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This page covers depressants -- chems most often used to slow the nervous system. These are often called downers. Facts about the depressant alcohol are found on a separate alcohol page. Facts about some so-called sex drugs are found on Sex and chems page.
On this page you'll find facts on the following chems:
For facts on:
FF: Baby, you can drive my car
Chill pills
Some prescription chems that slow the brain are known as sedatives and tranquilizers. They can be helpful in treating anxiety or sleep problems. The main types of tranquilizer are benzos, barbiturates and sleep medicines. You'll find the basic facts about them below.
These chems slow the nervous system. Some make it impossible to do much, while others leave the person more or less functioning.
Some chill pills kill pain. Others don't.
The technical difference between sedative and tranquilizer is that sedatives kill pain and put you in a stupor, which tranquilizers don't do. Also, when people say tranquilizer they normally mean minor tranquilizer. The major tranquilizers are psychiatric drugs used to calm people with severe mental disorders.
Sedatives slow the nervous system and offer a fair degree of pain relief, putting the person in a twilight state.
Tranquilizers also slow the nervous system, but do not ordinarily result in an inability to function.
The word narcotic is often used to describe chems that slow down body and mind — they depress your nervous system and tend to make you sleepy. They come under such headings as opioids (or opiates), prescription painkillers and barbiturates.
Alcohol is also a major nervous system depressant. Please see the main alcohol page for more facts.
Opiates and opioids desensitize the body to pain. Relief of small, often unnoticed pains, along with relaxation of muscle nervous tension, tends to induce a sense of well-being. The person feels relief from all the slings and arrows of life, all the petty fears and concerns. That sense of relief is a strong incentive for many young people who suffer from "routine" levels of anxiety associated with civilized life.
But that very quality can lead the breathing system to shut down, with severe brain damage or death quickly following.
People who use such chems regularly tend to need more and more in order to get the desired high, thus increasing the likelihood of severe injury or death from overdose.
Those who use downers to knock out the pain of life also knock out much of its meaning.
In particular, when opiates enter, three driving forces of life often leave: sex, action and hunger. Users "fly low and die slow" (and sometimes not so slow).
Heroin is an opiate chem made from morphine, a drug processed from poppy plants.
Heroin is sold on the street as a white or brown powder or as a black sticky substance called "black tar."
People inject, sniff, snort, or smoke heroin. Some users mix heroin with crack cocaine in a "speedball."
Heroin rapidly floods brain sectors that quiet anxieties and induce a sense of well-being. As with other downers the heart pumps less vigorously than usual and the breathing system slows down.
Aside from the feel-good rush, other effects include dry mouth, arms and legs feeling very heavy, and being mentally spaced out. While "nodding," the user is out of touch and unable to communicate with anyone.
Even worse, heroin these days is often cut with the extremely powerful painkiller fentanyl. It doesn't take much fentanyl for you to OD and die. Yet you have no way of knowing how much is in the heroin you are buying.
Naloxone, if given soon after an overdose, is a medicine that has proved effective in reviving opiate and opioid OD victims. Nalaxone -- which is often referred to by the brand name Narcan -- nasal spray is available over the counter in many locales. This powerful life-saver can also be injected by syringe. Its use requires no medical expertise, which is a big plus, since time is of the essence when administering this med.
Heroin can lead to addiction, a form of substance use disorder. Withdrawal symptoms include severe muscle and bone pain, sleep problems, diarrhea and vomiting, and severe cravings for the drug.
Withdrawal from heroin may include these symptoms:
Morphine is closely related to the chem heroin. Both derive from the poppy plant. Morphine is commonly used medically to give pain relief to severely afflicted patients.
Though not as strong as heroin as a painkiller, morphine packs plenty of punch. And for that reason the chem is, like heroin, quite dangerous if not taken under medical supervision.
In the United States, a small percentage of the morphine obtained from opium is used directly for pharmaceutical products. The remaining morphine is processed into codeine and other derivatives.
Morphine use carries most of the same risks as heroin use carries.
As with injection of heroin, injection of morphine can be quite risky -- because very often carelessness accompanies the need for relief.
Opium is the name used for the dried juice of a particular poppy plant. The odorous, reddish-brown substance is kneaded into balls, cakes or strips.
Opium has been in high demand for thousands of years both for its painkiller and feel-good effects.
Opium is often smoked by recreational users, though the bitter flavor can be reduced when mixed with food.
Morphine, heroin and fentanyl are processed from opium. Other painkillers, such as oxycodone, are closely related to opium chemically. That goes for codeine, also.
