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How dangerous is ecstasy? Should I be worried?
Kyougu
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I have a friend (admitedly not a close friend) who has always been known as the "pothead" of us. At first it was just a joke, since although I don't smoke, I never really thought he was in any real danger. Though over the past couple of years since I known him he moved from occasional user to what seems to be a pretty heavy user. If I would guess, I would say he probably smokes at least 3 times a week. Again, it was weed, so I didn't give it too much thought.
Lately though I found out that he's been taking ecstasy. And from what I would guess, more than just when going out or rarely. It struck me when working with him yesterday, that he was carrying his pills around (I noticed around 5 or 6) and he was telling me all the different forms of x and it's effects. Then a friend of his dropped by to him give a pill which is suppose to give him more saretone (sp?) levels in the brain, which he said the x lowered. Those things didn't strike me as a casual user.
So how dangerous is this drug?
Lately though I found out that he's been taking ecstasy. And from what I would guess, more than just when going out or rarely. It struck me when working with him yesterday, that he was carrying his pills around (I noticed around 5 or 6) and he was telling me all the different forms of x and it's effects. Then a friend of his dropped by to him give a pill which is suppose to give him more saretone (sp?) levels in the brain, which he said the x lowered. Those things didn't strike me as a casual user.
So how dangerous is this drug?
Kyougu on
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As for X, I think it's more the random shit you're likely to get in it than the actual drug. Since the target audience isn't likely to know good stuff from bad and/or have a dedicated source, there';s more chance of getting either inert ingredients or harder stuff mixed in. Just what I've heard, so YMMV.
The chemical component that extasy is based on isn't any better or worse than other drugs out there, but the bad problem with X is who you get it from and what else is inside it. The good stuff used to just have vitamin C and mdma, but now there's a lot of crap floating around out there with coke, crank, and god knows what else in it just to fill out the pill more cheaply.
If he's going to do it, it's his decision. You should talk to him if it's bothering you though, as a friend. If he still wants to do it, get a testing kit online. I don't know if they're even still out there, but back in the 90's there were a lot of reputable sites that sold them and you could see how much of a tablet was crap.
Just my .02
I'm not condoning it or chastising it, just saying that a lot of new stuff is made of more than just mdma (the actual drug)
if it's still up, erowid.org has a lot of info, or used to at least.
edit: as for long term use, there's always the chance that long term use with any drug is extremely bad for you. I only did it a handful of times in college and that was it for me though.
If he does do it, make sure he's not mixing X with booze. Have him drink lots of water and keep hydrated.
You/he can check out pubmed for brain imaging studies on the effects of MDMA. A quick survey of a search for MDMA fmri yields a number of papers showing the negative physiological and psychological effects of chronic use.
That's pretty much my knowledge of it. I know some friends that have done it and havn't had any negative effects as of yet, but they haven't done it more than a few times.
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e: Take a look at this page in particular.
Regular use may may be dangerous.
But yeah, just read Erowid.
https://medium.com/@alascii
Drugs are pretty boring really, its all about the drinks.
She said a majority of other things you can recover from, but once that stuff was gone, it's gone.
MDMA doesn't just affect serotonin, it also has effects on dopamine and oxytocin. A lot of the "street wisdom" regarding ecstasy is very outdated or just plain wrong... and there is no pill or supplement you can take to reduce the risks of ecstasy. (And some pills that people occasionally take to "balance their serotonin" or whatever can actually make things worse by tying up the liver enzyme that breaks MDMA down, increasing the possibility of overdose.)
Some of the other comments are on the right track:
- You don't always know what you're getting in a pill of ecstasy. It might be MDMA, it might be something more dangerous. Two relatively common adulterants are DXM and PMA - PMA is very dangerous, and DXM is dangerous when taken in combination with MDMA.
- MDMA itself is not terribly dangerous in moderation. MDMA is always risky, there is no "safe" amount, however, the risk is much greater when you do it multiple days in a row, when you do multiple pills at a time, when you combine it with other drugs (including alcohol or prescription drugs like antidepressants), or when you mix pills. So don't do these things.
- A lot of the risk from MDMA use comes from overheating and dehydration. However, drinking too much water can also be risky. A good rule of thumb is 16 ounces or 30 ml of water per hour.
