Corey

How do people high on cocaine act? What are the symptoms?

Sam Winchester

It depends on how it is delivered into the body. You can either inject or smoke cocaine. If you inject it directly into the bloodstream, it goes straight to the brain within seconds. The rush caused by this can make some people vomit uncontrollably. The wave of euphoria doesn't last very long, though.

If it's smoked, the effects usually last longer (ten to fifteen minutes) but it also takes longer to reach a euphoric high (usually around two minutes).

The effects of cocaine can be numerous: Increased blood pressure, increased heart rate, euphoria, arrythmia, and in some cases paranoia, just to name a few.

Cocaine raises dopamine and serotonin levels in the pleasure centre of the brain. After the initial euphoria, users suffer depression, otherwise known as the "crash".

__________________

Don't unlock doors you're not prepared to go through.

SacredCircle

You can also snort cocaine. I don't know how long the high lasts when snorted, but from the parties I went to people would do a few lines every 20 minutes or so. There was incessant chatter from everyone who was high and constant "sniffing" and rubbing of noses. No one seemed to ever get tired and the next day was hell for them.

__________________

Olly Buckle

Really good cocaine makes you feel like God for five minutes, then keeps you awake for hours. Bad cocaine just keeps you awake. The constant "another line?" is chasing that five minutes, probably unsuccessfully. It makes the user selfish and greedy but does not interfere with the personality or outward appearance in the gross way that opiates do so that people don't realise and often get ripped off by cocaine users when they would just show a junkie the door. Best indicators, running nose, continuously and unconsciously rubbing or wiping nose, over talkative, over confident, very poor, talks big.

__________________
Unity will conquer, true love. The Fabulous Prince Buster

Read me at.
http://www.associatedcontent.com/join.html?refer=323686

Sam Winchester

Insufflation (the technical term for snorting) allows the drug to penetrate the blood-brain barrier quicker than it would by administering the drug orally. It usually creates a much faster onset. However, studies have shown that the time to reach peak subjective effects in cocaine administration was fifteen minutes for snorting, three for injection, and only one for smoking.

Cocaine is a psychoactive drug. Upon administration, it acts primarily on the central nervous system. It changes mood, behaviour, perception, and consciousness. It creates a euphoric feeling, which can last anywhere from ten minutes to several hours, depending on the purity, dosage, and administration technique. It raises dopamine and serotonin levels in the nucleus accumbens - the pleasure centre of the brain. As Olly said, you feel like a God. The reason why it was hell for them the next day is because "crashing" after Cocaine use is like going from the best day of your life to the worst in a blink of an eye. You crave the feeling again. You become depressed. Which is also why Cocaine is one of the most addictive drugs on the planet.

__________________

Don't unlock doors you're not prepared to go through.

Malone

You guys are funny.

__________________
There Is A Policeman Inside All Our Heads: He Must Be Destroyed

Shawn

No kidding. The proper answer anywhere else would be: "Do your own research." With a proper nudge in the right direction.

__________________
The most frightening part of leaving a parent's home, to me, is not knowing where one's own home is.

JosephB

I'd ask Robert Downey Jr. I'm sure he's acted on drugs plenty of times.

__________________
"The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources."
-- Albert Einstein

"I am really only interested in a fiction of miracles."
-- Flannery O'Connor

Foxee

Believe it or not the Net is a great resource for this. I had to have a character get high on a heroin-like drug and I know very little about drugs. I looked up what I wanted and found first-person accounts of what it was like to be high on a similar drug. That's all you really need...symptoms, timing, imagination.

__________________
By trying we can easily learn to endure adversity. Another man's, I mean. ~Mark Twain

JosephB

Yes. The net is a wonderful for the type of research where you have to get in someones head. I have a character who's been raped in the story I'm working on. I've read first person accounts, forum threads and even the poetry of rape victims. The later, I think, gave me the most insight into the emotions and frame of mind of the victims.

__________________
"The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources."
-- Albert Einstein

"I am really only interested in a fiction of miracles."
-- Flannery O'Connor

Mike C

That's me without cocaine.
I must have been unbearable when I was using. It's also known as the world's most expensive way of making yourself look stupid. But, I have to say, very moreish!

__________________
My writing
My Photo Blog
Web design for Writers
The Oddville Press

PSFoster

I haven't had much to do with coke users while they're using. I used to work A & D rehab, and I know they really are a pain in the ass when they're coming off of it.

I do know some meth addicts, and former meth addicts.

__________________
I'm too blessed to be stressed and too anointed to be disappointed.

TWRaven

It also depends on how much you snort, and how long you have been doing it. Addicts are just as ugly as any other drug addict. But for the occasional user, sometimes you can't even tell their high, if they have not overdone it. On a side note, it can make sex really fun, or overly frustrating.

oscar

It's usually all "me, me, me, me..." They talk their own BS, believe it, and expect you to too. They go after members of the opposite sex who they would normally never dare approach. They talk, and talk, and talk. Their pupils might appear huge.

Their car is amazing, their job has the best pay, is much better than yours, and they know all the important people, they are going places, they have been offered a recording contract, etc. etc. Words like arrogant, egotistical, and deluded come to mind. I've seen fairly nice people, who maybe exaggerate only a little now and then, turned into full blown, narcissistic, pathological liars over a few years.

However, despite all this, they never seem to have money for things other than drugs.

Kayleigh7

my dad was really aggressive and easily angered

__________________
I know what I'm doing may be dumb, I know I should not be staring at the sun; But the thought of you leads me to temptation. It's the same whatever side you're on, separated we are delicate and small; and the space between needs a retention.
-Leigh Nash (Ocean Sized Love)