Though opium is not nearly as strong as morphine or heroin, you can still wind up addicted to the stuff.
These days, drug dealers don't bother with crude opium. They're more interested in selling you refined products like heroin, fentanyl and pain pills.
Codeine
Codeine is made from the poppy plant and used to stifle nagging coughs and to quiet minor pain.
Some people guzzle the stuff in order to get an opiate buzz. That's a good way to shut down your breathing system and die. Or end up with permanent brain damage. And, like other opiates and opioids the chem is addictive.
Fentanyl is about 50 times stronger than heroin. That may sound exciting, but that means it's real easy to OD on the stuff. Tiny amounts can send you to meet your Maker earlier than you had planned on.
The chem, like other opiates and opioids, is very useful in the hands of experts for helping patients avert severe pain.
But, drug dealers have found that the chem is easy enough to make in Mexican labs with precursor chems shipped from China and elsewhere. And because it is so potent, it is easier to smuggle than other outlawed chems. That means U.S. dealers can lace heroin and pills with the stuff in order to give weak chems a punch. But, who knows how much of a punch?
As with all such drugs, the biggest danger is that your breathing system shuts off and you either die or have permanent severe brain damage.
Some of fentanyl's victims
https://dbookforyou.blogspot.com/p/some-fentanyl-victims.html
Oxy is short for the prescription pain pill oxycodone, which is sold under the brands OxyContin and Percocet. Another common opioid pain pill is hydrocodone, which is sold under the brand Vicodin.
Both morphine, sold as Kadian and Avinza, and fentanyl are marketed as prescription pills.
When these pills are mixed with alcohol, which also depresses the nervous system, the risk of death or severe brain damage from respiratory failure is high. And, as the body begins to resist -- or tolerate -- the chem with repeated use, the user may chase the initial high by swallowing more and more at once.
Too much can bring on an OD death. But how much is too much? The user's ability to estimate this is clouded both by the demands of craving and by a lack of technical knowledge.
Further, once you're hooked on pills, you may find that street heroin is cheaper. The only drawback is that shooting up with needles is the cheapest mode of ingestion. But the peril of contracting awful diseases via dirty needles and syringes is nothing to laugh off.
Ringo: Gotta...
Benzos
Benzos -- or benzodiazepines -- are depressants that produce sedation and hypnosis, relieve anxiety and muscle spasms, and reduce or halt seizures.
The most common benzodiazepines are the prescription drugs Valium, Xanax, Halcion, Ativan and Klonopin. Shorter-acting benzos used for sleeping pills include Prosom, Dalmane, Restoril and Halcion. Versed is a short-acting med used by doctors to relax emergency or surgical patients.
Benzo pills sold on the street are routinely popped directly or crushed and snorted. Benzos are often sought by heroin and opioid pill users either as substitute downers or in hopes of enhancing the feel-good state. Cocaine users also use benzos, either to calm down a coke rush or to obtain an effect similar to the cocaine-heroin, or speedball, effect.
Aside from slowing the heart and lungs, benzos are known for bringing on amnesia, nightmarish dreams, irritability and even hostility.
Signs of benzo overdose are pretty much the same as those for other downers: Extreme drowsiness, confusion, impaired coordination, decreased reflexes and very shallow breathing. Coma and and death are possible.
Mixing benzos with other downers, such as alcohol, is a good way to end up in the morgue. Sometimes the effects of such combos do more than add together. It's as if one chem plus another chem doesn't equal two chems but now equals 10 chems in drug power. On this line, a couple years back nearly 14 percent of people who had died using opioids and opiates were found to also have taken benzos.
Without telling customers, drug dealers sometimes mix benzos into opiates and opioids as a means of stretching supplies.
Benzos can be dangerous even to people who have prescriptions. For example, benzos have been found in the bloodstreams of drivers involved in an alarming number of fatal car crashes.
Z-drugs are in some ways similar to benzos, but in general don't carry as much risk for misuse. But even so, when they are misused great danger lurks.
Z-drugs are so called because they tend to have a z in their generic names and also because they are prescribed in order to help people "cut z's" -- get some sleep. Like benzos, Z-drugs are sometimes classed as hypnotics because they tend to put you in a trance-like state by reducing brain activity. They cut down on the number of neurons firing in your head.
Some names are
Barbiturates make up a class of depressant drugs that have long been used to counter insomnia, relieve anxiety, calm muscle spasms and prevent seizures. But they have been largely replaced by benzos and Z-drugs. Even so, they are still around -- and still dangerous, especially when mixed with alcohol.
