Drugs Kill
Zach Keesee & Cassidy Roy
How drugs that affect the brain work.
- The neurons in the body take the messages and they go to the brain and back to the body. If we didn't have neurons we woudn't know what we felt or other 5 senses, about something.
- These drugs act like neurotransmitters, block neurotransmitters, or change the amount of a neurotransmitter in synapses. Changing the communication between neurons by interfering with neurotransmitters changes the way we sense, feel, and respond to the world around us.
- The action of certain neurotransmitters is the basis for our different moods and emotions. Serotonin, for example, is a neurotransmitter that greatly affects our actions and reactions to the outside world. Antidepressants are examples of drugs that change the way the brain works in a beneficial way.
The path to addiction
- Drug Use: Getting pleasure is one reason why people repeatedly abuse drugs. No one starts using drugs to become an addict. But every addict starts as someone experimenting with drugs.
- Tolerance: One of the first developments in the addiction process is a condition called drug tolerance. Drug tolerance develops after repeated drug use when the user finds that it takes more of a drug to feel the same effect felt when first using the drug.
- Dependence: After repeated drug use, a person finds that he or she cannot function properly without taking the drug. The state in which the body relies on a given drug in order to function normally in known as physical dependence.
- Addiction: While drugs are changing the abuser's brain, he or she is also learning drug abuse behaviors and attitudes. When people become addicted to drugs, they lose control of their behavior.
Behavioral warning signs of addiction
- Loss of interest in schoolwork
- Dramatic change of appearance
- Change of friends
- Unexplained mood swings
- Absences from school
- Dramatic change in eating habits
- Excessive secretiveness or lying
- Unexplained need for money
Explanation of withdrawal
- The uncomfortable physical and psychological symptoms produced when a physically dependent drug user stops using drugs is called withdrawal. Withdrawal is characterized mostly by symptoms that are opposite of the drug's effect.
Ways to treat addiction.
- Give thought to the problem.
- Review your choices.
- Evaluate the consequences of each choice.
- Asses and choose the best choice.
- Think i tover afterward.
Local facilities
- Promises West : call for more information 1-800-431-5175
- Promises Malibu : call for more information 1-888-909-4819