Drug Abuse

4. Research Findings: The Beginnings and Effects of Drug Use

NUMEROUS QUESTIONS ARISE WHEN CONSIDERING ILLICIT DRUG USE. How do people begin to use marihuana, the psychedelics, or the opiates? How do they get the drugs, use them, and pay for them? What, generally, are the effects of use? How do these effects impact on the user's psyche, on his close relation ships, on his capacity to work and function socially? And, above all, how does he manage   if he does-to use the drug reasonably and in a controlled fashion?

The preceding chapter has offered quantitative answers to these questions. This chapter and the next approach them qualitatively by letting the users speak for themselves. They consist mainly of excerpts from interviews in which the interviewers (I) have asked the respondents (R) a variety of questions about their use of illicit drugs. A few of the responses have been edited in order to clarify the meaning, and in all of them proper names have been changed. For the users of all three types of drugs the questions focus on the following general topics: (1) beginning use (in the case of the psychedelics, the history of early use); (z) effects of use; and (3) social sanctions and rituals that helped to control use. Unless otherwise stated, all excerpts apply to controlled users. This chapter deals with the first two topics. Chapter 5 presents findings on rituals and sanctions.

Marihuana

The following excerpts illustrate the types of responses given by our marihuana subjects to interviewers' questions about how they began to use the drug, how it affected them generally, and specifically how it affected their work and personal relationships.

BEGINNING USE. One of the many confirmations of the representative nature of our analytical sample came from our subjects' descriptions of begin ning use. Twenty-five years after the publication of Howard S. Becker's "Be coming a Marihuana User" (1953), these users reaffirmed his observations and upheld ours. Despite the enormous estimated increase in marihuana use since Becker's day-since then about 57 million have used-the beginning users expressed great apprehension about this first step. They were not immune to the general public's concerns about what the drug might do to them (that is, the possibility of addiction or derangement) or unaware of and unconcerned about its illicitness, as the following exchange reveals:

I: How did you feel about marihuana prior to using it?

R: I was scared.

I: In any particular form?

R: I didn't really know what it was; I had just heard everyone talking about it, and I had heard that smoke was so bad and this and that, and how people that have family problems do it. But I didn't want anyone to think I was shocked, because then they'd think I was an old grandmother, and I wasn't. But I was really scared for a while.

1: When did your fears begin diminishing?

R: Probably when I smoked myself.

The beginning user looked for a guide to show him what to do and how to do it correctly-and safely. In this search the neophyte tended to overestimate greatly his more experienced peers' understanding of the drug. Most younger users, too, consistently overestimated the extent of others' use. And my staff and I found, as Becker had found earlier, that most beginning users did not get "high" the first time, often to their discomfiture.

R: The first time I tried it? It was in my sophomore year of high school and a friend-oh, no, my brother-gave me my first joint. He didn't want to either. I had to force it out of him.

I: How did you go about that?

R: Well, I knew that he smoked, and I'd wanted to try it, but I didn't know where to look, and I didn't know anything. And he didn't want to give it to me because then he said it would come back that he was the one who turned me on. He really_ didn't want to give it to me, but finally he did. I said that I'd get it somewhere else if he didn't give it to me, so he just gave it to me, and I smoked with a friend-well, not even such a good friend-I don't even think we got off. No, I'm sure we didn't: I remember now. But I didn't want to seem completely stupid to him, so I just kind of acted like I knew what I was talking about.

Usually the first experience did not bring much pleasure:

I: Do you remember enjoying it?

R: No, I didn't like it. I mean, I don't know if I got high or not, but to me it didn't taste so hot.

Nonsmokers often had a particularly difficult time.

I: On how many occasions did you use marihuana before you experienced a high?

R: Uh, probably ten or twelve times, and I felt as if the reason was that I didn't really know what the smoking was all about. As I said, I have no experience with cigarettes, and inhaling was a foreign issue to me. If I did it, it hurt. And that's why I didn't get off -'cause I didn't know what smoking was about.

Another nonsmoker's patience was finally rewarded:

I: You said that it was about six or seven times before you did get high?

R: Oh, it was more than that. About fifty times.

I: How come you kept smoking it?

R: I dunno-I just did. I don't really know why I did.

I: But the f first time you actually got the high was when you were trying hashish?

R: Yeah-well, I had smoked hash before, but all of a sudden it just hit me.

It was our impression that the last user, in spite of his determination to get high, had had considerable unconscious anxiety about the whole process, and that his tenacious assault upon his fears was characteristic of his personality structure and general behavior. Others worked through their anxiety in different ways, again in consonance with their personality structure and behavior in situations other than drug use. One cautious and methodical young man put it this way:

R: There were a couple of people in my dorm who were using it, and they offered me some, and I didn't get off on it the first few times.

I: Had they offered it to you before the time you accepted?

R: Not directly. It had been passed around in situations where I'd been, but I would just let it go by, and it hadn't been in any sense forced on me, it was just there and then I finally wanted to pick it up. Curiosity really.

Another young woman whose everyday life was characterized by keeping herself within a middle ground, neither too loose nor too tight, said in answer to the question, "Can you remember the circumstances of your first use?"

R: Yeah, very well. I was with some friends, and someone came in, a friend of the people I was seeing. I didn't know him, and everyone was smoking-I knew they smoked, but I was very skeptical. I was very conservative about it, and I still didn't really know what it was all about. I still thought that it was dangerous. I wasn't really persuaded to smoke, I just watched everybody. I saw nobody going mad or anything; they all were laughing and having a good time. So I said well, OK I smoked and I got high. I liked the high and I smoked.

The popularity of marihuana can act as a deterrent to beginning use for those of an independent spirit who automatically on personality grounds resist becoming passive followers. This was true of more of our subjects than we had anticipated, particularly those whose resistance was buttressed by social factors.

R: I was initiated into drugs, into marihuana, by my brother; I always had a sort of negative attitude toward drugs when I was in high school. Some of my friends smoked grass. And they said, "Come on, get involved in it." They were really "hippie" types [laugh]. When I say that, it's a nonderogatory term; but it was pseudo-hippie. That was in 1969 when the peace movement was very active. They were together with a purple light bulb and glasses and a poster on the wall, and they were really into the "drug culture," sitting around in a circle, "right on," things like that, so I had a negative attitude toward it because I just thought it was so plastic. I think there was also a certain part of my Catholic upbringing that was involved, with its "Don't do anything." I don't know if that's true or not, but I think that definitely influenced me, so I just didn't want to get involved in it. Then when I finally did, it was in a totally different situation, and I enjoyed it. I got involved with my girlfriend, at that time, in a more real sort of situation.

Although several subjects reported minor anxiety attacks when first experiencing intoxication, these passed quickly. The only user who reported a serious disaster from his first experience presented it as a joke:

I: How old were you? How did it happen?

R: I know that when I was in high school I smoked pot a couple of times, but I don't have any clear recollection of that. I didn't get stoned. The first time after that 1 was working in this car dealership in Boston, and this guy I used to work with said to me one day during lunch, "Do you want to go out and smoke a couple of joints on the roof?" And I said, "Yeah, sure." And about three days later we did it again, and I lost my job because I got so blown away. I was moving a car from the roof down, they had a ramp that you had to drive down. Well, I just couldn't control my faculties. I was bringing this car down from the body shop to the waiting customer, and I took up two poles on the way down. And I completely wiped out the passenger side that had just been replaced. Well, the hubcap got down slightly before I did [laugh]. I came down there and he said, "Pick up your check," and that was that. That was the first time, other than the couple of days before when I got stoned; there really wasn't much to it-you know, the first time.

It was clear to the interviewer that this subject was well aware of the danger of a drug experience that resulted in such loss of control. His response also bore out the fact that beginning users have the most acute difficulties with control, particularly when driving. Experienced users may have driving problems too, but they tend to be of a different sort, similar to those of alcohol users-problems of risk-taking and overestimation of control rather than of lack of awareness.

Most parents have great difficulty in sharing their children's marihuana use (see chapter 1). Joining in an illicit activity is hard enough, but the reversal of the usual relationship between the experienced parent-teacher and the inexperienced child-learner may be extremely complex, especially because the intoxication experience often results in loss of control and even helplessness. Here is an excellent description of that confounding situation.

R: My mother smoked marihuana one time. I-my brother and I-had three joints and we knew she wanted to try it. So I said, "Ma, I got some now; do you wanma try it?" And she said, "What?" And I said, "Some grass." And she did try it and she hadda do it before her husband got home. And he'd have been home in about two and a half hours, so it took us about fifteen or twenty minutes to smoke, and she said she didn't get high. But then she went into her room, and when I opened the door to see what she was up to, she was reading a book upside down-not reading at all, just pretending to do something so she could just be alone and feel what it felt like to be stoned on marihuana. And then I closed the door because she asked me to get out, and then she put the TV on, and I heard the TV on, so I went back in. I was really interested to know how she'd react. So she had been watchin' television for about ten minutes and the picture was all blurred, it wasn't even there so she didn't really care to watch television or read. She just wanted to laugh and be alone, so I did leave her alone after that, and my brother and I could hear her, in the parlor, laughing. I thought that was good. But she never did it with us again. I believe she's done it, y'know, after that. I mean, with her girlfriends, because I know her girlfriends do it. They're older women, and they ask me for joints once in a while.

GENERAL EFFECTS OF MARIHUANA USE. The overwhelming majority of our sample reported positive effects from marihuana, though few were as ecstatic as this user:

I: Did you enjoy it the first time you used it?

R: I loved it, I loved it, I loved it.

I: When did you next try it?

R: Next weekend, I loved it. I have ever since.

All but two of our subjects (and they will be described later) insisted that they had always been in control of their marihuana use. For example:

R: There was no time I ever had to need a high, or, y'know, just do something daily because it had to be done. I'd get high if I wanted to, then the next few hours I'd light up a joint. You know, it's under control. It's never a need or urge that I have to satisfy. Yeah, tried speed, tried acid, never got too involved for the reason that it's too exhausting-and I just don't like doing things that are gonna tie me up and knock me down.

Most of our subjects were special-occasion users. Regardless of their specific frequency of use, these subjects indicated that smoking marihuana was associated with certain activities. They insisted that the change in perception when intoxicated heightened their enjoyment of these activities.

1: Are there any activities that the use of marihuana makes easier for you?

R: Living my life [laugh]. I think that most of the things I do that make me feel good, I would just as soon do stoned as straight. I mean, if I'm in some kind of athletic stuff-occasionally I get together with some friends and play touch football-that's just as much fun or more fun stoned. Chess is definitely more fun stoned. In fact, that's one of the reasons I got into chess. There's a puerile element to most games that I just don't get off on, or else it's really rigid. I'll play hearts sometimes, and I enjoy hearts, but it's a very cerebral sort of enterprise, it really is. But chess, once you know the rules and a couple of openings and stuff, chess is largely intuitive. And that's what getting stoned is about. It's opening the third eye, just sort of increasing that capacity, and that's why I like to play chess stoned. So I guess, in general, things that involve intuition are most fun stoned.

Perhaps the most frequent effect reported was the increased enjoyment of eating, the well-known "munchies."

1: What do you particularly like about marihuana, the marihuana high?

R: You know, everything is much more enjoyable, stuff like that. Eat a hell of a lot more, get the munchies all the time. I don't really know. Kills a lot of time.

Many planned their use around this activity:

1: Do you ever smoke marihuana before dinner?

