Cocaine

Cocaine is a drug that is extracted from a South American plant. It is the second-most common illicit drug in America.

It is typically found as a white crystalline powder and is is usually snorted through the nostrils or injected.

In the form called “crack,” it is altered to be a solid substance and broken into chunks (“rocks”) to be smoked. In this form it is smoked (inhaled into the lungs).

When used recreationally, cocaine generally gives the user a sense of energy, invincibility, exhileration, and alertness. Even acute effects of cocaine are dangerous, potentially causing heart attacks, seizures or respiratory failure.

Crack gives a quicker and more intense effect and is highly mentally or psychologically addictive and is even more physically dangerous. Many abusers of powder cocaine graduate to crack as cocaine will no longer produce the desired effect and produces a very short-term high. Users are known to use crack for months at a time, only sleeping once in several days and developing an incredible sense of “needing” the drug.

Long-term effects can cause erratic or violent behavior, extreme irritability, or depression. It literally affects the brain’s chemistry and sometimes this can be permanent, causing the person suffering from cocaine or crack addiction to have depression, irritability, and even suicidal thoughts.

Drug addiction treatment, or “rehab” for cocaine or crack abuse can be very effective. Users that try to stop on their own have a very hard time; they may stop on their own for a while but, because of their addiction that has developed, and because of incapability of dealing with the problems of life, will almost always return again and again to use.

Residential rehabilitation for 30 or 90 days is often effective for helping the addict begin the process of recovery from addiction. In addiction treatment, they will attend therapy in order to address their issues. For an outline of what happens in addiction rehab, click here.