They're using other drugs than marijuana, for sure.
Some of the addicts start with marijuana, because it is not a very "strong" or "intense" drug compared to heroin which some addicts may not be able to handle at first (nicotine is even worse... :roll: ). One of my old classmates who has been living in a drug rehabilitation center for the past year (as of now) told me that when he started using drugs (he also used heroin and other amphetamine-based drugs), he began with smoking marijuana.
I have also come across plenty of talk about the moderate to high amount of illegal goods being sold in the areas near where I live (slums), and the illegal transactions I hear the most about (next to kids being able to buy hard liquor from roadside stores) are those involving marijuana.
Like with any other addiction, the amount uses increases slowly and by the time the user realises there is a problem its often already too late.
Weed changes the brain response, and this change can become permanent.
This is all too true. I'll narrate a story about a drug-awareness seminar that came to my school around 2 weeks ago.
The speakers were 3 decent-looking men, who happen to be among a group that runs a drug rehabilitation center about 10km from my house. I was surprised that their drug awareness talk itself (not counting the introductory prayer / powerpoint slide) contained very little religious talk, which saves me the trouble of having to narrate it as realistic (non-religious) as possible. I am only familiar with the stories of two of the three men, since the other did not narrate much about himself.
One of the three men was a marijuana addict from the early '90s until around 2002. He had sampled amphetamine-based drugs and other variants, and was even offered by one of his friends to go on heroin as well, but he chose to stay on marijuana. At first, he would only smoke his "joints" occasionally, such as 1-3 times a week. When he tried to drop the habit after several years, he was unable to do so and experienced severe withdrawal symptoms whenever he would go for a week without the drug. I guess his dosage over time went beyond 'safe' limits.
The other man was a young husband, with two kids in elementary school at the time he began his marijuana addiction. Just like the other man, he was hooked to his addiction and would even sell his belongings in his house, just to be able to buy more marijuana for his drug use, until the point that his wife (his family is Catholic, just like the majority of people in the Philippines, although I am not) kicked him out of their house. It ended up affecting his relationship with his family and he was only able to restore things to normal after entering rehabilitation.
The pattern is the same; once they got hooked on the addiction to excessive marijuana, they were powerless to stop, to the point where it affected their lives.
If those two adult men suffered such effects, then I sincerely pity those wayward teenagers whose drug addiction(s) ruined their academics (the Philippines has more than half the population below the poverty line) and led them to be future criminals, thieves, rapists, and street people instead of having a proper future.
Guests: 338
Hidden: 0
Users: 0