R: Once in a while. If I'm going out to a restaurant and I really want to chow down and get my money's worth, I'll smoke a couple of "jays" before I go out. And that way I know I'm going to get my money's worth.

Another frequent report was that the changed perception enhanced users' enjoyment of sexual activity.

R: I find that sex is better when I'm stoned. I: How come? What's the difference?

R: Well, because I can do more things with grass. I can, well, when I'm straight there's just too much goin' on, you know, in my head. If I wanted to kiss a girl while I was straight, there'd be too much going on in my head for me to really get into the kiss, whereas with grass I can get into the kiss much more easily. I can really feel the kiss, the energy in the mouth, and that's all I feel. Like a blending of energies ... more into body feelings rather than thinking, "Well, am I doing this right, will she like this, will I like this?" Everything just happens naturally, and you are only in that experience, not in another and not in your head. You can even feel what the other person is feeling, I mean in her body. You can feel with your body when her body is close to orgasm and then you begin to feel it too. There's something like a merging of feelings, body feelings, and every touch, every movement, is like magnified a hundred times. Touches even on the hands or even toes become intense. The only problem is that usually after such an intense experience I just want to fall asleep. But that's OK, too. There's this sense of timelessness. Nothing exists but this moment.

This description of enhanced enjoyment, which was echoed in one form or another by most subjects, seemed to the interviewers to be accurate. But some other reports of pleasurable experiences seemed to indicate that the users were having difficulties.

For example: " I think I use it in three ways. Be a big shot. Next I use it for hiding myself; if I've got a problem, I cut it out right then and there. And the third thing is enjoying myself. Going out for a ride and smoking marihuana and laughing and stuff. You know, you go down the corner of Boston Common and run a while, or get high and run track or something; that's all it is. That's what I do for enjoyment. Something to hide away from." In other areas of his life this young man showed a tendency to self-consciousness that resulted in defensiveness and a fear of exposure. This tendency seemed to be enhanced by his marihuana use, controlled though it was.

Another example of drug use reported as pleasurable was even more alarming:

R: It's easier to go to school stoned. It's just easier to space out the classes more. You're just less conscious of the busywork and the bullshit. You just sit there and leave your body there if you want. I used to go to math class at two o'clock, my last class, and just fall asleep. I'd never done that before, sleep in the afternoon or sleep in public or sleep in school, and I'd just go in there, fall asleep, and when I heard the bell, I'd wake up, and instantly I'd be awake. It was as if I was in alpha, meditating. Oh, that freaked me out, 'cause I'd sleep through the class, but I'd wake up instantly at the bell, I mean wide awake, more awake than when I came into the class. And I'm just able to daydream in that class. Draw pictures. And I'm also more able to listen to the teacher. If 1 want to tune into the teacher and it's noisy and I'm stoned, I become a better receptor.

The last report seemed alarming not just to the research team but to other subjects as well. One user expressed his general concern as follows:

R: I think that [it's dangerous] for people getting involved with drugs, especially young people beginning high school. I know that when I talk to my brother [and his friends], they tell me some pretty incredible things about drug abuse in high school. When I went to high school I was a fairly serious student, but they say that the majority of kids that go to school go to school stoned in the morning. That's like being an alcoholic. And I know you cannot go to school stoned and learn as much as you would have if you weren't. It's just sort of a way to avoid the unpleasantness of school. But it really is a type of escape. I believe that. As far as hard drugs are concerned, in high schools it's just too tempting for kids to become involved in this totally new experience, in a way, and [they] give it more credit than it's really worth. You can read so many articles about pro-drug attitudes-that there is truly something beyond the physical aspect of it-that these kids will try it and it's great and they get really into it. And all of a sudden it's a new way to become socially involved with different people, which isn't what those kids need. The same thing with grass, I guess. All of a sudden there's a key, and they're involved in it, and it just can take away a lot.

Only a few of our subjects (41%) expressed overt difficulties with marihuana use, and most of them tended to blame the drug's illicitness rather than the drug itself.

1: Have you ever had any difficulties or adverse experiences with marihuana?

R: Only when I'm high or if I try to smoke in a public place like on the street. If I'm alone or with friends at somebody's house it's OK, but I get really, really nervous to be outside with it, even when I'm with friends. My friends don't seem to mind, but me, every time I see a police car or someone looks at me funny, I think they know I'm high or I'm carrying something and I get really paranoid. If I'm high on alcohol, I never get those feelings. I can even be staggering around a little or talking funny, but I never worry about it, I just enjoy it. But the fact that you're not supposed to possess grass or use it makes me afraid that someone is going to do something about it-like a cop.

The fear of being caught by the police falls into the same category:

R: Yeah, I've gone places with him in my car. I'll go some place and there will be roaches all over the car. Or I'm afraid someone will open the glove compartment and there will be an ounce of pot in there or something.

In addition, many of our younger subjects were afraid of being caught by their parents:

R: I came home one day and I'd just done a dope deal or something, and I left a few ounces of pot hanging around on the top of my bureau 'cause I just went out to the store to get something and I didn't figure he'd be back, and I left the door open and he came in and saw it . . . "Oh, what's this?" Well, I said, "It's not mine," 'cause it wasn't, 'cause I'd sold it [laughs] ... And he said, "Well, what are you doing with it?" and I said, "Just holding it for somebody. " "You're holding it for somebody?" he said, and I said, "Yeah, he'll be here in twenty minutes to pick it up." And sure enough in twenty minutes they came and picked it up ... so I solved that one. So after that he just said, "Do you use that stuff?" and I said, "Well, yeah, I've tried it." "Do you use it a lot?" I said, "No." I didn't use it a lot ... and I didn't see that much wrong with it anyway ... and a few other times that we've talked about it, he told me that he used to smoke. I don't know if he used to use it, but he smoked it from time to time when he was younger. He used to live in Texas and I guess there are places where it was just growing! So he didn't think it was all that horrible. At that point I'm sure that the reason he felt that way about me using it was because it was an illegal drug and it could put me in jail. But I know how he feels now: he feels that it's a really stupid law.

The worst effect of marihuana use described by 4 (18%) users was a highly agitated state, usually defined as becoming "paranoid."

1: Did you ever have any adverse or unpleasant experiences with marihuana?

R: Yeah, I've become extremely paranoid at times, yeah. I was riding my motorcycle.

1: Did that stop you from using it?

R: No, I realized it was me, the same way as I had bad experiences on MDA. I realized it was me it was coming from, not the drug.

Two reported giving up marihuana for a brief time after such experiences. However, two other subjects wanted to continue use and tried to figure out under what conditions they could do so without experiencing the feared reaction.

R: I don't know if it's physiological or mental, but I can't do grass a lot and enjoy it because it gets me nervous, and I don't like being nervous. And it was hard for me to admit that. We have a group here, and I finally laid it on them, one time when I got high and I was really, really uptight. I was sitting there and I was almost at the point of I don't know what ... I was getting really upset at telling them this 'cause I had never told them that I get paranoid ... I find it much easier to control hallucinogens than it is to control grass. Grass is almost always guaranteed to get me uptight. If it got where I enjoyed it, I would do it as much as I felt like doing it. 'Cause I see where people have it as a very large part of their lives, but yet it doesn't rule them; people I know who are therapists, they'll get high excessively, but yet still are doing viable things and enjoying it. I feel sort of bad that I can't do it that much, but I just have to live with" it. But I would say that if I could get things straight, I'd probably smoke a little bit more. It is enjoyable when you do enjoy it. I've really dug it at times.

In a sense such subjects use this reaction as a further mechanism, albeit a shaky and dangerous one, to promote control.

EFFECT OF USE ON WORK AND RELATIONSHIPS. With the marked excep tion of the young man who lost his job in the garage, as well as of some students whose schoolwork was affected, our subjects denied that marihuana had had any definite influence on their work life. They also did not feel that it had influenced their relationships with people negatively. (This response was in sharp contrast to that of our opiate-using subjects.) The most common effect reported was a bonding of friendships. Subjects contended that the experience of using together enhanced a feeling of closeness and solidarity:

R: We all worked together in this drug-counseling place. And, of course, because of our jobs we weren't supposed to use drugs, but of course we did. Soft drugs. We were all really different types and I think there would have been a lot more abrasiveness in our work together if we hadn't had this experience of coming together and getting stoned together. We even used to do it after hours in the counseling office! But it's like, well, grass breaks down your own defenses, so you can see through the defenses of other people. You can see, well, something like the core of their being. So that if Jim talks too much to people on the hotline or if Alice grabs all the phone calls before anyone else can get a chance to, well, you don't get so angry at them because you know you've had these times when you were high and relaxed together. And all those annoying personal habits either weren't there or just didn't bother you as much.

R: It's like you can develop a real sense of trust with people you get stoned with. Everybody gets a little whacked out, things are really funny that usually aren't, people's associations get really loose, but if you're high, too, you can understand them. I thing that you need the same sort of trust to get really high with people that they say you need for an LSD trip. And if you get a little anxious or paranoid, there's always someone there to say something funny or tell you.it's OK. I mean, it's the kind of experience that whatever you say or do is OK. I don't find that to be true in other situations. I feel closer to people I've gotten stoned with than to people I haven't.

Users often claimed that the drug itself produced this closeness. The research team, however, believed that it resulted from the sharing of an illicit and pleasurable experience, which gave the sense of being on the inside of something special and naughty that was not shared by the straight world.

R: I remember we used to feel really superior to people who weren't high or who had never smoked. We felt we understood things that they didn't. Well, it was a sort of religious trip we were into and we felt that when we were stoned we were close to God or the life source or whatever you want to call it, and people who were pot virgins never experienced that. Well, maybe they did; I mean, you read all these things about Indian yogis and whatnots who are high all the time. But we felt we got a glimpse of that experience when we were high and we could return to it whenever we wanted to, by smoking. No struggles, you know. No renunciation, no chanting, just light up a "jay"!

Marihuana use certainly provided a special topic of conversation. It made the user feel like a member of a club.

R: I talked about drug use a lot with some friends, maybe because most of them get high, you know, that's why. If I hung around with friends who didn't take drugs, I wouldn't talk about it, but most of the people I know do use drugs.

On the other hand, marihuana use was not approved by all groups. Many of our subjects reported estrangement from old friends who did not use, because the users feared criticism and disapproval:

R: I began using with new friends because none of my other friends would want to smoke.

I: Did you ever ask your friends if they wanted to try?

R: No, not really, because I knew what they'd answer. I don't think I wanted so many of them to know.

I: Why?

R: Because they'd probably be disappointed in me.

I: You mean, be disappointed that you'd be different or changed?

R: Not so much that I'd be different, but I'd be taking drugs, and they'd say, "You don't need that, you can be happy without it."

Another issue mentioned by at least 23% of our subjects was dealing (selling drugs). Most experienced users deal at one time or another. Usually this is not for profit (although many try to get a free ounce or so for themselves out of it) but for convenience and solidarity. If someone can make a good buy in the world of marihuana users, he is expected to let his friends in on the transaction. He thus becomes a dealer. Being a dealer, he can also make new acquaintances and develop a certain prestige:

I: You would just deal marihuana with your friends?

R: Yeah. Occasionally I'd deal to an outside person, but mainly with friends. It was exciting.

I: Dealing for profit, or dealing to cover costs, or ...

R: Dealing for kicks. I mean, for the excitement, and the macho, and the ego. I was the dealer and my name was known nationally. I was so proud when I met some girl for the first time and became really close, and after a while she said, "I've heard of you," and that was really an ego thing.

