If you had to choose have drugs had a positive or negative influence on SWIYOUR life?

[radagast]

swim has got in his memory (Which is short and rose tinted to say the least) nothing but good memories of drugs
now obviously some memories were scary or strange but on the whole good prevailed

this isnt the case with everyone and there are horror stories but if you had to sum it up would it be mostly good or mostly bad.
I will be interested to see the results of the poll

[Nature Boy]

SWIM would say positive. His drug use revolves around pot daily, alcohol most weekends, the occasional roll or trip whether it be MDMA, mushrooms, LSD etc. SWIM can't say he's had many negative experiences using drugs. There have been nights where he may have dropped one pill too many and had a rough comedown, or maybe a bad hangover after a night's drinking, but these simply do not stack up against all the great experiences he's had with most drugs.

[Nicaine]

SWIM appreciates the "if you had to choose" part, because drugs have been an integral aspect of his life rather than "influencing" it (as though they stood off to one side and weren't really a part of the whole thing).

However, he does think overall they've led to some poor choices and certain actions that he deeply regrets, so he chose the "mostly negative" option. There's no way of knowing whether SWIM would really consider his life "better" if he'd never done drugs, because he would not be the same person at all.

P.S. the substance that's caused SWIM by far the most trouble and heartache is crack cocaine. He hadn't done it in a long time, but the memories are still so strong it's almost PTSD-like. One of his few genuine regrets that he'd love to turn the clock back on.

[London_Bloke]

Positive:

SWIM found many years ago that MDMA stripped away all the bullshit and baggage that was preventing her from being "fully in the moment" and deserving of the love her mate was showing her.

SWIM and mate have since moved into other realms of experimentation and research, all with the same goal in mind of maintaining the open channels of love and communication. Lesson One was that SWIM and mate now are able to maintain the open channels without chemical assistance, leaving us to chose chemical experimentation as an adjunct to the lessons already learned. And to assist in having just a wonderful time together. They have almost 20 years together and attribute some of that success to the chemicals that helped break down barriers that everyone must erect to get through the work day and open a door to true intimacy.

SWIM has not only learned how to shut the door to distraction and stress, but to open the door to intimacy at will - a skill learned while experimenting with MDMA. SWIM will be eternally grateful for this gift.

[Bajeda]

Originally Posted by Nicaine

SWIM appreciates the "if you had to choose" part, because drugs have been an integral aspect of his life rather than "influencing" it (as though they stood off to one side and weren't really a part of the whole thing).

Swim would have to agree with Nicaine partially on this one.

He feels that recreational (and serious) drug usage has become part of his life to the extent where he can't say whether it's either mostly good or mostly bad as a whole. Swim believes that he is simply a different person than he would have been had he not chose to partake in drugs in his younger years. He doesn't know exactly what type of person he would be now if he hadn't become interested in drugs, so he can't evaluate on such a general level whether drugs have had a completely positive or negative influence on him.

Swim did choose the "positive" option on the poll however, as he finds that he has had some experiences with drugs that were definitely of a positive influence and finds to be quite useful. Its experiences with entactogens and psychedelics that swim found beneficial, as well as cannabis to a certain lesser extent. His past use of opiates, stimulants, alcohol, and other inebriants haven't really benfited him other than altering his lifestyle somewhat and possibly exposing him to different types of people that he wouldn't have known otherwise. He couldn't really say what influence his collective drug use has had on him overall though.

[~lostgurl~]

The question was about influence so swim answered negative, as far as memories, lots more memories of good times than bad, mostly good really, but if SWIM had never taken drugs she would be better off health wise, physically, looks, financially (by far) and may have even achieved some of her dreams in life by now. But SWIM would probably still be a closed minded ass, so she is still glad she played, she just wish it wasn't at such an expense of so many other things.

[Forthesevenlakes]

SWIM has found that different drugs have influenced his life positively in different ways. Even experiences that were initially negative, SWIM has attempted to at least turn into a positive lesson to be learned. There are few substances that SWIM has tried that SWIM hasnt found something positive in. However, this may not be an inherent property of the substance or experience itself. When it comes down to it, SWIM thinks substances just ARE, they are neither good nor bad. Its all in how swiWe interpret our experiences with the substances, or related to the substances. But through various substances (initially DXM and marijuana) and with them, SWIM was inspired to be curious about how the brain works, why drugs work in the brain, etc which led him to his current career path. This, SWIM would consider, the main positive effect in his life.

[dnb warrior]

SWIM chose positive, that is if he had to choose, he would not go back on the decision to get into drugs. they taught SWIM to live for the moment and he feels better for it. but since that one initial learning it has mostly been downhill and the negative impact has been huge. it's a very hard question to answer.

[dip]

[paranoid]

[stephy171072]

Swim would say definatly negative.

The drug thats has the most negative impact in swims life has been heroin.

All because of swims drug use swim has lost many friends and the trust and respect from the few she does have left.
A hell of a lot of money!
Her place at university.
Quite a lot of self respect.
A deacent nights sleep free from nightmares and regret.
Swims health has deteriated.
Swim has caused her self and her family and the ones she cares about a lot of pain and feels horrible for doing so.
Swim has done things she would never though she would be capeable of doing.
Swim lost all of her belongings (yes everything) from her clothes, to her diarys and photo albums, her computer, memory box, things from childhood, books, cd's, dvds, tv ect. everything. This is a long story I wont really go into here but to sum it up it happned because swim was deep into the horrible drug world and was invloved with some really bad people who when she tried to get away from them they got rid of all her stuff.
Swim feels she has lost her life in general at the moment. Swim knows she is young and so there is still time (hopefully) but right now swim is living a sort of non life due to drugs. Every day is just the same swim wakes up and has to get money to score then score the use or swim gets really ill and this happnes a lot to swim when she can't score for whatever reason.

Swim is actually quite suprised from the results of this fourm she didn't think the vots for positive would be so high. Guess it just depends on the drug the user is taking.

[Politicalchalk]

At 13, Swim's ant farm was totally what The Gap (a clothing store for our friends outside the US) wanted said farm to be. Totally. Than somehow, LSD made it's way into the farm and now, the farm make choices for itself, instead of being led into ideas of what it "should be".

A hundred times over, the same choice would be made.

[Ilsa]

it depends on a lot of variables (emotional state, type and amount used, etc), but my cat thinks lostgurl summed it up well--my cat wouldn't take back her experiences, but, as is the nature of the beast, she's dinged herself pretty badly once or twice. when she was younger (15-19 years old), she was just experimenting, and didn't seem to suffer any long-term consequences, so she'd say that that level of use was neutral to positive. over the years she experimetned quite a bit, without serious incident and even ended up graduating with high honors at the top of her class in undergrad and was awarded a fellowship to grad school.

the needle changed everything. in short, swim lost her health insurance and became severely depressed, quit working and went from shooting an oxy once a month or so to slamming coke and heroin daily for a few months. she lived with friends who had money, so she didn't resort to selling herself or anything, and ended up moving home and quitting, but she threw away pretty much her life in florida, her credit, and her self-respect. she almost od'ed several times and lost way too much weight. she let drugs rule her being for awhile, and takes it pretty easy these days. she's much happier with the grad program she's transferred to (environmental science--no DEA license, but waaaaay more interesting ) all in all, it's not the drugs themselves that have the negative consequences, but the physical and psychological ruts we dig ourselves into during the course of an addiction.

[dimichaeltryptamine]

Positive.

Swim says, "If you can go further with your mind and do good, and you know what you are and aren't capable of, then you can go anywhere you want. In or out. It's all in your mind. Your choice. You make or break what drugs are to your life."

But that's just Swim.