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Heroin vein or artery??? need some help plz!!!

S

stupidgurl

Greenlighter
Joined
Aug 18, 2011
Messages
3
hello! i'm new here, this is my first post. so i recently just started shooting again (hence the stupidgurl) and i have a question...
i have been reading other threads and stuff around the web about how to tell the difference such as pain and the color of the blood-artery being brighter red and 'frothy'. whats weird is in my right hand, i see the veins, and when i register there is no pain but the color is a brighter red than my other hand or arms...could this be an artery?? i just shot up now, and there was no pain, the color was a little brighter but not 'frothy' but i now have just a little swelling where i injected and the skin surface is numb. the numbness isnt traveling up my arm or to my fingers, just around the area i injected. is this an artery? please help me clear this up, thanks!!
 
ive had the whole numbing thing go on ,,REALLY SCARED me when i first started had my whole forearm go numb for about 30min one time .....

first time i hit a artery i fucking flipped didnt even take the needle out out just wildly shook my arm bout had a heart attack ,i just didnt know at the time..

point being you will know if u hit anartery ...feels like actual FIRE
 
you know what...that was one of my main questions, is would i know if i hit an artery. and obviously from everywhere i have read, everyone says that it hurts something aweful. i have never had pain but the color throws me off ya know?
 
I think you would probably know if you hit an artery. It would be really painful shooting into it, and the blood would be considerably lighter than when you hit a vein. Arteries need more pressure to push blood through the body, so if you did hit an artery it would probably be difficult to push the plunger down on your needle, and it might bleed a lot. I'm not really sure though, I've never hit an artery myself. Just be careful, if you ever think you may be in an artery and not a vein don't inject.
 
That fire things right ya know. I've definately hit an artery a few times, and the pain is just horrific. you only need to push your plunger a tiny bit and it feels like a white hot poker is being driven up your arm/in your boob or wherever.. wouldn't wish it on anybody.
 
Blood is the more lighter red the more oxygen is in it. So blood in veins isn't totally out of oxygen. Depending on the site of injection your blood will have different hue. Also, blood doesn't always "jump in" into the syringe, the reason it sometimes does is because there is some pressure in both veins and arteries but it's much higher in arteries. Nonetheless, it also varies depending on the site of injection and the pressure of blood in veins in your feet should then be much lower than it is in a vein closer to your heart.

Hitting an artery and injecting even a small amount of an acidic solution with some heroin citrate or other salt doesn't end with some little swelling. It's numbness from the place you injected into down the limb which gets seriously swollen, you also feel pain like something very irritating went with the blood and you feel it in all arteries going from the artery you hit. The best scenario after injecting into an artery is that the numbness and the swelling go away after 2-3 days, the worst scenario is gangrene. You will notice it as your skin will change color to blue and then the only option is amputation of the limb, otherwise the infection will spread and cause death eventually.

If you hit an artery but don't inject anything into it, then pull out the needle and apply some cotton pad to provide pressure and keep it there for at least 15 minutes, then see if bleeding stopped. Also, it's good to place your hand or leg above your head by simply lying down. The area around the injection site may be swollen but that's it, no numbness of the whole limb should appear.

Also, some people mistake hives coming from allergic reactions with hitting an artery as in both cases numbness and swelling may appear.
 
^ Agree with most of that. Just to say - the colour of the blood can be quite an unreliable indicator, I've seen bright blood from veins and darker blood from arteries - may have been down to lighting in the room etc but it can be subtle. Pain (arterial walls have their own nerve supply unlike veins), harder to register (due to thick muscular arterial wall), pulsatile (pushing up plunger - but this can be subtle depending on your syringe) are all signs but you should check that any vessel you ae going for is non-pulsatile before injecting. Arteries also generally (but not always) lie deeper than veins. Failing to stop bleeding after or spasming causing intense pain and/or pallor below the artery are signs after you have injected, but oviously by this time it is a little late!

As well as familiarising yourself with a vein map I would recommend all injecting users to familiarise themselves of the location of some of their arteries by feeling for the radial (wrist, on the same side as your thumb), brachial (inner elbow towards your body if your forearm is outstretched and your palm up) and femoral (should you need to resort to this - the artery lies snuggled up between the vein and the femoral nerve, with the vein nearest your groin and the nerve on the outside).
 
ime the swelling has went down within cuple hours...the skin coloration is different though,anybody with visible veins should not get anywhere near a artery
 
True, veins in the first spot people inject into are well seen and big enough to hit it good. But there's also an artery close enough to median cubital vein. I know some mistake an artery for a vein as they see pulsating, they think that's where they should hit because the tourniquet probably made the pressure in veins lower in the limb high enough for a vein to pulsate. And that's wrong.