Psychedelics

The psychedelics differ from marihuana (and also from the opiates) in combining three different characteristics: they are nonaddictive; they are high-impact drugs; and users quickly develop a tolerance to them.

All of our clinical evidence supports a fact that has now become well known: few individuals continue heavy (frequent) use of psychedelic drugs over a prolonged period of time (Becker 1967; McGlothlin & Arnold 1971; Bunce 1982); in fact, no such users appeared in the reported sample. Of the controlled psychedelic subjects, 56% reported daily or weekly use as their highest frequency. The mean length of most intensive use for these subjects was only 13.78 weeks (S. D. = 14.14, range = 1-52), compared with 86.46 weeks (S. D. = 107.06, range = 4.5-364) for controlled marihuana users and 48.11 weeks (S.D. = 56.46, range = 1-260) for controlled opiate users. Some of our subjects, however, referred to transitory periods of heavy use as a kind of "addiction. "

1: How about in terms of yourself, have you ever been drug-dependent or drug-addicted?

R: Yes. I was, maybe, drug-addicted. I guess there was a sort of psychological dependency. When I was in high school, I was tripping on acid two or three times a week. That was when I was about sixteen.

I: How long did that go on?

R: The heavy part of it went on for two or three months.

This self-definition of "addiction" was based not on any physiological or even psychological assessment of dependency but rather on an assessment of subjective feeling. Psychedelic use is an experience with an astonishingly high impact, whether positive or negative:

R: We prepared for our first acid trip. I: What did you do?

R: Well, first of all, I trusted him to be my guide, sort of. I had read that you needed a guide, a guru, in case anything bad happened. Well, we were in love, and he had tripped a few times, and he had never had any bad experiences, he said.

I: What did you do?

R: We went to his house in the country. We ate bee pollen before we dropped the acid tabs.

I: Bee pollen?

R: Yeah. I didn't know, but Joe said that acid eats up the B vitamins in your system, and bee pollen would protect us from that.

I: I see.

R: We spent some time together first, getting close to each other. We braided each other's hair. We took a blanket and walked about a mile into the woods, to a very sunny spot surrounded by rocks and trees. Oh, this acid, one of Joe's friends had already tried it and he said it was very gentle, good for a first trip. He said the trip would last a few hours, so we dropped it in the late morning so we could enjoy it in the afternoon and come down that night in the country house where no one else would be around. And we didn't have to work the next day, so I wasn't worried about getting too ...

I: What happened?

R: Oh, it was lovely, just lovely. At first, for about an hour, nothing happened, and I thought, Oh, this isn't working, maybe something's wrong with me. But then I noticed how beautiful and how sort of real the rays of sunlight on the rocks were. It was like I'd never seen sunlight before. It looked like rays of butterscotch. And the little animals, grasshoppers and squirrels and birds, came out, and it was like they weren't afraid of us because we were so at peace, and they knew we wouldn't hurt them. I felt at one with nature. It's something I've looked for since then but have never experienced again. And we looked into each other's eyes and we were friends and we weren't afraid and we made love, there on the blanket in the woods.

The negative experiences were equally intense: I: What were your bad trips like?

R: Very paranoid, just got very paranoid, and I wouldn't go near anybody, and I'd feel freaked out by everybody, and I would think something was happening which wasn't. At one point, I thought-I was at this party and I was tripping and I had a bad trip- I thought I was supposed to fight all these people. It was, it was a really bad trip.

Not only is it impossible to sustain such levels of stimulation, but the experience soon becomes repetitious (Zinberg, Jacobson & Harding 1975). In addition, tolerance develops quickly, which adds to the user's assessment of himself as becoming addicted.

R: I developed a very high tolerance to psychedelics at that point because I was using them so frequently, and to such a degree where I could, you know, like right now, I think if I took half a tab of acid, I'd go way up there. It would take me maybe five or six, and one time I took twenty tabs.

Once they had built up tolerance, our subjects found they could control the effects of tripping in order to deal with commonplace circumstances. Until then, however, none of them, in contrast to the users or marihuana and the opiates, could conceive of working or carrying out other general activities while using the drug.

EARLY PSYCHEDELIC USE. Before ig6o the psychedelics had been used experimentally as an adjunct to psychotherapy, as a treatment for alcoholism, and as a method 0f sensitizing therapists to the nuances of psychological disruption. Such experiments had gone on for years without causing undue anxiety, but 0f course they had been carried out in medical and other highly controlled settings that almost automatically provided defined limits. A great change occurred in the early 1960s when Timothy Leary, with his "tune in, turn on, and drop out" slogan, touched off more general consumption of these drugs. Their use spread with amazing rapidity, especially among students, for they promised a great religious experience, a sense of oneness with the universe, and insight into oneself. At the same time, of course, they threatened to bring a freak-out, a bad trip, a lasting psychosis, or a genuinely irreversible personality change.

Because our project was based in Cambridge and the Greater Boston area, where Timothy Leary had launched his "crusade," we interviewed several users who had known Leary and begun their psychedelic use with him. Excerpts from their responses t0 our questions will illustrate the nature 0f use in the Leary era as well as the continuing influence 0f that era and the subsequent development 0f different ways 0f thinking about use.

Even the earliest users, in the throes of joining a social crusade with spiritual and political overtones, were searching for evidence to counter the general public's fears about psychedelics, fears that the users loudly decried.

R: Of course, I had some hesitation about taking it at that time, but I soon became aware of the fact that there was little basis to my fear. Right in this house I had Tim Leary come in and one of the experts down at Harvard Medical School-experts in this field-who was interested to see what the drugs did to chromosomes. He persuaded me to invite Leary here to have his and our chromosomes tested, and out of the four of us who gave our blood for this purpose, on a kind of blind basis, the only one who showed any abnormal number of breakages in the chromosomes was the only one who had never taken any of these drugs. My friends, when I told them this story, they said, "Oh, we ought to promote LSD as something that improves your chromosomes, 'cause Tim's were the best of all."

Another characteristic of the early use of psychedelics, which was far less evident with marihuana and hardly existed with the opiates, was the development of an ideological position. Users of psychedelics were not simply smoking

a joint, they were becoming part of the enlightenment. This view of use came at least in part from Leary and his influential outpourings.

I: Before you tried hallucinogens, what did you know about them?

R: Well, all I knew was what I'd read about them, and I took a very dim view of it. It seemed to me silly to think that a drug could touch off a religious experience, and this is what Tim Leary was telling us. He told us about his convicts that he was giving it to, and he said they were talking like medieval mystics, and this made me a little skeptical. But here I was supposed to be a big expert in the field of psychology of religion, and here were claims about it, and I felt that I shouldn't come to premature conclusions without taking it myself, and that was my chief motivation.

These strong ideological convictions helped the individual overcome his anxiety about us and face up to the "straight" society's disbelief that such a drug experience could be interesting and even important.

R: I'd read in the papers about acid-and in magazines and stuff like that, usually Life magazine-and about how people's chromosomes were being this and that. There was some pretty scary publicity about it. It struck me that people were probably fooling around with their fundamental chemistry, you know. And this particular guy did it, and then told me about it, and it didn't seem to me that he was changed. In fact, he seemed better. It was very important to him. It was probably the most important thing in his life, by a long shot. And since he was that close a friend, I was open to him.

There is little doubt that Lester Grinspoon and James Bakalar (1979) were right when they noted that the early users of psychedelic drugs were frustrated by the public's failure to take seriously their positive feelings about the inner change that resulted from the drug experience. One of our subjects stated it as follows:

R: Oh, yes, yes, I did enjoy my first trip. Even though it was an ordeal in ways, and I can't imagine anybody wanting to take a trip on LSD without a good reason for it, any more than I can imagine going to the '   dentist for fun. But it was not only good things for me that were valuable, it gave me insight into the value of the drug. In thinking about this school situation during the trip, it occurred to me that if the . president of the institution could give LSD t0 all 0f his faculty, his' problems would be over. But, when the trip was over, suddenly I realized that something had happened to my animosity. My hostility had about 90% drained away, and I haven't stayed awake a minute sine then, worrying about that situation. S0 that was maybe the high point of the trip.

The fervent anti-drug propaganda of the 1960s that was aimed at discouraging use of LSD was not particularly successful. The dire warnings that LSD caused physical damage (which turned out not to be true) and the made;„,,,, up stories about users being blinded by staring at the sun did not always frighten potential users.

1: Had you read about LSD prior to using it?

R: Several times, yeah. From all kinds 0f viewpoints. I'd read a lot of bullshit. I'd heard about these people blinded by it watching the sun. and heard that was all bullshit. The chromosome thing turned out to be pretty much bullshit. And I'd read a lot of Tim Leary who seems to have-I don't really agree with all of his things, but at the time his kind of movement that he was the head 0f was pretty important to me. It was more all-encompassing than the resistance movement, which only seemed to be extremely political. I was kind 0f getting disenchanted with just changing the system. I thought changing consciousness had something to do with it. I was really getting into Leary's philosophy.

Users were affected by anti-drug propaganda, but instead 0f being turned away from the psychedelics they tended to idealize their use.

R: I feel I owe a tremendous debt to LSD. Um, I think that it helped to sensitize me to certain things about myself, once I was ready to be sensitized. It's sort of a chicken-and-egg thing; that is, I suppose that some of what happened to me would have happened if I'd beer straight, but I really think that there's something about drug use intelligent drug use, that leads to the necessity to face up to certain parts of oneself, or myself, with greater clarity and greater force than might have been true otherwise. It's the whole question of being jived and the whole question of putting on airs and of pretending to be other than what one is. It's just much, much harder to pretend when there_ are psychedelics involved than when not.

Instead of recognizing that use was an interesting experience that some people might like but most would not risk, the users themselves became committed and active proselytizers.

R: I was more advanced in drug use than the rest of the group. I was out of the group, like. I used to get a high sensation about it. They'd say, "What are you using that shit for?" Weirdos. And I'd say, "Shut up, you don't know what you're missing." So I got a few people to get high, and they did psychedelics with me, mostly mescaline, and they liked it, really liked it.

Besides idealizing psychedelics, many users became extremely moralistic about their use.

I: I vaguely remember your mentioning before that acid for you meant deciding to do some thinking work, as opposed to just getting high and having a good time. Is that fairly common?

R: Yeah, it is for a lot of people I know. I mean, it's hard to get high and have a good time on acid. It really is hard. It's strenuous work.

R: I very rarely pleasure-trip. I usually do psychedelics when I have something I want to work out. Sometimes I pleasure-trip. It's a definite aid to my personal growth. I probably trip once or twice a month. Prior to tripping, I do needs assessment. What's my need in relation to the drug? I want to make sure it's a good reason if-I don't do psychedelics when I feel I need to escape because that's when I know I won't have a good trip. To make sure if I need a recovery period, like if I'm going to have time or not, I'm very ... Sometimes I'm affronted by my sense of responsibility, and it bothers me [laugh]. But, yeah, I'm very careful that there's enough time to do it right, and I'm not going to interrupt the pleasure of that trip. I usually get off late afternoon, you know, to experience that change into night. I'm basically a night person. I like tripping at night. I never trip alone.

I: Is there anyone in particular whom you'll trip with?

R: Not constantly. There are certain people that I have, that I know, that I trip with, but not necessarily one in particular or two in particular. But it's always a constant set of people that I trip with.

I: How large is that?

