real problems, only resistance to adapt to something your body, mind, and spirit werent meant for.

The real long term effects stretch far beyond your body. The real long term effects involve biological organisms' inability to break down these drugs, and our sewage systems' inability to filter them. These drugs are massing in our soils, oceans, lakes, rivers, watersheds, swamps, and clouds more and more every day. They are destroying the fundamental functions of life, of microorganisms, and even of some simpler multicellular organisms. The harm the fungi's abilities to allow trees to communicate with each other. They are altering the genes of crustaceans and fish. They are poisoning birds and weakening corn and cabbages. They are harming the sensory organs of pollinators, and compromising the immune systems of flowers and fruit bearing trees. They are skewing the fertility, endocrine systems, and overall health of all higher order organisms. The drugs you take are in my body when I drink my city's municipal water. Whoever is reading this now, the drugs I took in my youth are in the beer on your desk. We have so many pharmaceuticals in our environment, that our Earth is suffering from the dose.

The problems youre having deep inside wont ever go away with any pills or bottles. No shots or scans, no surgeries or bypasses will cure you. They will only numb you and cover up the gaping holes you need filled. Dont feel inferior or different by that statement, we all have these holes created by modern civilization, and we all have to work hard to either ignore them or fill them with what they need. Many people live their whole lives forming their personalities around the willful ignorance of such holes in their spirit, and find that adapting to this awkward means of existence for our bodies and minds is easier than introspection and self awareness. You will never fill the holes that are missing with the same systems that create them. You have to embrace your world with an open mind, and understand your body is very far removed from the environment it is adapted to.

Learn to appreciate life itself, not the experience of life (though that is also a great idea), but living things. Surround yourself with life, with living things. Engage in biognosis. Learn to communicate with plants, insects, and animals, without voice. Stand in a forest and spend an hour simply breathing, without speaking. Learn to grow your own food. Start with some simple "house plants" if that seems intimidating. Grow some probiotic bacteria in your kitchen, learn to nurture them and treat them like a dignified, powerful, aware, and living thing. Try and walk in grass whenever you can. Learn that your physical health is strongly related to your mental health. Learn that your GI tract has enough neuroreceptors to be comparable to your brain, and that the food you eat has an extremely strong association with your mood, self perception, outlook on life. Study herbalism, its history, its pan-cultural phenomena, and learn the near infinite alchemy that plants are capable of, that human pharmacies could never have even a glimmer of home in replicating. Learn about acupuncture and acupressure, and the meridian theory, and discover that you are more of a pile of electricity, not just a pile of solid and liquid matter. Learn that this electrical grid that allows life to flow through your body must remain connected to the electrical grid of your ecosystem, to your local biome, and to the entire Earth itself. Learn that the more you remain disconnected from this bio-electric grid, the further you are from optimal health.

With this knowledge, you can heal yourself.

If you really want to help yourself, read this book with a very open mind: "The Lost Language of Plants" by Stephen Harrod Buhner. Then, reevaluate your position on pharmaceutical medicines.

The-Lost-Language-of-Plants-9781890132880.jpg
 
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^Wow. Incredible post. Obviously, rm-rf has very strong feelings/opinions/beliefs on this, and without knowing much more about it, I'm inclined to believe much of what he/she said. I'm also inclined to investigate it further and try some these suggestions. Who ARE you rm-rf?

You've amazed and intrigued me.

I use kratom currently as a way of getting off of opium (poppy pods). I find myself hooked. How do you view medicinal plants that can be abused? Like kratom and others?

What would you say to recovering alcoholic/addict like me, trying to get rid of a kratom habit and be totally sober. From where I was on 20-25 drinks/day and eating almost $200 worth of poppy pods/week, I've made progress, but I'm not where I wanna be.

Your insight would be very much appreciated, and I'm sure to find it highly valuable.

peace,
podsnomo
 
Wow! Thank you. I was looking for advice from someone without an agenda...I get all this advice from people with angles and from individuals who know I am a former drug addict, and as a consequence don't trust my decisions.