In short, moderate use is probably not that big of a deal. Frequent or heavy use is a cause for alarm.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
That limed, what mdma does is cause the cells in your brain that absorb excess serotonin to go into reverse mode, releasing more. With normal doses and sparse use, this is basically all the drug does. The excess release of serotonin is what makes you feel the way you do. Serotonin is one of the chemicals your brain uses to trigger neurons to do their thinking thing, and all that extra juice causes increased feelings of empathy, general lessening of inhibitions, heightened sensory interpretation, touch being the most commonly discussed but it's everything.
Then you come down, the brain mops up the excess serotonin, and things get back to normal. With constant use, your seretonin receptors wikll desensitize and and you will feel depressed and probably take more to feel better and then things go to hell rather quickly. Once you reach a certain dosage, which is fairly low, taking more mdma has little effect, lowest effective dose is best. Your brain can only produce so much serotonin in a given time period and once it's used up, it's used up and you feel bad. The trick is not to use it all up. It IS possible to really OD (like, toxic levels killing your brain cells) on mdma if you take a whoooole lot, basically, things go whacky in the brain and (I'm fuzzy on the OD mechanic but) your dopamine reuptake chutes start processing serotonin which, at the end of the process makes, basically, formaldehyde. That's MDMA. The chemical is pretty safe and fun if used responsibly.
The chief danger with street ecstasy is NOT the MDMA, it is the risk of adulterants (some have really horrible reactions w/ mdma, like DXM, and you could just get coke or mde or mda or meth and any of a million things and no mdma at all) and the lack of education surrounding it. It's easy to dance for 7 hours and not be thirsty the whole time, which, ya know, is kinda bad. Most deaths attributed to mdma are really heatstroke or bad reactions with other drugs (NEVER MIX MDMA WITH DXM/COUGH SYRUP or an MaOI EVER), usually leading to heatstroke, and other stuff like car accidents.
Know what you're taking, listen to your body and look out and be looked out for and MDMA is fairly safe and fun when used sparsely. Like anything though, you can get burned.
I have personally seen regular, frequent use of MDMA turn a person's brain to slush. That means like Friday, Saturday, Sunday, weekly. Basically most cognitive reasoning became much harder for him. What was really noticeable was the speech. Doing it a few times won't hurt you too bad, but regular use is not good, especially since they'll start upping the dosage pretty quickly.
I'm not worried at all about his marijuana habit.
I certainly wouldn't call it "impartial" or "unbiased." Erowid definitely has a mild pro-drug bias. It just seems impartial in comparison to all the hysterical anti-drug propaganda the US government puts out.
That doesn't make it bad, it's just not the end-all be-all of drug info anymore.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Well that may well be part of it, but then these guys are not serious druggies - I'm talking respectable professional family men here. But anyway, this is a digression as I have no way of testing this
That's entirely fair. The US government is exactly the last place you should go for the straight dope on the effects of drugs.
Hmm... the pun wasn't intended at first, but I'm definitely going to leave it in there.
What would you say is a better (or at least, less biased while remaining informative) source?
I don't do drugs (aside from socially drinking once in a while, and what has become a bit of a caffine addiction) and have little interest in experiementing, but I'm always curious as to the information available as to their effects.
Erowid is still one of the best sources, and I don't think there's any single source that is any better.
I just recommend keeping a critical mind while you read it.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
X pills purchased on the street are notoriously impure. Cocaine and heroin are not going to be in your pill, because they would not be cost effective at that price or psychoactive at that dose. Meth, caffeine, MDA and other MDMA-related compounds, and DXM are more likely, but not terribly dangerous in the oh-god-you'll-die sense if you're reasonable. Things like PMA, which is responsible for the idea of X cooking a person after a single pill, are extremely dangerous.
The pill your friend received to replenish his serotonin was likely 5-HTP, a natural serotonin precursor.
As someone who has done his fair share of X, I will say that it is not something I would recommend under any circumstances. It can make you emotionally unstable up to a few days after use, and some people may act irresponsibly without realizing that they are just hungover.
I volunteered for DanceSafe shortly after its inception and helped them put together a lot of their early informational materials. I didn't write that presentation, but I wrote some of the other materials that I think that presentation might be based off of.