R: Probably ten people.

Words such as "sacred" and "sacrament" were prevalent in the drug culture.

R: I wouldn't use in the city or with people whose vibes I wasn't sure about, with people whom I got bad vibes with. To me LSD is almost a sacred thing; you should take it in a natural setting, somewhere where , you're with the earth.

Many actually tried to organize a church. They extolled the psychotherapeutic value of the experience in cataclysmic terms.    R: I totally freaked out on LSD. But to me it was the best thing that ever happened.

I: What do you mean?

R: It seemed like the therapy that John Lennon went through with Janoff, whatever they call that. It seemed like the process of bringing you back to your childhood, bringing you back to your instincts. It took Janoff two years to pull that off with his questions and answers. It took me two hours getting high off that LSD. My whole existence was wiped out. I ' didn't know my name. Most of this, what I'm telling you now, is from accounts of what people tell me because I was unconscious of it. I took this LSD when I was inside the city area, and the energy was built up. And it was those hang-ups I mentioned to you before-my parents and my sexual hang-up-and I totally erupted in this guy's room. Just vomiting and throwing things and screaming, and they took me outside and walked me through the snow. I remember I thought I was Jesus Christ expounding to all the people. I really was yelling a bunch of nonsense. I'd no idea what I was yelling, and I came back to my room and I tried to rape this girl. People stopped me, but I saw this girl and I said, "Do you want to ball me?" And I grabbed her. Then when I was coming down, I saw that it was my paranoia with my parents and my frustration over being a virgin that brought it all on. Also, I realized what an ego trip I was on and realized that I was living in an illusion that I was not even aware of. I really thought-the way that I woke up from that acid-I never felt worse in my life.

Because these therapeutic expectations were highly exaggerated, many users were disappointed in the results of their drug use.

R: Um, it was preplanned in that I had been reading about some other people's psychedelic experiences and how they had gotten into really heavy places, like getting back to the moment when they were born, that sort of thing. And I thought, wow, I'd really like to trip and try to concentrate on getting back to the moment when I was born. Of course, what happened was that the trip brought nothing like that whatsoever, but that was kind of the impetus behind it. And I first realized that by reading something, it was possible to get somewhere more important on psychedelics than I realized before.

I: And so you were really setting out to do some work on this? R: Yeah.

The crash from excessive expectations often led to painful and rather hollow mouthings of a religious nature. The decision to turn to Eastern religions and mysticism came partly from these disappointments. Partly, too, that decision was the outgrowth of the drug experience itself. The sense of a genuinely alternate state of consciousness -an awareness that perceptions, both external and internal, can change   raised questions about the unvarying nature of the usual state of consciousness and everyday reality (Zinberg 1974). I believe that the campaign against use of these drugs deprived users, for a time at least, of the opportunity to work through their drug experiences and to integrate them socially and psychologically with their usual consciousness experiences. Thus forced out of their everyday environment (Zinberg 1981; Zinberg and Harding 1982) by their drug experience and by the culture's response, they turned to obscure and sometimes bizarre philosophical or religious ideas. I: What's the main thing you recall about it? What happened?

R: Well, generally, the first trip was one of the most unusual-it lodged me into maybe a black, sinister side. I really got into the black arts. I: So you were into magic?

R: Well, after that I was convinced of something.

Obviously, this type of experience only increased the alienation between users and the straight society.

There also were important political overtones. As Kenneth Keniston (1969) and others have shown, the drug-using groups initially were apolitical. And certainly the straightforward political young people who in the early 1960s were struggling for civil rights and improved health care in Mississippi and Alabama were anti-drug and contemptuous 0f drug users. But in consonance with the old maxim, "The enemy 0f my enemy is my friend," the drug revolutionaries as well as the civil liberties revolutionaries soon began t0 see the reigning cultural outlook as narrow, repressive, and destructive.

R: I think there are now many fewer people taking acid-that the relationships are much more carefully worked out about acid. It used t0 be that a whole corridor 0f students, you know, in a dormitory, just would take

it 0n the spur 0f the moment. When I first came t0 teach here, that was around 1969-1970, things. like that would happen. There would be campus riots here, tear gas, and the police, and the kids would be tripping their brains out. I know that people wouldn't d0 that any more. They are t00 wise.

It would be going t00 far t0 say that "make love not war" came solely from lysergic acid and a few other chemicals, but the use of psychedelics had ideological significance in the anti-war movement. It could be argued, and probably correctly, that the drug-using part of that movement was the fringe, the alienated, and not the core movers and workers. Yet drug use was important in that it espoused in an ideological sense the fighting of repression. For many of our psychedelic subjects, too, aggressive political activity, which contrasted sharply with their earlier drug stance, seemed to compensate for the feeling of disappointment over the psychedelic experience.

I: When you were tripping, can you recall any really good moments or experiences that you had? Anything stand out in your mind?

R: Let's see. Well-not really. Tripping I always got the attitude, is this all there is?

I: It was never a monumental thing?

R: Yeah. I always expected so much more from it. But it made me aware of myself and of other people who were using it. I watched those other people who were using it and saw that the answer wasn't just to sit around and hallucinate in your head and then decry Kent State and Cambodia on the one hand, but then just give up on the other hand. I saw that wasn't the answer. There were bad, horrible things going on. These were bad men, evil men, who were running the country and lying and cheating the people. I had to do something about it. At the same time, I developed an intense dislike for these "peace" people who were always loaded.

I: You said you felt you had to do something about it. Did you?

R: Yeah, yeah. I joined the campus SDS. I occupied buildings. I got my head busted. All those things.

EFFECTS OF THE DRUG. The effects of psychedelics on our using subjects were remarkably consistent, whether positive or negative. Certainly the pat terns of the drug's effects were far more consistent than was the case with either marihuana, opiates, or alcohol. The first important effect mentioned again and again by our subjects was the influence on relationships, a kind of powerful bonding among people who tripped together.

R: I asked my friend about his first trip, and he said that none of the people really knew each other; they had heard of each other and had met at cocktail parties, but that's all. And at the end of the trip, they knew each other [laugh] extremely well. So I imagine that through that, through acid, I will get to know some of these people better. If they'd be willing to try it, I think that's one way people could get to know me quickly.

Most of our subjects experienced this bonding and sense of personal closeness. Many reiterated that psychedelic use had had a profound influence on their interpersonal relationships. A sense of openness about themselves enabled people who used together to relax certain critical faculties. The shared experience seemed to establish a feeling of kinship, as reported earlier by Zinberg ( 1974) and by Grinspoon and Bakalar (1979).

I: What happened during the trip?

R: We talked. I had never talked so openly about myself before in my life. And it was easy. I didn't feel, you know, like hiding anything about myself, or that what I was was so terrible. Then he told me about himself, and I could understand him and feel close and think everything he thought was bad about himself was really OK, just like it was with me.

Sometimes the shared experience included more than openness; it appeared also as a special type of kinship shared by those who had done something daring, dangerous, and illicit.

R: I was with a pretty stable group of friends. We all got high pretty regularly [laugh]. And there weren't any tensions, like this was a group I felt comfortable with and part of. In eleventh grade I started getting into acid pretty heavily, toward the end of the fall and into the winter. By wintertime I was tripping like a couple of times a week. On some levels, none of my friends were very bright. School was essentially a very weird situation for me in terms of-I was like an honor-type student, on the one hand, and had nothing to do with the other honortype students who were super-straights. The people I hung around with, some of them were bright but didn't use it; some of them just "hung out."

I: So there was a real disjunction between your school life and your friends? The friends you hung around with outside of school? How did you feel?

R: I felt good. I liked the-idea of the contrast that I had. It was a small school, and I was possibly the brightest person in that school, but at the same time, I didn't work at being in school.

This was particularly true of the younger group, who tended to talk a great deal to one another about their shared experience: Who had done it? When? With whom? Was it good acid?

I: In thinking about your group of friends, do some people more than others seem interested in using LSD?

R: Sure.

I: The acid group? R: Yeah.

I: If so, how do they show it?

R: They talk about it: "Let's trip together"; they describe their trip experiences in detail. I'm amazed at the amount of time that I will spend talking about trips with people. "Last time I tripped, this and this happened. I saw this and that . . ." "Yeah, yeah, the last time I tripped, this and that happened to me . . ." That's a pretty frequent conversation.

This apparently repetitious conversation also seemed to buttress sanctions and rituals. The secret-society aspect of use led many of our subjects to adopt odd times and odd places for tripping.

R: We weren't supposed to, 'cause it was a formal school trip, right? And, you know, about a third of the school tripped, and, you know, it was really, it was incredible, the way people got along.

I: How did the principal and the teachers handle it?

R: Well, they thought it was a really good weekend, right? 'Cause here were all these people who were-they didn't see us all day 'cause they were out walking and stuff. And then they'd come back after a day of tripping and we were still tripping, you know, sitting around talking at night, sitting around the fire.

I: Did they ever find out?

R: Probably, but nothing's ever been said.

R: Uh, I-every once in a while I'd stop working, maybe for a weekend or something, or for a Friday and a Saturday, and every Sunday there was a whole bunch of us that got together in church and did acid.

I: Just before church, or in church?

R: No, it was like in the afternoon, you know, when nobody was in the church; we'd just go in and sit down and talk and stuff.

I: And do acid? R: Yeah.

Once the users had learned to control the effects of the drug, they often took special pleasure in going into the world to test the impact of their different vision and its effect on their interactions with other people.

I: Was the second experience you had similar to or different from the first one?

R: It was similar in that it was taken with the same friends. This one was at night, and at one time we did go into the town and buy something. And I learned about how to come down enough to, like, go and buy something at a store, and stuff like that. I learned, like, how to control myself and not be paranoid.

I: How did you learn that?

R: Uh, it's a group thing. Like, you're gonna-someone tells you that you can do it and you do it. You just come down when you have to. Just pull out, because acid isn't like a body drug. It's a head drug. And if you learn to know it, you can pull yourself out of the mood.

R: There was often a secret pleasure in going into the world and experiencing it. You know, how it was out there. Let me look at them with my eyes open, for maybe the first time. I wanted them to see me too, to know what I'm like when the hostility is drained away.

Users' relationships with their parents made this testing of interactions extremely problematical. One young man who did not wish to be discovered by his parents admittedly took a great risk when he tripped in the next room:

R: My parents were in the other room. Most of my previous drug use at my earlier ages was done in my own room with the door closed. And usually with a light burning very dimly. I did most of my tripping there, at night.

The dilemma of how to continue use when their children were present was often expressed by our older subjects:

I: How much is too much acid in your opinion? R: In a given dose, you mean?

I: No, in usage.

R: Well, I can only speak for myself. I would say that for me, I come back to my rules about using it. I like to use it with, like, one person or a small group of people that are very carefully picked out, in a careful situation where I'm not going to be confronted with tasks that I won't be able to do. Like, I won't use it during the university term when I'm teaching, or when I have to prepare something. And also the kids. The kids, by the way, don't like it. My daughter very specifically says she doesn't want me to be tripping. At least not in her presence. And that's the arrangement. That's an important restraint on me, by the way. She says, "Daddy, I don't want to be around you when you're tripping. You act funny, and I'm afraid that the car is going to crash and you're going to be arrested by the police." She sees this on TV, as a matter of fact. So I said, "OK, that's the deal. " And since they live with me half the time and with their mother the other half, they're frequently here. It means I have to arrange it specifically. It's usually Saturday night.