The thought of no alcohol was one of the most depressing thoughts ever, because I am just now getting to have a "nightlife" and my favorite place to chill and meet new people is at the local pub, where there is this awesome shuffleboard table.

FYI my doses of Prozac and Wellbutrin have been increased, and I am starting to feel better with more energy. I had a beer tonight with a co-worker, and I felt for a few moments pretty depressed and down, but just reminded myself that I was on medication and they might interact but that I had power over how I felt...and within a few minutes the depressed feeling was gone.

Did not know about the Melatonin, I actually have been taking it in the evenings when I am having difficulty falling asleep.

Thank you for your love, support, wisdom, experience! Addiction is a slippery slope (I've been down it a few times, but am starting to get a hang of this thing called life). I agree, the medications are only a band-aid...I'm going back to the couch ;)
 
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I'm sorry if I seemed to have an agenda. Well, actually, I do have an agenda, that is, to help people. If you're only having a beer or 2 or 3, no biggie on the meds. I'm a recovering hardcore drunk, so that's where I'm coming from. Good luck staying off the slippery slope. I never could!

peace,
pnm

Wow! Thank you. I was looking for advice from someone without an agenda...I get all this advice from people with angles and from individuals who know I am a former drug addict, and as a consequence don't trust my decisions.

The thought of no alcohol was one of the most depressing thoughts ever, because I am just now getting to have a "nightlife" and my favorite place to chill and meet new people is at the local pub, where there is this awesome shuffleboard table.

FYI my doses of Prozac and Wellbutrin have been increased, and I am starting to feel better with more energy. I had a beer tonight with a co-worker, and I felt for a few moments pretty depressed and down, but just reminded myself that I was on medication and they might interact but that I had power over how I felt...and within a few minutes the depressed feeling was gone.

Did not know about the Melatonin, I actually have been taking it in the evenings when I am having difficulty falling asleep.

Thank you for your love, support, wisdom, experience! Addiction is a slippery slope (I've been down it a few times, but am starting to get a hang of this thing called life). I agree, the medications are only a band-aid...I'm going back to the couch ;)
 
I am passionate about these things because I am passionate about the existence of human consciousness in this Universe. Continuing down the path we are on as a species will result in the annihilation of all higher order forms of life on this planet. These are the "long term effects of prescription drugs," and the industrial empire required for their existence.

Ive been physically addicted to drugs before. Ive also been physically addicted to alcohol - to a point where I was suffering from internal organ damage and required a lot of specialized healing. There was a point in my life where I was told I may need plastic surgery to have a normally functioning esophagus (due to the volume of hard liquor always present in my system). I say this because I can empathize with anyone going through a struggle with life, and using chemicals to compensate. These things, these industrially manufactured chemicals, only have the power to allow us to forget the problems are there.

Anyone who would judge someone for being a drug addict is a sheep, a liar, and a coward who hides behind the shelter of their false belief bubbles. They have disregarded their ability to feel and empathize with the rest of humanity, and have become dependent on the image of lesser people to maintain their own residual self image of a stable, proper, and needed individual. We live in a society of dehumanization, where "crimes" are used to allow the rest of us to adhere to perceived and culturally-manufactured social mores and behaviors, all of which are centered around productivity to benefit a higher authority. We lose our connections to each other in this process, and we allow ourselves great distances from others by means of these judgements; we are effectively coerced into a system that leaves no room for healing others, but only more powerful coercion. The psychological drugs prescribed to people are just these tools in physical form - tools to numb you, break you, cause you to avoid introspection, cause you to avoid philosophy and the examined life, and chiefly, cause you to succumb to the will of a system which offers little benefit to the many while vastly empowering the few. More importantly, this whole system of "treatment" is designed for maximum profit, with minimal risk to the security of these profits. They are purposely designed to never allow your problems to go away.

... Obviously, rm-rf has very strong feelings/opinions/beliefs on this, and without knowing much more about it, I'm inclined to believe much of what he/she said. I'm also inclined to investigate it further and try some these suggestions. Who ARE you rm-rf?