Here are a few names:
The danger of OD is spotlighted by the fact that injected barbiturates are used for executing prisoners, for euthanasia ("mercy killing") and for state-sanctioned ("legal") suicide.
Xylazine is used by veterinarians to tranquilize animals and lacks any medical use for humans. The stuff is sometimes sold on the street laced with the super-powerful opiate known as fentanyl. The idea is to stretch out the feel-good high from the fentanyl.
Xylazine has been linked to a surge in drug deaths.
As with benzos and Z-drugs, xylazine use can be dangerous. Your heart rate and breathing can slow down to the point of death. Mixing the stuff with other downers, such as alcohol, greatly boosts your risk of death or longterm body damage.
DW1
On this page you'll find facts on the following chems:
✓ Heroin, morphine, opium and codeine
✓ Fentanyl
✓ Oxy and prescription pain pills
✓ Barbiturates
✓ Benzos and Z-drugs
✓ Xylazine
For facts on:
GHB and Rohypnol, please go to the Sex and chems page.
Alcohol, please go to the main the main alcohol page or use an alcohol page link in the sidebar.
DW2
Fab Four: A Day in the LifeFF: Baby, you can drive my car
Chill pills
Some prescription chems that slow the brain are known as sedatives and tranquilizers. They can be helpful in treating anxiety or sleep problems. The main types of tranquilizer are benzos, barbiturates and sleep medicines. You'll find the basic facts about them below.
These chems slow the nervous system. Some make it impossible to do much, while others leave the person more or less functioning.
Some chill pills kill pain. Others don't.
The technical difference between sedative and tranquilizer is that sedatives kill pain and put you in a stupor, which tranquilizers don't do. Also, when people say tranquilizer they normally mean minor tranquilizer. The major tranquilizers are psychiatric drugs used to calm people with severe mental disorders.
Sedatives slow the nervous system and offer a fair degree of pain relief, putting the person in a twilight state.
Tranquilizers also slow the nervous system, but do not ordinarily result in an inability to function.
DW3
Nervous system slowdown
The word narcotic is often used to describe chems that slow down body and mind — they depress your nervous system and tend to make you sleepy. They come under such headings as opioids (or opiates), prescription painkillers and barbiturates.
Alcohol is also a major nervous system depressant. Please see the main alcohol page for more facts.
Opiates and opioids desensitize the body to pain. Relief of small, often unnoticed pains, along with relaxation of muscle nervous tension, tends to induce a sense of well-being. The person feels relief from all the slings and arrows of life, all the petty fears and concerns. That sense of relief is a strong incentive for many young people who suffer from "routine" levels of anxiety associated with civilized life.
DW4
By suppressing nervous excitability, opioids have proved effective at controlling nagging coughs and diarrhea.But that very quality can lead the breathing system to shut down, with severe brain damage or death quickly following.
People who use such chems regularly tend to need more and more in order to get the desired high, thus increasing the likelihood of severe injury or death from overdose.
Those who use downers to knock out the pain of life also knock out much of its meaning.
In particular, when opiates enter, three driving forces of life often leave: sex, action and hunger. Users "fly low and die slow" (and sometimes not so slow).
DW5
HeroinHeroin is an opiate chem made from morphine, a drug processed from poppy plants.
Heroin is sold on the street as a white or brown powder or as a black sticky substance called "black tar."
People inject, sniff, snort, or smoke heroin. Some users mix heroin with crack cocaine in a "speedball."
Heroin rapidly floods brain sectors that quiet anxieties and induce a sense of well-being. As with other downers the heart pumps less vigorously than usual and the breathing system slows down.
Aside from the feel-good rush, other effects include dry mouth, arms and legs feeling very heavy, and being mentally spaced out. While "nodding," the user is out of touch and unable to communicate with anyone.
DW6
Heroin is often stretched out or "cut" with such things as sugar, starch and powdered milk. These can clog blood vessels that lead to the lungs, liver, kidneys or brain. The result is not good.Even worse, heroin these days is often cut with the extremely powerful painkiller fentanyl. It doesn't take much fentanyl for you to OD and die. Yet you have no way of knowing how much is in the heroin you are buying.
DW7
Long-term effects of heroin use may include collapsed veins, infection of the heart lining and valves, abscesses, severe under-the-skin tissue damage, and lung complications.Naloxone, if given soon after an overdose, is a medicine that has proved effective in reviving opiate and opioid OD victims. Nalaxone -- which is often referred to by the brand name Narcan -- nasal spray is available over the counter in many locales. This powerful life-saver can also be injected by syringe. Its use requires no medical expertise, which is a big plus, since time is of the essence when administering this med.