Obviously this subject's efforts to establish and maintain the social sanctions and rituals that would allow the trip to be successful would have been interfered with by concern about his children and certainly by conflict with them. The second major drug effect often mentioned by our subjects was a sense of personal revelation that might be experienced either as physical sensation (sexuality or sensuality, including eating) or as personal insight (philosophical or spiritual understanding of oneself and the universe).

R: What happened was that I got much more interested in talking with people I was with and in walking around outside. Again it was winter and there was snow on the ground, and it was quite pretty. Again, I was making reflections on visual things, but beginning somewhere inside my head to see that there was a heavier dimension to all this than I had realized before-just, you know, the first revelation.

 

The reports on physical sensation, and especially sexual and sensual interests, varied considerably more than was the case with marihuana users. Many subjects reported enhanced sensuality after use of psychedelics:

 

R: Everything looked so good. I could just look at the sea and feel it on my skin and in my bones. Touching it was ecstasy. Sensations were exquisite.

 

But some reported decreased interest in direct sexual experiences.

 

R: I was too into myself to want to touch him. He looked beautiful and I wanted to look at him. But not anything as rough as sex. He said the same thing. He really loved me and sometimes he would want me, but right now he didn't think he could even get it up.

 

Several men reported difficulty in achieving erections, and several women remained dry and unresponsive physically, despite great waves of sensuality and longing. However, an occasional subject transcended that barrier and reported:

 

R: A merging. I couldn't tell which of us was which. I was in her body and she in mine. It was incredible and when I finally came, it was like no orgasm I ever had before. It was my whole body.

 

In as much as psychedelic drugs, which are chemically related to the amphetamines, are appetite suppressants, subjects did not report the delight in eating that characterized our marihuana users. But they often reported great pleasure in simply tasting small quantities of a special substance, particularly after a long period of tripping.

I: What else do you remember about the trip?

R: Well, we had been on the beach for hours, lolling around, talking, enjoying ourselves. Once in a while, somebody wondered whether, you know, we should have something to eat or drink, and I couldn't even imagine it. Then somebody, he was very energetic all day, got up and went into the house and brought back boysenberry sherbet. It was Haagen-Dazs, and I took one mouthful. It was absolutely delicious. I thought it was the best thing I had ever tasted in my life. I could taste every nuance of the flavor and also felt, really felt, the texture as I never had before in my life. I took one more taste, but that was all. It was perfect, but it was enough.

The sense of personal revelation or illumination was not limited to physical sensations but might take the form of personal insight, either in regard to oneself or, in a philosophical-spiritual-religious sense, to the universe. This was not a static response but one that changed as the user gained more experience with the drug.

R: When I trip now, I think about what's going on in my personal life rather than thinking about communicating with a godhead or something like that. There is less of a psychedelic thing to it, and more of a personal thing to it. I don't know if that's going to be a permanent change, I don't really know.

These illuminating effects of psychedelic use were consistent with the individual's personality structure and with what was going on in his or her emotional life at the time. For example, subjects who in their usual state of consciousness tended to deal with conflict by turning passive concerns into some active form would respond, while tripping, in the same general way. Somaticizers somaticized; cerebral types cerebrated; and so on.

I: What's the biggest mistake you've made about drugs?

R: Being too overconfident. In the two or three trips that I've had, I guess I consider that that's where my mistakes were. That I felt getting high would improve the quality of whatever was going down. I could have realized it if I had just stopped to think about it; it was a situation that could only be hurt by tripping. The mistakes I've made in terms of drugs are the mistakes I've made in general, in terms of not slowing down to think about what's really going on.

R: It used to be that I would wait for things to happen, for someone to come to me. Which is sort of a paranoid model. From the way I grew up, I waited for things to happen to me. I became aware of that sort of pattern through LSD use. For some people, it takes them months of therapy to figure that kind of thing out. The acid thing just [snaps fingers] put me right at that place of understanding the pattern. So, in a sense, even though I was probably crying for half the trip, it was not so much fear or anxiety as just settling into a lot of it. It was the same kind of crying people do in marathons in therapy. They are crying, but it's kind of a relief, almost, to be crying. It's kind of a "I'm comfortable with myself" kind of crying. And I'm back in touch with that pain, which is to say a real experience that I had cut myself off from. I think of acid experiences, tripping, and therapy a lot in the same way. It's probably why in the first six months of this year I didn't do any acid much. 'Cause my therapy was the same thing, more or less.

The importance of set does not mean that a personality problem or difficulty bred bad trips per se. As H. L. Barr et al. 0972) discovered, there are typologies of reactions to psychedelic drugs, and the severe reactions do not necessarily follow personality disturbance. Some of Barr's most disturbed subjects handled the experience well, while some of those with the best-balanced personality structure had trouble. Our findings completely substantiated that conclusion. Set was a crucial factor, but the trip experience was more closely related to some aspect of the setting (for example, to personal relationships) and to social sanctions and rituals than to personality difficulties.

I: Did you ever have any adverse or unpleasant experiences with hallucinogens?

R: Yes, many. I: Yes?

R: Well, I particularly had a single experience, a bad, horrible experience with M DA, which is the kind of thing that just works on the emotional kind of realm. But at that point I was going through a kind of crisis dealing with my parents, and the parents were the internalized par-, ents. That lasted for about thirteen hours. It was the most horrible experience I've ever gone through.

I: Did that stop you from using it? R: No.

Most of the experiences reported in this section concerning subjects who had bad trips were idiosyncratic, based on specific set issues, and often the users had shown bad judgment through inexperience or by not following the accepted sanctions and rituals. Such mistakes became less common as our subjects continued to use psychedelic drugs. My conviction that heavy psychedelic use is unlikely to persist grew out of our subjects' reports of their longterm experiences, which showed the shifting nature of the drug's effects. Many said that their anxiety over tripping increased rather than decreased, although this did not necessarily cause them to give up use: 61% indicated that they would like to continue very occasional use, while 94% reported that they had reduced use from their beginning level.

R: I don't know, maybe I'm wrong, and maybe any acid I would do would give me the same good high as before. But I don't get it; I'm afraid, and to me it's not worth risking it because eventually, if I keep taking more and more drugs, eventually I'm gonna get a bad trip and I'll get bummed out, and I don't want that to happen, and that's why I don't do that much.

Í   I: Do you plan, at any point in the future, either immediate or long range, to trip again?

R: I'm not planning it, but I suppose, under certain circumstances, I would. I always said after I tripped the first time that I didn't want to trip again unless, like, I was again with a guy that I really like unless I was going out with someone and I really enjoyed and trusted him, and then I'd wanna trip with him.

Our subjects' previous concerns about the bad health effects of the drug seemed more overwhelming as they continued use. For many, the experience simply became more and more negative.

R: I started having bad trips, and I just stopped. Plus my tolerance was getting rather heavy. It took two or three to get off, to trip. I just stopped.

What had previously seemed like personal insight leading to a gentler and more accepting view of the world also changed.

I: Why did you stop psychedelic use?

R: I was getting too screwed up. I was getting in a real kind of trip where I was feeling, you know, kind of superior. And I've noticed that a lot with people who do a lotta acid. They get into a kind of real trip that they're better than other people. And I was just doing that too much. I dunno, just kinda know-it-all and everything. I can't really explain it just knowing it all and stuff of that nature. I realized it mostly this summer, 'cause when my friend lived right behind me, there was a house and a buncha acid freaks lived there, and, you know, I could really see it in them, exactly.

In this case, the subject was aware that the "insight" had turned sour. In several other cases, the subject's representation of his evolved view of the world, which he himself experienced as insightful and accepting, seemed to the interviewer to be condescending, pretentious, and alienated, lacking an awareness of how that subject might be seen by others.

R: There's a real difference in the way you look at the world if you've had the experience of tripping.

I: What do you mean by that?

R: It's, uh, well, you get sort of a more objective sense of what's, going on in the world. Things happen, but they don't affect you as much. Things that used to bother you, maybe, you can sometimes see that they're really funny, or, well, sort of temporary. Like, this, too, will pass. People who don't trip don't understand that.

I: Why not?

R: It's like you get a sense of the larger picture of things. People who don't trip are too tied up in themselves to see anything beyond their own petty little troubles and problems.

I: Were you like that at one time? R: Yes.

Moreover, on successive follow-up interviews more than half of our subjects had another consistent reaction: they began to find the drug experience isolating in an intellectual sense and increasingly less interesting. Some of these users had given ecstatic accounts of their early trips, and many had never had trouble with bad trips. Most, in fact, had never experienced a bad trip.

R: There are things that I like to do that some of these acid people don't do, which is writing and thinking about politics, and talking about things, and things like that. I tend to encourage people to be more like that, to do that. I miss the people that can talk about a lot of these things.

R: I want to communicate sufficiently that there is less of a special quality to being high than there used to be. That it is something that feels good, and it keeps me in touch, and I place great value on getting stoned in some circumstances. But I don't have a sort of revelatory kind of feeling about tripping that I used to-sort of a closer-to-God kind of feeling. And now things are more mundane, I guess.

Ultimately, most subjects seemed to agree with the following user's summation of his experience.

R: Finally, I realized it was simply boring, yes, boring, boring. Who would have believed it? It was so good at first, so good. How I wish I could feel like those first times again! That was glorious. Now it's repetitious. It takes such a long time, too. I've already thought those thoughts and seen what the drug has to show me, and it isn't much fun doing it over and seeing it over. It's such a shame, but that's how it is. I: Is that just your reaction?

R: No, my friends feel the same. We talk about it once in a while, how great it is. And sometimes we talk about trying it again, maybe after a long time. And then it will be more like it was. But the last time I did it, it was just boring.

Opiates

The decision to use any of the three illicit drugs in this study-marihuana, the psychedelics, or the opiates-inevitably results in some degree of anxiety for the user. This anxiety may arise for physiological, psychological, or social reasons-that is, in connection with the drug variable, the set variable, or the setting variable.

The decision to use marihuana is accompanied by a relatively low level of concern. Since its use has become socially normative within certain age groups, there is little psychological or social anxiety, although in certain states there is still fear of engaging in an illegal activity. The greatest worry, especially among beginners, arises from the recent attention given to the health hazards that may follow marihuana use.

The decision to use a psychedelic brings greater anxiety because of the drug's greater promise of pleasure or pain. Nevertheless, the concern about psychedelics-and this is also true of marihuana-is ameliorated by two facts, one physiological and the other social. First, there is little risk of quick addiction; and second, although society does not openly approve of these drugs, it does not automatically associate them with deviance, criminality, and potential degradation, as is the case with the opiates.

The decision to use an opiate is filled with anxiety on all three counts. In regard to the psychological or personality factor, people who decide to take such risks come from that small fraction of the population that is skewed toward embracing danger or resisting self-care. Further, the experience of addiction diminishes personality differences and makes all compulsive users seem very much alike (Zinberg 1975). Thus it is not surprising that many investigators have regarded the personality factor as dominant in the decision to use an opiate as an intoxicant. Yet the social factor-the setting variable-should not be disregarded. The importance of setting showed up most strikingly among our controlled opiate users, who, with the exception of those few who had an unusually well-developed system of internal checks, could not have remained controlled on the basis of personality factors alone. Instead, their ability to continue moderate use depended to a significant degree on social sanctions and rituals, as well as other social supports. At the same time, however, they felt the anxiety engendered by society's association of opiate use with degradation, deviance, and criminality.