I am no one special. In a way, I am you, and you are me. I have no talents you do not have, no attributes or abilities you are without. My only uniqueness is the experience in this world the Cosmos has given to me, and simultaneously, given me the burden of sharing whatever wisdom gathered along the way with everyone else. No novel ideas exist in this Universe, no human has ever conjured a notion, thought, or piece of knowledge without being influenced by the greater web of life around him or herself. We are creatures incapable of continuing our existence without each other, and our tasks in life are to aid each other along the way. The knowledge I have to share is thousands of years old, some of it hundreds of thousands of years old, buried in our unconscious, passed down through epigenetics, and held together with bioelectricity. I am no one special, I am you in another form.

FYI my doses of Prozac and Wellbutrin have been increased, and I am starting to feel better with more energy. I had a beer tonight with a co-worker, and I felt for a few moments pretty depressed and down, but just reminded myself that I was on medication and they might interact but that I had power over how I felt...and within a few minutes the depressed feeling was gone.

Did not know about the Melatonin, I actually have been taking it in the evenings when I am having difficulty falling asleep.

You can eliminate your need for these drugs with exercise, deep breathing regiments, interactions with biological energies (plants, animals, other humans), and a very disciplined diet. The last part is quite difficult in our modern society, as real human nutrition is harder and harder to come by, replaced with the convenience of industrial manufacture. Try including organic raw pecans, organic raw soaked/sprouted cashews, and organic raw soaked almonds in your diet. The nutritional profile in these simple foods provides heavy neurological regulation, enough to cure insomnia, depression, lethargy, and apathy. I remind you again, I am a former opiate addict, I know the realm of apathy all too well. If you have to have it in the extremely flawed "scientific" lens of Western understanding, then know that "studies" have shown that pecans and cashews work more, if not better, for depression, than prozac. I just did a quick websearch for "pecans vs prozac" and found this link: http://www.doctoryourself.com/prozac.html. Do your own research, and always refuse to allow anyone else to think for you.

Do you realize how dangerous that statement is, to an entity with as much power as Merck, Phizer, or GlaxoSmithKline? Could you imagine their fear of knowing that all of us could immediately walk away from their hundreds-of-billions-of-dollars strong system by eating some nuts that grow on trees? Have you heard recently that Merck purposefully and willfully used flawed data to promote the use of their mumps vaccines on the human population, with profit being the only motive? Do you really want to be part of a health-care system that ignores your health and only concerns itself with godzilla-sized profits?

Try including organic barley grass (powder for ease of incorporation into a busy life), it strongly increases melatonin production. The melatonin in pill form will always be vastly inferior to that created by the all powerful alchemical lab that is your body. It will lack the electron signature, the sub-atomic vibrational signals, that a molecule created by your own cells would have. In addition, it is wrapped with toxic chemicals, allegedly "safe for you" as stated by the extremely corrupt organization known as the FDA. It came through a very dirty and quickly produced industrial manufacture, carrying with it all the dust, microscopic particles, and even radiation from "sterilization" in this manufacturing process. It contains chemicals foreign to your body's chemical makeup, and it make be hundreds of years before we are even capable of comprehending the insidious effects of these chemicals' omni-prescence in our bodies and in our environments. Barely grass has been used, very successfully, for over 2,000 years to treat a number of liver, GI, and emotionally or psychologically related illnesses. It also grows right out of the Earth, and costs pennies in comparisons to the chemicals coming out of a polluting, environment-destroying, slave-working soul crushing factory.

The FDA is not here to keep you healthy. The FDA is here to keep you working, and keep you a valuable asset to the corporations it serves. Take some time and have a glance at the individuals who work for and with such a governing body, you may be surprised at the overwhelming conflict of interest. Its sort of like Northrop Gunman and Lockheed Martin serving on congressional staff in Washington, and the connection to the volume of human-killing devices made accessible to the most violent areas of the world. The chemicals approved by the FDA are approved by the corporations who manufacture them.

You have the power to unravel this entire problem with the choices you make. Be very aware of what you consume and who it benefits the most, and who it detriments the most.