The other thing is veins go deeper with longer use, more and more adhesions are one of the reasons. Also, when you shoot up long enough, you know it well where the vein is. The trick is with longer use veins also "like to move". I had like 3 spots on my right arm, now I can't see two of them at all. And I haven't shot up since Oct 09 (not counting a few times lately).
 
hence WHY i praise weight lifting...heavy and high reps ...this forces oxygen into the blood ,veins expand (keeps them healthy)

i know everybody has looked at a bodybuilder pic and drooled over the veins once or twice
 
once i had to go to the ER (for something unrelated to drugs) and since i had used up all my veins they had to use my femoral artery to get blood from me. i was shocked to see that it was ORANGE!!! i mean really a weird color and it definitely looked frothy. but the weirdest thing was that i could tell that the artery was MUCH tougher than a normal vein and although it didn't hurt it felt like they took a hole punch and punched a hole in my artery. they also had quite a hard time getting it to stop bleeding... i remember them applying pressure for what seemed like forever and it kept bleeding! and then they had me continue to hold cotton on it for a long time after... really weird experience!!! i felt like they could have killed me!

and then they put an IV in my neck.... lol
 
yea i had to have an iv put in my foot ,horrible feeling mentaly felt like i was being judged ,but i was very drunk !!

but still not a good feeling
 
stupidgurl said:
hello! i'm new here, this is my first post. so i recently just started shooting again (hence the stupidgurl) and i have a question...
i have been reading other threads and stuff around the web about how to tell the difference such as pain and the color of the blood-artery being brighter red and 'frothy'. whats weird is in my right hand, i see the veins, and when i register there is no pain but the color is a brighter red than my other hand or arms...could this be an artery?? i just shot up now, and there was no pain, the color was a little brighter but not 'frothy' but i now have just a little swelling where i injected and the skin surface is numb. the numbness isnt traveling up my arm or to my fingers, just around the area i injected. is this an artery? please help me clear this up, thanks!!
Click to expand...

You have more pressure in your arteries than you would ever think. I've heard stories of the plunger traveling a few feet out of the back of the syringe. As for the color of your blood, It pulls oxygen out of the water in the solution. That's what most people call a "flash" the blood goes from nearly black, to a red "blood" color. You will know if you hit an artery. My personal recommendation is to stick to 1/2 inch insulin needles. They make it very hard to ever get into an artery. It's never impossible though, and be even more careful in your hands. The smaller the vein, the more likely to have a leak. Keep it precise in feet and hands. It's really easy to hide until you miss and have a huge knot sticking up on the back of your hand.
 
adder said:
True, veins in the first spot people inject into are well seen and big enough to hit it good. But there's also an artery close enough to median cubital vein. I know some mistake an artery for a vein as they see pulsating, they think that's where they should hit because the tourniquet probably made the pressure in veins lower in the limb high enough for a vein to pulsate. And that's wrong.
Click to expand...

Eep yeah, and I don't want to encourage people to start digging around for deep vessels! Just wanted people to perhaps have a feel for non-visible veins in their forearm before moving onto hands/feet/groin etc. The key is to know for sure you have a vein - some of the best ones might be feel-able but not visable, but you do need to confirm it is a vein (non-pulsatile and compressible with minor pressure) before you inject into it and not just assume it is.

I know a few phlebotamists and they have never hit an artery because they know what veins feel like compared to arteries - I reckon they could hit a vein in their sleep and they really do rely on palpation far more than looking for veins. Knowing how both feel is more important than all the vein maps in the world imo, as you said the brachial artery does run close to the median cubital vein..
 
Get a circulatory system diagram and use your fingers to gently feel for your veins, the kinda feel like a shoelace under a blanket, so it's hard at first, but you get better at it. Also, keep track when you get your blood taken where they go if you don't have visible veins, it will give you a starting point for 1 vein at least and you can inspect the length of it to get a feel for feeling them, then go on to other areas based on the diagrams.
 
Definitely, I've followed a vein from my wrist all the way up my forarm feeling for it where it isn't visible.. I've got a slight fixation with the way veins feel, I sit bouncing my finger on mine on the bus etc so I've discovered most of my decent ones.. and most of the fat, strong ones (except in the antecubital fossae) are non-visible ones.

Really didn't mean to recommend for people to go poking around for a deep vessel - arteries tend to lie deeper, be 100% sure what you have is a vein - the difference is easy once you have felt both and got the hang of it. Also, make sure there actually is a vein there before you inject, obviously... it's actually generally easier to hit deeper, better anchored veins but if you're used to surface veins it can take a while getting used to the angle etc..
 
Interestingly enough, my worn-out spot in the crook of my arm bounced back again - the vein is back to being a nice, thick shoelace with strong walls. Although there is quite a bit of scar tissue on top of it. Luckily I have found another good vein just a few inches over towards the inside of my arm (little finger side). Now with 3 spots to rotate through, I should be good to go... we will see i suppose.
 
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