Unless otherwise indicated, the excerpts that follow were drawn from interviews with some of the sixty-one controlled opiate users in our combined analytical sample. A few (so indicated) were taken from interviews with some of the thirty compulsive users at the same time. A few more (so indicated) were extracted from interviews with the "significant others" of certain controlled subjects whose statements we wanted to verify. Because these "others" were personally close to the users, they were familiar with opiate use, and many of them had tried it.

It is frequently assumed that everyone who tries using an opiate, particularly heroin, is overwhelmingly positive about the experience. This is a misconception. The responses of the controlled users in our combined sample seemed to the research team to be far more positive than those of a random sample of the general population of users would have been, even though these subjects had had bad experiences as well as good. This positive reaction from controlled subjects, as well as from most of the compulsive opiate users in the sample, can be easily explained. All of them had chosen to use opiates on a more or less regular basis, that is, to become regular users. Hence their enjoyment of the experience must have canceled out their sense of fear and risk. With the "significant others" the situation was quite different. Although many of them had tried heroin or another opiate, most had not reacted positively to the experience and therefore had not continued to use. The responses of some members of this group are included in order to correct the impression that everyone who tried the drug enjoyed it-a conclusion that would otherwise be inevitable because of the predominance of regular users in the sample.

BEGINNING USE. All the subjects in our combined sample shared the fear of the general public that any use of heroin would lead to addiction, and their beginning use was characterized by that overwhelming concern:

I: Had you heard anything about heroin before you started using it?

R: Yeah, I guess, you know, that it was addicting and it was terrible and this and that, but I'd also heard that you're not going to become a junkie by doing it once. But I'd talked with people who said that there are certain people who because of their body chemistry can have one drink or do heroin once and then become an alcoholic or a junkie.

I: How did you start using?

R: I found out that my sister and brother-in-law had been using it. Not all the time, but just every now and then.

I: Did they ask you to use?

R: No, they were waiting. I was asking them about it. Yeah, I wanted to try it. Well, finally she would say, "You should try it sometime," and I'd say, "Well, when are you going to get it for me?" Well, so they taught me how to. Finally, all three of us went off to get it. My, boyfriend didn't want to do it the first time. (But he doesn't do it a lot). We went off to this guy's house and bought some heroin and brought it home and tried it. And I thought it was great. My sister's husband did it for me, showed me how to use it. But they said, "Y'gotta watch out for this stuff, y'know. It's great, but it's true, it is addicting. " So I ended up using it like them. Every now and then.

Even if the subject had known a controlled user very well and believed what he had said about the experience; this was still not enough to remove the fear of becoming addicted:

R: Well, after all, she was a nurse. And I knew she'd been doing heroin off and on for years, and I knew she wouldn't bullshit me. She just wanted me to be with her and enjoy it. All the same, I kept thinking everything

I've heard all these years can't be all bullshit. So I was scared, real scared. But I said, what the hell, she's to be trusted and I let her fix me. Generally, however, the social factor, that is, reassurance from close associates, helped the beginner overcome his or her anxiety.

I: Did you have any apprehension or anxiety before you first used it? R: Yeah, I wanted to do it. I was scared until my friend would say, "No, I don't want you to learn how to do that without me."

Beginning heroin users often dealt with their concerns in the same way that many people deal with other concerns, by trying to outwit themselves. The next user, who had been very much interested in heroin but too frightened to go ahead, had hoped to avoid his fear by spontaneity-by not allowing himself time to think.

R: I really had no intention to do it [heroin]. And a friend of mine was going to try it for the first time, so I said, "All right, I'll meet you down here and we'll do a half-bag each." So I met him that night, we did it, and I don't know, we just got sick all night.

It would not be unreasonable to assume that this user's negative reaction came in part from the anxiety he was trying to avoid.

Several subjects found it easier to begin if they didn't have to make the decision to go out and buy the drug. When it was provided for them, there seemed to be less onus and therefore somewhat less anxiety.

I: The first time you used heroin, how did you get it?

R: These people I was running around with-I was at a party with Janethey had some. In fact, I didn't purchase it myself. They didn't even ask me to chip in with them to get it. They offered me some.

A combination of reassurance, spontaneity (false in this case), and being offered the drug by a friend characterized one couple's initial use.

R: It wasn't something I considered I'd ever really get into. It was just like a surprise came along, that kind of thing. This guy that was a mutual friend of ours lived with this whole crowd of people that had been using it for years and years, and he had an on-and-off access to stuff. He said, "Did you ever try junk?" I said we hadn't, and he started telling me he was shooting it like once a week or something. And I knew other people who did it. And he said, "Oh, let's get some," and I said, "Great." So those people came over to shoot up with some dope.

I: When did you next use? R: About a month later.

Many of our subjects began heroin use by snorting the drug. Those who injected it usually started by injecting it under the skin ("skin-popping"). If it was injected into a vein, someone else did it for them. Having someone do it for them was quite different from doing it for themselves.

R: The biggest thing about heroin, one of the biggest things I found about it, is there's a big psychological trip in shooting it. You know. And that's something that you sort of have to come to deal with in your own way. You either feel comfortable with it or you don't do it. The first couple of times I remember what I went through, but I'm still standing here.

I: How long did it take you to learn?

R: I knew how to do it after the first time, but it was a matter of-I couldn't get to that point. I'd really thought I could do it, you know. I'd get to the point where I had cooked the stuff all up and I'd tie myself off, and I'd get it all up into the thing there and everything. I'd just get ready. The needle had just touched my vein, and that would be it-I couldn't do it. And so probably the first three or four times after that, maybe five times, somebody had to get me off. But then one day I thought, "Oh, this is crazy. If I'm staking my life every time I do this, wondering what's in this sack, you know, and then letting somebody else, I should have the guts to do it myself. If I had the guts to do it in the first place, I should be able to do it myself " So I just sat down, tied myself off, and did it. And that was that.

Our subjects' concern about intravenous injection was realistic because most of the severe complications accompanying heroin use have come not from the drug itself but from this mode of ingestion. Anxiety about injection was so great that even people who had used heroin several times would not begin (quite correctly, in my opinion) to self-inject unless an experienced person was pr esent.

I: How long did it take before you learned to shoot yourself up?

R: Quite a while. I think it took me about three months. And even the first time I did it, I didn't want to do it. I didn't like the idea.

I: Did one of your friends show you how?

R: Yeah. He was around when I tried it myself. He was right there to make sure I didn't do anything wrong.

A few eager beginners moved from snorting to injecting far more quickly. I: And what about heroin? When did you start that?

'` R: Well, I started that about ten to fifteen years ago. I: Tell me about it.

R: Well, my friends talked to me about it. I wanted to try it for quite a while, because some friends used it. And they were into it for quite a while, and I wanted to do it but I was afraid to do it. So we sat down and we talked for a while about it and they talked me into just trying it. And I really liked it, an awful lot, right from the beginning.

I: What was the first way you used it? Did you shoot it or snort it?

R: Uh, well, it's funny 'cause I snorted it, and after a while I felt so good that I wanted to shoot some and I shot some in the same night.

I: Did you get sick from it?

R: No, I didn't get sick at all, which was amazing because everyone else seemed to be getting sick, you know. And ever since then I've liked it so much that I haven't wanted to stop it, you know. I mean, not that I have a habit or anything, just that I really like it. Weekends jeez, I look forward to that every weekend.

But whatever the manner of ingestion, the desire for social support and interaction predominated with almost every beginning user.

R: A friend where I worked used to take heroin on weekends-a weekend chipper-and he turned me on to it. We worked in a very hectic situation there, would get really tensed up. And so he began to describe to me how relaxed this drug could make you feel. After a while, I asked him to show me how to use it. It was very inexpensive then in the good old days. He turned me on to it and I would get high a little bit with him, but my main friend was this girlfriend of mine. I turned her on to it and I would get high with her most of the time. Snorting, just snorting.

I: What can you remember about the first time?

R: Oh, the first time was wonderful. It made me feel very warm and it was like, it just took all the tension away. I had to go meet some people to go to the movies after that, I remember, and I remember waiting for them in the lobby of the movie theater and just, you know, feeling unafraid of anything. Not that I can remember feeling afraid of anything before, but all of a sudden I was very unafraid. Nothing could harm me. So I liked the feeling. Felt very open and very calm and very invulnerable and very peaceful and nice. I really loved it. Interesting thing is if I don't do it for three or four weeks I just forget about it, forget what it's like to be high and don't need it. Or if I do use it, I can feel when things get out of hand, and basically I don't enjoy it that way.

Interestingly, neither the extent of social support nor the extent of the user's initial positive response necessarily indicated the degree of his or her eventual attachment to the drug. Initial reactions differed, but positive responses like those of the preceding and following subjects were common.

I: How old were you when you first used?

R: About eighteen. And then I met this guy at school who was into opiates, who was shooting smack at the time. And we talked about it. We were friends, he was kind of in my circle of friends. And I asked him to get me some, to get me some morphine, and I skin-popped it. And I loved it. Lots of fun, got loaded on it. I remember I took it the first time with this girl who was just a friend of mine. And, ah, she was a very laid-back kind of person and I'm kind of two-faced. I like being active and, on the other hand, I like to spend a lot of my time just relaxing. And I, I loved . this drug. Just lay there and didn't get bored, just felt comfortable. I felt very comfortable with her. The first time I took morphine, I knew that I liked the drug, and that it was very compatible to my psyche.

By contrast, some responses were far more qualified: I: What was your first use like?

R: Well, I wanted to, it made me feel good in a way. It gave me some kind of release. See, I was pretty tense at the time, and it was a very pleasant kind of thing, although I got sick, see, 'cause it takes getting used to. I went through that period with heroin, just as I went through the same period with tobacco.

And sometimes unpleasant effects were reported as major elements during initial use.

R: I liked it, but I got sick. I was always running to the bathroom and throwing up, but it was like, "Oh, I feel great," and all of a sudden I'd feel, "Oh, I'm sick," and I'd go to the bathroom. It'd be over in two seconds, and I'd be back again. But I don't throw up any more.

This subject needed perseverance and a strong desire for the drug in order to continue use after being sick.

For many other subjects perseverance was required in another way because, to our surprise, not everyone experienced the drug's effects immediately. Despite heroin's reputation for great power, some beginning users of opiates, just like beginning users of marihuana, had to learn to get high.

I: Did you get off the first time?

R: No, didn't feel anything. At first I didn't, you know, understand the high, because at first you want to go to sleep and something like that. But I gradually got to understand the high.

I: How long did it take before you understood the high?

R: Well, I guess it must've been about two or three times, 'cause the first time I tried it, it was like there was nothing there. All I was doing was just itching. But then, one time I tried it and it seemed like I could feel a little something, like my body just got off and relaxed.

It is, of course, hard to untangle the influence of the drug from the effects of set and setting. Nevertheless, the kind of social group that was involved in the initiatory process clearly made a difference. In fact, the greatest concerns of controlled users seemed to stem from their relationships with compulsive users. Hence, despite the next subject's later conviction that she could avoid ''   addiction, being initiated by a former addict appeared to affect her initial response.

R: It was after he got out of treatment. We've become very good friends, and rather than living at home, he was living with me. And, uh, it was something that I had toyed with, experimenting with heroin, thinking that once I had experienced it, I could share a degree of empathy.