It's now very outdated. Yes, MDMA does what that presentation says it does, but it also does a whole lot of other things that we didn't know about at the time, and the model it presents for neurological damage is simplistic and has been superceded. Preloading with vitamins, antioxidants, herbal supplements, or any other kind of pill might reduce the neurological damage from MDMA, but the evidence for it is weak and contradictory. My primary concern is that people might think that because they've preloaded with 5-HTP or vitamin E that they are then safe to take more MDMA, which would be a very poor decision. Vitamins and supplements are no substitute for moderation (or abstinence).
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
This guy just said everything I was going to pretty much.
The one thing I'd note is that different people react differently to the drug; some take it for years and the effects are similar (assuming reasonable usage, which to me is once every couple of months) and then some will take it anywhere between 5-10 times and notice the effects seriously diminished and the "hangover" greatly lengthened.
As something to try once or twice I wouldn't really discourage someone, but I'd definitely discourage someone from doing it regularly like your friend...anything more than once a month I would view as very bad for you in the long run
In my country a lot of heavier guys need two to feel any effect. But I agree you shouldn't be taking enough to give you a high, then taking more.
https://medium.com/@alascii
Also potency varies greatly. The idea is not to get high, then try to 'boost' yourself once you start coming down.
It's like squeezing a sponge (in this case, your brain's neurochemical receptors) and getting all the water (happiness) out of it, then squeezing it again before you soak up any more water. You might get a bit more moisture, but you're going to tear up your sponge.
Feral, you're crazy awesome.
Btw, got a more relevant link as far as neurological damage is concerned? I'd love to know what I did to myself.
I still do half a pill once or twice a year on special occasions
...unless you've got bad luck. The problem with ecstasy is that seemingly at random it'll just go ahead and cause complete liver shutdown. Because it's so easily synthesized, it's impossible to accurately trace to the producer, and it's impossible to gauge purity. The result is that nobody's quite sure how or why it happens, but every now and then some kid's liver experiences over 90% liver failure within a few hours, or suddenly days later. Awesome party drug, right? Here's a good study on the phenomenon, if it's slightly outdated: http://www.erowid.org/chemicals/mdma/references/journal/1997_brauer_transplant_1/
Not much has changed on that front, though. Personally, there are much safer ways to get high if that's what you really want to do.
CUZ THERE'S SOMETHING IN THE MIDDLE AND IT'S GIVING ME A RASH
Um, Pubmed?
In all seriousness, the Wikipedia article on MDMA effects is a pretty sober discussion of the possible causes of toxicity and the potential use of over-the-counter antioxidants.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
The study you linked states that the (horrible and deadly!) liver complications are likely due to individual sensitivity, and highly unlikely due to impurities in the drug or combinations of drugs. Which makes sense, because otherwise you'd see regional waves of liver failure whenever some goon cooked up a bad batch of something.
I'm personally shocked that I hadn't heard of this phenomenon before, simply because it's the kind of thing the government loves to latch onto (horrifyingly affects a relatively small number of people).
edit: also, how does one track a chemical back to the producer? I mean, most X sold in America is in the form of colored and stamped pills, which I would think along with the specific impurity footprint as a cross-reference would make identifying them a relative cinch.
Also, tracing it is still going to be hard. It's notoriously difficult to get dealers to rat out bigger dealers all the way back to the producer, and if you're looking at maybe a 1 in a 1000 or 1 in 10000 bad pill scenario, and the kid who took the pill is dead... it's not going to be follow that back to the producer. A really smart producer would make a batch, move to a different area, make a batch, move again, etc. Once you've sold a few thousand pills to local bulk dealers, it'll be a while before you can do that again anyways, and you don't want to be in town if things go south.
There's also the issue of him and his friends having taken the pills 72 hours ago, no one being entirely sure whether they were blue or green under the lighting (especially if they'd used anything else prior), and especially if they had more than one pill design. Who had the pink one? Who had the orange one? Did anyone else have the one with a rabbit on it? Aside from the fact that all of his friends who ended up not in the hospital are going to deny having any involvement in the drug use whatsoever because at that point, buddy's dead. No reason to go to jail after the fact, right?