Heroin can lead to addiction, a form of substance use disorder. Withdrawal symptoms include severe muscle and bone pain, sleep problems, diarrhea and vomiting, and severe cravings for the drug.
Withdrawal from heroin may include these symptoms:
Restlessness
Severe muscle and bone pain
Sleep problems
Diarrhea and vomiting
Cold flashes with goose bumps ("cold turkey")
Uncontrollable leg movements ("kicking the habit")
Severe heroin cravings
DW8
MorphineMorphine is closely related to the chem heroin. Both derive from the poppy plant. Morphine is commonly used medically to give pain relief to severely afflicted patients.
Though not as strong as heroin as a painkiller, morphine packs plenty of punch. And for that reason the chem is, like heroin, quite dangerous if not taken under medical supervision.
In the United States, a small percentage of the morphine obtained from opium is used directly for pharmaceutical products. The remaining morphine is processed into codeine and other derivatives.
Morphine use carries most of the same risks as heroin use carries.
As with injection of heroin, injection of morphine can be quite risky -- because very often carelessness accompanies the need for relief.
DW9
OpiumOpium is the name used for the dried juice of a particular poppy plant. The odorous, reddish-brown substance is kneaded into balls, cakes or strips.
Opium has been in high demand for thousands of years both for its painkiller and feel-good effects.
Opium is often smoked by recreational users, though the bitter flavor can be reduced when mixed with food.
Morphine, heroin and fentanyl are processed from opium. Other painkillers, such as oxycodone, are closely related to opium chemically. That goes for codeine, also.
Though opium is not nearly as strong as morphine or heroin, you can still wind up addicted to the stuff.
These days, drug dealers don't bother with crude opium. They're more interested in selling you refined products like heroin, fentanyl and pain pills.
Codeine
Codeine is made from the poppy plant and used to stifle nagging coughs and to quiet minor pain.
Some people guzzle the stuff in order to get an opiate buzz. That's a good way to shut down your breathing system and die. Or end up with permanent brain damage. And, like other opiates and opioids the chem is addictive.
DW10
Fentanyl
Fentanyl is about 50 times stronger than heroin. That may sound exciting, but that means it's real easy to OD on the stuff. Tiny amounts can send you to meet your Maker earlier than you had planned on.
The chem, like other opiates and opioids, is very useful in the hands of experts for helping patients avert severe pain.
But, drug dealers have found that the chem is easy enough to make in Mexican labs with precursor chems shipped from China and elsewhere. And because it is so potent, it is easier to smuggle than other outlawed chems. That means U.S. dealers can lace heroin and pills with the stuff in order to give weak chems a punch. But, who knows how much of a punch?
As with all such drugs, the biggest danger is that your breathing system shuts off and you either die or have permanent severe brain damage.
Some of fentanyl's victims
https://dbookforyou.blogspot.com/p/some-fentanyl-victims.html
DW11
Oxy and prescription pain pillsOxy is short for the prescription pain pill oxycodone, which is sold under the brands OxyContin and Percocet. Another common opioid pain pill is hydrocodone, which is sold under the brand Vicodin.
Both morphine, sold as Kadian and Avinza, and fentanyl are marketed as prescription pills.
When these pills are mixed with alcohol, which also depresses the nervous system, the risk of death or severe brain damage from respiratory failure is high. And, as the body begins to resist -- or tolerate -- the chem with repeated use, the user may chase the initial high by swallowing more and more at once.
Too much can bring on an OD death. But how much is too much? The user's ability to estimate this is clouded both by the demands of craving and by a lack of technical knowledge.
Further, once you're hooked on pills, you may find that street heroin is cheaper. The only drawback is that shooting up with needles is the cheapest mode of ingestion. But the peril of contracting awful diseases via dirty needles and syringes is nothing to laugh off.
DW12
Marmalade: Gotta Get Up to Get DownRingo: Gotta...
Benzos
Benzos -- or benzodiazepines -- are depressants that produce sedation and hypnosis, relieve anxiety and muscle spasms, and reduce or halt seizures.
The most common benzodiazepines are the prescription drugs Valium, Xanax, Halcion, Ativan and Klonopin. Shorter-acting benzos used for sleeping pills include Prosom, Dalmane, Restoril and Halcion. Versed is a short-acting med used by doctors to relax emergency or surgical patients.