I: What was first use like? ,

R: I think I did too much. Because I couldn't do anything but lie very still. If I tried to stand, I would get extremely nauseated and very dizzy. It was an unpleasant sensation to do anything but lie very, very still. And looking back on it I think that some of them must have been very concerned about me because every few minutes they would speak to me so as to get a response and make sure I was still there.

I: How did it feel when you were lying there?

R: It was pleasurable, but there was a certain amount of-I couldn't say anxiety, the drug eliminated all of that-but there was a cognitive concern on my part to stay awake. Because it was a very drifty, very floaty, very dreamy type of thing, and I made a point not to go to sleep. Like I say, I think I did too much. Because, well, it was a very pleasant feeling. The experience as a whole was not altogether pleasant. It was a matter of the amount that I did.

I: How did you manage to stay unaddicted?

R: I've always felt that addiction was a result of the life style and not the substance itself. I've never lived a junkie life style, like I observed in my friend.

Although many of our subjects who had unpleasant initial reactions continued to use, many others did not continue even though they had not had a bad   , time. In spite of social support the next interviewee (one of the "significant others" group) gave up use.

I: Were you one of the first of your group to try heroin?

R: Well, there were quite a few of us that tried it at the same time. I: All for the first time?

R: Yeah.

I: How many were there?

R: Oh, there must've been about five of us. Two of my cousins, and one woman and a man. Before this I had had other opportunities to try, but I passed it up. When I lived at home, I had no conception of what getting high was all about, really, and so I never had any desire to, you know, filch stuff from medicine cabinets or anything like that. And after this, I had no desire to use heroin again either.

Though the following user's declared moral motives sounded unconvincing to the research team, he stopped use after several positive experiences.

I: You had heard terrible things about it?

R: I heard it wasn't very enjoyable. It was like being very drunk, without having to drink, and all this stuff. So I tried it. Also, I knew that my high school was having a lot of trouble with downs, even some heroin, so I did want to try it because I was thinking of some time becoming a teacher. And I wanted to have experience with that drug if it was becoming popular. So I did try it, and it was all right. I didn't really find anything thrilling in it.

I: And you tried that on a few occasions? R: Yeah. And I sort of liked it.

I: And no other times?

R: No, no. I don't have a source for a drug like that. Just the opportunity came up, and I tried it.

After the extremely negative experiences of the next user (a significant other) there was apparently no question of continuing.

R: I had been scared in the first place, but Alice kept telling me how good it was. She got it and I snorted it. For a little while I felt a sort of a glow; then I began to feel sick. I've never been so sick in my life. The nausea went on for hours, or it seemed like hours. Finally, I threw up two or three times. Then for a little while I felt better, and then I got sick again. It was horrible. I never would touch any of that stuff again. I told Alice if she even mentioned it to me again, we were all through.

PSYCHOLOGICAL AND SOCIAL EFFECTS OF THE DRUG. The following descriptions of the effects of opiate use show that some widely held views about these effects are misconceptions. Neither the actions nor the pleasures and difficulties of our using subjects were stereotypical. For example, there was little straight shooting up (intravenous injection) and little sudden nodding off (quickly falling asleep). In addition, their reactions were not so monolithic as laboratory experiments with the drug have led researchers to expect. Instead, both positive and negative responses were highly individualized and idiosyn cratic, almost as much in the case of our compulsive subjects as among con trolled users.

Subjects mentioned as the most pleasant effects the "rush" (glow or warmth), the sense of distance from their problems, and the tranquilizing powers of the drug. Pleasure that was experienced as bodily sensation often expanded into a feeling of psychological well-being. Many subjects linked the drug to special-occasion use: sex, eating, other specific activities, and socializing. The social aspects of drug use were regarded as very important-both the social group with whom use occurred, and the problems of association with non-using groups. The greatest danger faced by controlled users was the potentially disruptive result of their association with addicts, an association that was dictated by their need to obtain the drug but that threatened their own carefully balanced using style.

Although our interviewers obviously could not measure the degree of pleasure resulting from a subject's use, they were instructed to make a subjective judgment as to whether each user's responses were spontaneous and sincere or whether they sounded hollow. We knew that since our controlled  subjects were not addicted, their opiate use would not bring them relief from any incipient withdrawal syndrome. Yet it was hard for the research team to distinguish between the kind of pleasure that comes from the relief of discomfort and that which is purely gratifying. Certainly we had expected more celebration of the famous "rush." The next subject was fulsome in his praise of this effect, but his response was not typical.

R: The whole thing of getting off on dope is the rush. I mean, to me it is. That's the one thing about dope that I don't care what anybody saysyou can get sick of any drug, I have of most of them, except for marihuana, and I do like a downer-but you never feel that rush like on dope and, I mean, that is the ultimate. That's the best. It is.

Later he described the sense of an immediate effect that propelled him from one state of consciousness "entirely" into another. His sense that use was relaxing was similar to that of the next respondent, whose calmer descriptions sounded more convincing to the interviewers.

I: Is there anything in particular that pleases you about opiate use as compared with other drugs?

R: Ah, yeah, you know, it's the rush you get, but it's very mellow. And it's a body thing. I can feel myself relaxing. And there's sort of, like, a euphoria sometimes. Especially with smoking. You just feel good, you feel calm. You feel warm, you feel relaxed, or I do. But it seems like other people do too.

The next excerpt resembles descriptions of the opiate high given by writers who have used the drug.

I: Could you describe an opiate high for me?

R: Well, I can try. You get warm. Your vision is definitely blurred. You're very, very lethargic, relaxed, almost to the point of falling asleep but not really asleep. It's like being in a dream and being awake at the same time. Your eyes will be closed and you can't keep your eyes open, but you're fully conscious. You can hear what's going on in the room; if there's music on, you can hear the music, but you really couldn't get up and walk around. Well, you could, but it would be more like bouncing around. It's more like lying back, half asleep, in a dream sleep, and it's very, very-mystical almost.

Almost all of our opiate users described their sensations much more in bodily terms than did our marihuana and psychedelic users.

I: Could you try to tell me in your own words what the high feels like? R: Well, the first feeling I can say is, uh, heat, a welling up of warmth that appears all over my body. My thighs and my stomach first. And it's a general relaxation. Warm feeling, associated with a calm, like a descending calm, like a fog settling in, over my whole body. I'd say that time seems to slow down, the thought processes seem to slow down, and get more rambling or associating, or dreamlike. Everything's being slurred, my gestures, my speech. Although with conscious effort this can be overcome, it seems to be a symptom. The rush is more pronounced some times than others. I don't know what that is due to. And by rush, I mean, you know, the immediate oncoming heat.

Most subjects attempting to convey their pleasure in the experience explained that the initial sense of physical relaxation gradually turned into a feeling of mental well-being.

R: I think there's a big physical factor involved in it. It's like a body stone kind of thing. But at the same time, the whole thing about the psychological thing that's involved in doing it-I think that carries over into the feeling afterwards. But psychologically, I feel good, I feel great, I don't know, I feel good [laugh].

What may be called the "distancing effect" was an almost universal reaction to an opiate high as distinct from a marihuana or psychedelic high.

I: Could you try to tell me in your own words what the high feels like? R: It's like crawling into a psychic cloud. Everything is cushioned for you. Very, very little that's negative gets through to you. I don't know, I think it's very relaxed, very pleasurable. Very low anxiety level, very low desire level. I guess the high-uh, you feel full. You know, whatever kind of hole you might have in your being-I think people do, everyone feels lacks of one sort or another-you know, it fills in all those spots.

I: What happens when you come down? How do you feel?

R: You come down real slowly. Usually, if you get loaded any time during the day, you're still loaded when you go to sleep. You wake up in the morning, you're just your normal self. I don't, 1 don't feel any comedown from it.

The distancing effect seemed to be a sense that the user's 1, " his perceiving self, saw what was going on outside, and apparently to a large extent inside, his psyche from a distant, sage vantage point. Many different descriptions of this phenomenon were given.

I: What in particular pleases you about heroin? R: The feeling of nonexistence that I get.

I: Have you ever had any unpleasant reactions? R: Oh, sure, I've gotten sick.

I: Do you mind getting sick on it? R: It doesn't upset me.

I: How does it affect your use?

R: It doesn't discourage it any [laugh]. Another subject described it as follows:

I: What do you enjoy about heroin?

R: I like the feeling of getting totally numbed out, and not having to worry about anything, and having a place. I mean, I would feel like I had a safe place in the world, and before I didn't.

But not all aspects of this experience were pleasant. Several subjects found it somewhat disorienting.

R: I got sick at first, and I thought, "This is supposed to be great?" And I didn't want to stay home and be like this all night long. And I just went   , out. And it was heavy winter and my coat was open and I was feeling great. And I went to a friend's house, smoked a little reefer, and just sat back and had, like vivid nods, vivid color nods. Just colors, like a rainbow in your head. It was sort of like an acid trip right in there. Or

it was like hallucinating, like nods are. You close your eyes and they're all here. And it just turned me on, so much, to dope. "Forget it," I said, "I don't care if I get sick on this stuff. 'Cause it's so beautiful, beautiful."

It was clear to the interviewers that several subjects experienced this distancing effect as tranquilizing-that the drug was acting as an anti-anxiety medication.

I: Could you try to describe in your own words what the high feels like? R: It feels, first of all, like there's a definite sensation of easing tension. Even if I'm not specifically feeling tense, there's a definite feeling of relaxation that kind of sweeps over you. And a loosening up and a kind of general un-uptightness that reflects itself in a lot of areas. In terms of the way I see the rest of my life, it makes everything seem beautiful. I feel a lot more optimistic. I'm able to handle all the things I have to handle. Everything seems like a nice challenge instead of a burden. I enjoy experiencing the things around me. I'm able to let the world back in a lot more, rather than when I'm in a normal state and just preoccupied with everything I have to do and problems and different things like that. When I'm high, I seem to be able to just forget about a lot of things and deal with them one by one. And, it's a kind of letting-go feeling.

These subjective reactions of those who used the drug more or less "medicinally" (as a tranquilizer) but who also insisted on their enjoyment or euphoria made it very hard for us to be clear about the differences of opinion about heroin and euphoria as discussed by McAuliffe and Gordon (1975) (see chapter z).

I: How important is using heroin to you?

R: Depends on the situation. Like, if things are going my way, that's the way I was takin' heroin. If things weren't goin' my way, if something happened to me-like, my mother every month or so she's going in the hospital, everything slams on me, plus exams at the school, plus dealing with whines, plus dealing with my social friends' flaky actions'   then. heroin's very important. But it feels good.

The extent to which most users did not want simply to nod off but wished to enjoy the high came as a surprise to us. Sometimes, but not always, this attitude was associated with a hyperactive personality.

I: What do you particularly like about heroin?

R: I'll tell you what I don't like. I don't like to use it to become unconscious. It doesn't heighten my senses, but I like to use it to the point where it relaxes me, to the point where my nervous system is not so overcompelling, where I'm not reacting so much to different circumstances. I'm very hyper anyway. It's almost like I'm speeding all the time. And it slows me down a little bit and I can think clearly.

I: You don't get off to nod?

R: No, definitely not. I think that anyone who does that is just wasting it or really just trying to put themselves out of the picture.

The use of heroin seemed to be idiosyncratic, related to the habits of the individual and his or her choice of special occasions for use. We were surprised how often the special-occasion use of heroin for sexual enhancement was mentioned.

I: What are your feelings about drugs and sex?

R: Umm, they can enhance the visceral-experiences. I think sometimes they may alter emotional content somewhat. But the reason that I use dope with sex is primarily sensational, visceral.