I'm thinking it'd be a pretty huge pain in the ass to trace. Especially if it's a relatively rare imperfection issue, which it'd have to be. The odds seem to be extremely low, but it happens enough. Know why I never got into E? My dad works in a hospital and as luck would have it, one of the guys he works with at the hospital had his kid rushed in at 5 AM with massive liver failure. The big problem with liver failure is that you can only transplant part of a liver, not the whole thing, and rejection rates are high, as are rates of complication (notably sepsis). Also, it's an incredibly poor way to die.
CUZ THERE'S SOMETHING IN THE MIDDLE AND IT'S GIVING ME A RASH
Either way, this is fascinating stuff and a strong argument against taking any substance, be it X or a chili hotdog, from an unknown source.
I don't know how you can get any better than this. Fuckin' Peter Jennings doing his thing. Great journalistic integrity in this one. There's no fear mongering bullshit nor is there a pro bias. It's just what we know about ecstasy, straight up.
It's also an entertaining watch so I recommend this doc to anybody who's even heard of ecstasy.
The number of cases versus the number of users is astonishingly small, in regards to liver failure as well as other severe toxic reactions. In that regard MDMA is safer than the vast majority of prescription drugs available. I'm not a major defender of the drug but objectively speaking, it's fairly safe in moderation. Larger numbers of people suffer severe toxic effects the first time they try alcohol.
Also, the only "chronic" user had only had 4 months history with the drug; it merely took some time for the liver to fail. All were "new" users in that regard. It's likely an issue of body chemistry interaction that catastrophically impacts the liver.
You can trace most ecstasy production to Western Europe and Israel; there's some batch production in the US but it's relatively insignificant. The most common adulterants are MDA (not significantly more dangerous than MDMA), DXM (more dangerous, but also used recreationally (the drinking of Robitussin) and can generally be determined through taste sense alone (you know if you just put a DXM pill in your mouth)) and PMA, which is significantly dangerous. For all the talk of impurities, generally you're getting MDMA or MDA; truly toxic pills are probably fewer than 1 in 1,000,000. (PMA is not a common additive.)
Again, it's extraordinarily rare for MDMA (or a pill posing as such) to kill someone; fewer than 10 deaths in the USA per year and that includes people who died of other causes who were found to have MDMA in their system. When someone is sickened dies, it's going to get out; MDMA is usually "branded" and people will either avoid it or follow it up the chain; it will always lead to Europe or Israel, almost without exception. You don't worry about the major traffickers being in town; they're never US citizens, anyway.
Again, I have to say that I'm not a major defender of the drug, but I do favor objectivity, and this type of talk is purely hypothetical fearmongering and extraordinarily rare. Generally people know exactly what "brand" they are taking, generally if they take many they're buying in bulk, even if not they are getting the same "type" unless you've got a very fancy dealer selling different varieties (it happens!)
People know. People talk. I've been to two parties where people died, a rave outside Albany, NY on New Year's Eve, 2000, and a Paul Van Dyk party at Twilo in New York City in July later that year where a Johns Hopkins medical student overdosed significantly. In both cases, people talked to the police, they discussed what they knew about what the individual had taken, etc. They're not going to prosecute their friends, and really, people are people, not monsters who won't snitch after a friend dies, especially E-tards.
I will say that in both cases the individual was solely responsible for their behavior and only the Twilo kid had taken ONLY MDMA (just an inhuman overdose of it, at a party that was 110 degrees and packed like sardines.)
That's horrible, but I'd wager it was legitimate MDMA, and a bad body chemistry reaction. People take risks every day; you're likely to die from one of many things you do. If you're particularly risk-averse, I would discourage you from experimenting with it. (I generally do so anyway.) But this is far from widespread; if you look at the deaths from alcohol poisoning, they far outweigh all deaths from MDMA since its invention in a single year.
The DEA guy makes me absolutely sick to my stomach.
Edit: Heh, All the "rave" people they introduced are people I know. Tommie Sunshine has DJed at my house before, Frankie Bones used to pick out records for me at Sonic Groove before it closed
There's this huge association of E and raves, and it's certainly not entirely misplaced, but I feel that it is hugely detrimental to electronic dance music, as people seem to think they have to go hand in hand...they don't, not by a long shot. I've been entirely sober for the vast, vast majority of my raving career. I love that music. It was never about the drugs.