Thank you for your love, support, wisdom, experience! Addiction is a slippery slope (I've been down it a few times, but am starting to get a hang of this thing called life). I agree, the medications are only a band-aid...I'm going back to the couch

Youre welcome. It is my job as a homo-sapien. It is a slippery slope. It is excellent that you regocnize this as difficult, but not impossible. Many things in life we choose to see as impossible, when in reality, they are merely a high level of difficulty. This perception changes everything about your Universe, and your destiny in it. We choose to surrender our fate when we perceive things as impossible. We choose to better ourselves when we change "impossible" to "very hard." We ALL need the couch, anyone who thinks otherwise is in denial.

Always remember, the drugs you are taking are filling up some hole in your mind and soul. Weather it is street drugs, or legal, for-corporate-profit drugs, that is all they are doing. It is up to you to find that hole, understand what it needs, and to fill it with life. The drugs only hide the hole and allow you to forget its there, they dont remove the problems the hole causes.

I use kratom currently as a way of getting off of opium (poppy pods). I find myself hooked. How do you view medicinal plants that can be abused? Like kratom and others?

I view it the same as anything else that can be abused. You can abuse a dog's willingness to be domesticated in return for your shelter, love, respect, and food. You can abuse a flower's willingness to provide you with fruit and energy. You can abuse a tree's ability to provide you with resources to shelter yourself, heal yourself, feed yourself, and so on. You can abuse the strength you have been given in life to coerce others into engaging in activities that arent directly beneficial to themselves but only to you. You can abuse the beauty you have been given in life for the same ends. You can abuse this power we seem to have that we label "intelligence," in order to adapt your environment to suit your own pleasures, wants, and desires, at the cost of the environment itself. I see no difference in abusing the milk of the poppy, than in abusing the ability to create such abstract notions as "financial derivatives" and using it to imprison the majority of the human race. You can make the choice, do you want to exist as a pathological entity? Or do you want to grow, and become part of the cosmic vibration of consciousness, to help the continuation of the seemingly rare existence of this astral phenomenon we call life?

but I'm not where I wanna be

Where do you want to be? What do you believe is stopping you from being there?

The Cosmos is rather stoical. If you choose death, it will simply wait a few hundred million years for something else to take your place. Life is immortal, it lives on asteroids floating around in space just waiting for the exact components and environmental conditions to initiate its algorithms for consciousness generation and biological expression. You, all of us, human beings, are not immortal, and can be wiped from existence in a mere moment. So how do I feel about the potential for abuse for anything? I think as a species, we are capable of overcoming any internal pathologies. We also are capable of choosing not to do so. Its up to you. Ask for help, again I reiterate, we cannot survive without each other. Being unwilling to help someone is the same as choosing to destroy yourself. We are all each other.

...

Does your mind continue to wander around into areas you do not feel are a healthy and beneficial use of your time? Have some more books!

407057-M.jpg



The Tao of Health, Sex, and Longevity
by Daniel P. Reid

I suggest this book to just about everyone I meet struggling with pretty much any manageable mental or physical health problem. The beginning to the path to every answer you need starts here. There are many ways through life, but only one Way to optimal health.

The timing here is pretty clutch:

GlaxoSmithKline to pay $3bn in US drug fraud scandal

GSK, one of the world's largest healthcare and pharmaceuticals companies, admitted to promoting antidepressants Paxil and Wellbutrin for unapproved uses, including treatment of children and adolescents.
 
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anti depressants havent helped me what so ever
ive always drunk alcohol recreationally whilst using AD's and my brain feels destroyed.
 
anti depressants havent helped me what so ever
ive always drunk alcohol recreationally whilst using AD's and my brain feels destroyed.

Antidepressants have a hard time doing a good job if your messing with your serotonin, dopamine and GABA regularly. It's the alcohol that's making your brain feel destroyed, I promise. If you can quit the booze or beer or whatever out of your life, just for a while, you should feel lots better. If it's the case that you're on an AD that isn't right for you, you'll never be able to tell unless you take it along with continued sobriety. Good luck man!
 
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