Benzo pills sold on the street are routinely popped directly or crushed and snorted. Benzos are often sought by heroin and opioid pill users either as substitute downers or in hopes of enhancing the feel-good state. Cocaine users also use benzos, either to calm down a coke rush or to obtain an effect similar to the cocaine-heroin, or speedball, effect.
DW13
The Man in Black: Ring of FireAside from slowing the heart and lungs, benzos are known for bringing on amnesia, nightmarish dreams, irritability and even hostility.
Signs of benzo overdose are pretty much the same as those for other downers: Extreme drowsiness, confusion, impaired coordination, decreased reflexes and very shallow breathing. Coma and and death are possible.
Mixing benzos with other downers, such as alcohol, is a good way to end up in the morgue. Sometimes the effects of such combos do more than add together. It's as if one chem plus another chem doesn't equal two chems but now equals 10 chems in drug power. On this line, a couple years back nearly 14 percent of people who had died using opioids and opiates were found to also have taken benzos.
Without telling customers, drug dealers sometimes mix benzos into opiates and opioids as a means of stretching supplies.
Benzos can be dangerous even to people who have prescriptions. For example, benzos have been found in the bloodstreams of drivers involved in an alarming number of fatal car crashes.
DW14
Z-drugsZ-drugs are in some ways similar to benzos, but in general don't carry as much risk for misuse. But even so, when they are misused great danger lurks.
Z-drugs are so called because they tend to have a z in their generic names and also because they are prescribed in order to help people "cut z's" -- get some sleep. Like benzos, Z-drugs are sometimes classed as hypnotics because they tend to put you in a trance-like state by reducing brain activity. They cut down on the number of neurons firing in your head.
Some names are
Zopiclone, sold under the brand Zimovane.If you combine Z-med use with alcohol or other chems, your chances of getting hooked on them goes up. People who are being treated for chem abuse may find it wise to steer clear of Z-drugs, as the potential for death is not minor. Signs of Z-drug overdose include:
Eszoplicone, sold under the brand Lunesta.
Zaleplon, sold as Sonata.
Zolpidem, sold as Ambien, Ambien CR, Edluar and Zolpimist.
Extreme lethargy, coma.As with alcohol and other downers, a dangerous overdose can happen even when not all these symptoms occur.
Major slowdowns of heart and lungs.
Poor coordination and reflexes.
Bad reasoning and judgment, slurred speech.
Blackouts, in which the user lives in some "alternate reality" that is later forgotten.
Hallucinations and delusions.
Seizures if the Z-med is taken along with alcohol or uppers.
DW15
BarbituratesBarbiturates make up a class of depressant drugs that have long been used to counter insomnia, relieve anxiety, calm muscle spasms and prevent seizures. But they have been largely replaced by benzos and Z-drugs. Even so, they are still around -- and still dangerous, especially when mixed with alcohol.
Here are a few names:
Amobarbital is a short-term medicine used to treat insomnia.Careless barbiturate poppers face the same risks as users of other downers: Death or severe brain damage from respiratory failure. That risk goes way up when pills are crushed, mixed with water and injected.
Butalbital, marketed under such brands as Fiorinal, is often sold as a combo headache pill that may include such chems as aspirin, acetaminophen, caffeine or codeine.
Methohexital is an anesthetic used in such procedures as electroconvulsive therapy.
Pentobarbital, sold under the brand Nembutal, was used as a sleep pill to help insomniacs doze off. But it is no longer available, except for special medical reasons, such as halting seizures.
Phenobarbital is used to head off seizures and to stop them while they are in progress.
Primidone also prevents convulsions and seizures.
Secobarbital, sold under the brand Seconal, treats insomnia, but is no longer a top favorite of doctors.
Pentothal is a short-term pain killer sometimes used to assist in hypnotism.
The danger of OD is spotlighted by the fact that injected barbiturates are used for executing prisoners, for euthanasia ("mercy killing") and for state-sanctioned ("legal") suicide.
DW16
XylazineXylazine is used by veterinarians to tranquilize animals and lacks any medical use for humans. The stuff is sometimes sold on the street laced with the super-powerful opiate known as fentanyl. The idea is to stretch out the feel-good high from the fentanyl.
Xylazine has been linked to a surge in drug deaths.
As with benzos and Z-drugs, xylazine use can be dangerous. Your heart rate and breathing can slow down to the point of death. Mixing the stuff with other downers, such as alcohol, greatly boosts your risk of death or longterm body damage.
DW17
The author of The Funny Stuff Funnies takes sole responsibility for the content of this e-booklet. This booklet has not been sponsored, either directly or indirectly, by any government or non-government organization or fellowship, such as AA or NA.
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