For a sexually active person who was a controlled opiate user, the experience of sex tended to fuse with the opiate experience.

I: Do you ever use heroin with sex?

R: Sometimes. If you don't use too much, you can get more in touch with your body. But I don't use dope to have sex. It's usually more by accident. But I do get physical when I do dope. It's nice to have a lady to lean up against.

Several subjects, however, reported a sexual problem that was quite general among opiate users.

I: You say you often use heroin before sex?

R: Well, not as much as I used to. You see, when I was a kid and just starting to use, I thought it was great with sex. I felt all relaxed and I never had to worry about coming fast. Before that I had, I think you call it premature ejaculation. Then, later on, when Susie and I were together for a while, I began to find it very, very frustrating. You feel great, all sexed up, and for a while it's terrific, but then you want to get off and you can't. After a while it stops being fun and gets frustrating as hell. If Susie hasn't taken any-and she does it only about once to the three times that I do-she begins to get sore and wants to stop. It becomes a pain rather than a pleasure. You can't pee, you can't shit, and especially you can't come.

Sexual activity was not the only special-occasion use reported. The following account is typical of several subjects who, like marihuana users, found that the pleasure of eating was consistently enhanced and who were not bothered by nausea.

I: Did you do heroin when you were out in California?

R: I did it a few times out there. I had friends who were chippers and one friend who was a junkie, and we'd go and do it sometimes and go out and eat a big dinner and do some heroin. I didn't believe any of the

bullshit about heroin. I still don't. It's an addictive drug. You've got to watch out, and when we went to eat, we'd shoot up and go eat a meal. I: Sort of a social thing?

R: It was a social thing, yeah.

I: Was the high conducive to socializing?

R: Yeah. Well, it depends how much you do. If you do a bunch, you nod out, you know, but it's a weird drug too, because you can get the energy with it to do almost anything. You just put yourself in the right frame of mind. I guess the whole idea of being high on heroin is fighting the down effect. A lot of people do that with sopers, too. You're supposed to go to sleep on them, but you fight it and it's a nice high.

Obviously, most of our users ingested drugs to get high, a goal that would suggest rather spicy and even decadent activities. Yet one subject's specialoccasion use could hardly have been more wholesome:

I: Are there any activities that your use of drugs makes more difficult or impossible?

R: No. Very much easier, if anything.

I: What activities do you particularly like doing when you're high?

R: Well, I like going out with my son to take in a movie or go to a sporting event, or something like that.

Another subject's use, which led to more mundane activities, illustrates how diverse the effect of the high state can be.

R: A lot of times I get high and wash a bunch of dishes and then wash the floor and stuff like that just because, you know, it's stuff that I've been meaning to do and should have done but I just didn't feel like doing.

I: But if you're high, it's easy?

R: I just [snaps fingers] breeze through it and that's that. "That wasn't bad!" And then I just go out and do whatever I wanted to do anyway. It was also clear that the ability to function and to channel the high state increased with the user's drug experience.

I: Was there any special reason why you wouldn't do it during the week? R: Well, during the week at night. When I was first doing it, I couldn't function too well after doing it. I could function, but I didn't do much but sit around. And talk, talk, talk. We'd talk a lot. But other than that, talking with people, I couldn't run around and do things. But now if I want to do it during the week, I-it's not that-I function. I function very well with it. As a matter of fact, I can sometimes, oftentimes, get more accomplished when I'm high [laugh] than when I'm not.

I: Oh?

R: Yeah. If I don't do too much. If I don't get too high, but just a little. I can run around and I get ambitious. I start running around and doing things. And getting involved in projects and stuff.

Not everyone, of course-and here is another example of the astonishing diversity of the drug effect-liked to be so active

I: What do you usually do after you get high?

R: I like to lie back mostly when I'm high, you know. I'd rather not be doing anything too active because the more active you are, the more it interferes with experiencing the high. I mean, I would prefer just to lie on my back with my eyes closed, either listening to music or not, either with a friend or not. It's pleasant to get high with friends, though. And, just feel the high. I've done it with other activities, too, but I prefer to be as inactive as possible while high.

Those who reported the ability to do a circumscribed and meticulous task more efficiently when high made the interviewers wonder about the extent of the subjects' hyperactivity when they were not high, even if they did not report that condition.

R: With heroin, I can play the piano and feel very relaxed, and I can really get into it. The other day, I felt like playing the piano when I was real high. I just finished doing myself up and I felt great. I was real high, and

I played one thing and I played another thing, and I was playing away. It sounded good to me, sounded really good, and I felt really relaxed, and I was expressing myself better.

The following excerpt from the response of a woman who was not hypersensitive showed well the extent of the variability of the drug's effect.

R: Actually, I've done a lot of good work when I'm high. I find that I can do a lot of work, say, on my writing, without tiring. I can concentrate on it more for long periods of time because I'll be enjoying it and won't have as much of a view to the end as to the doing. I can just keep going for a long time.

Perhaps more surprising than any other single finding were the consistent reports from controlled subjects that heroin and other opiates were used, very much like marihuana or alcohol, as part of an active social occasion.

R: And after we get off-you know all of a sudden everybody gets offeverybody feels real good and everybody's talkin', and everybody's gettin' to know each other, and it's good. It's a real good social drug, I think. All of a sudden your little social anxieties are gone. And people have told me, like my friends that don't use heroin-I've come home and said, "I've just shot some dope"-and they've told me, "You make more sense when you're stoned on a drug than any other time." And I believe them, I believe that's true. 'Cause I think, if you don't do too much, it's a real good social drug. You're real interested in everything.

Little has been written about the social aspects of opiate use. 'But interviews with several Iranians, whose country has a long history of ritualized use, were enlightening on this point. The Iranians pointed out somewhat condescendingly, because they felt that Westerners knew little or nothing about opiate use, that in Iran the drug was used quite generally in a social way. Indeed, they said, when a group of men shared an opium pipe after dinner, it made for a relaxed, talkative, and lively evening. Some of our subjects' experiences came close to this ancient tradition:

R: It's more a social thing-using occasionally. We would talk a lot while getting off. I've been in scenes where strung-out people would just, you know, all cop together, go into an apartment, all get loaded, and then split their separate ways. When you're using occasionally, even though there might be a lot of energy tied up with the ritual of getting loaded, a lot of anticipation, there isn't, that same kind of desperation as when you're strung out. And there isn't that same isolation. If you're strung out in a city, after a while you become a lone wolf. And, you know, you see it in yourself; you see it in every other person that uses.

Another frequent finding that somewhat surprised us was the extent to which many controlled users echoed the sentiments expressed by the marihuana and psychedelic users about the influence of prohibitionary laws on what would otherwise have been pleasurable social use. Several users were knowledgeable enough to quote Thomas Szasz (1975) and to claim that more bad reactions occurred because of the functioning of the laws against drug use than because of the drug use itself.

R: I consider the laws concerning heroin use to be antiquated and ridiculous-I've read Thomas Szasz-because I know the kind of pattern that I've evolved in using it. I know I can use it without going out and doing harm to anybody else. I know that I can use without doing harm to myself. And the whole thing about because you're using an illegal narcotic you're some sort of a criminal--or people say, "Heroin user?"-you know, that kind of thing. Just the whole connotation of people that use narcotics, you know, really turns me off. It's a real drag, and it's all because of the law.

Apparently using an opiate socially had a strong bonding effect. But the research team found that certain aspects of this bonding were different from those associated with marihuana and the psychedelics. For those two drugs it was the sharing of the experience, with all its strangeness, that seemed uppermost. With opiates, the sharing of fears concerning illegality seemed to be more crucial.

R: Illicit drug use is something that involves generally a great deal of trust. And if its not there, there's a certain degree of paranoia that arises because after all, it's heroin. I guess it's a matter of trust. I have used with strangers, but the feeling is not the same.

The bonding that followed the drug experience could be extremely important and long lasting.

Actually, the best set of using circumstances I can think of is being with the old gang from back home. We began together, began experimenting together, have gone through other aspects of life together, and the feeling is definitely one of trust. In this as well as in other areas.

I: How long has it been since you've lived at home? R: About six years now.

Those whose social relationships were based on opiate use were constantly concerned about the long-term effects of use on themselves and their friends and about the need for continuous checking and control. In their own eyes, of course, these chippers were breaking new ground.

R: Manuel and Nancy and I have been using dope together for years now. Because of our business and all, we're usually separated for half the year, when we come up north. But we keep in contact, and drug use is one of the things we keep on eye on each other about. I mean, like, how are you doin', how much have you been doin', and so forth. It's a subject of interest to all of us, and it interacts with our work, our individual art work, and our work when we're separate. Because we all use it to relax-while we're working sometimes, too-and we feel we've made some breakthroughs in the work as a result of being high. So, yeah, we keep in touch about it.

The drug effects were variable and sometimes difficult to deal with. Thus great importance was placed on having a social group that would be understanding about members' difficult moods or even their desire to absent themselves.

R: Well, it depends, but I think I can say I enjoy drugs more when I'm with other people. I know sometimes I get melancholy when I use heroin, and it's not always great to be melancholy with other people. And sometimes for that reason I do it alone. But it can be different, and if I do get melancholy, my friends seem to understand. Yeah, probably more enjoyable with other people.

It was also important for our controlled users to demonstrate to themselves primarily, and to others secondarily, that their heroin use had not interfered with their ability to keep up with many different social groups.

R: Even when I was in my heaviest drug period in California, I still kept my high-school contacts. I always keep my contacts up and I'll play the role, whatever it needs to be. I've never seemed to be so much out of control that I've had to cut off a complete group of people.

Yet in attempting to stay in contact with other social groups, users ran into the problem of having to conceal their heroin use. Quite in contrast to compulsives, most of our controlled subjects, like the next two, were morbidly concerned lest their use should become known to nonusing significant others.

R: I had so much close contact with my mother and my other friends, whom I dug more than these other dudes. I dug the dudes because they dug heroin, but my other friends were more important to me. You see, I was living almost a triple life. I had to not only conceal from my mother, but also from the good guys, and then swing with the bad guys. Plus, you know, try to put out towards society-you know, looking good, not showing anybody that you do this. So I couldn't afford to do it every day.

R: Most of my friends don't know. Or it's been mentioned a couple of times and then just dropped, and it's never been brought up again. So what they really know or what they think, I don't know, 'cause I don't go proddin' for it. Because they're sort of-some of them don't even smoke pot. The first time their initial reaction to it was just a shh, you know, it was just such a shock to them, sort of a thing, that their friendship means enough to me to want to keep it and not have that come between us.

For almost all of our subjects, the fear of nonusers' learning about their use proved to be well founded.

R: The people who've never done it or people who used to do it-reformed junkie-types-are so against it that it's not even worth mentioning. I'd rather not cause a hassle. And when I have told people, they're always watching out to see if I'm doing it, and if I am, they'll give me a lecture. So it's not worth it to tell them.

Even friends who shared certain aspects of the drug experience might disapprove if a controlled user crossed the boundary from snorting to shooting up. This added to the "paranoia" our subjects felt about others' learning of their use.

I: Have you had friends who don't use and know that you use and express disapproval?

R: Yes.

I: In strong terms? R: Yup.

I: What sorts of things do they say?

R: Well, with one friend-one that's most adamant about it-there's a lot of concern involved. And lecturing. And usually by the time it gets to the lecture, it wears on me, you know. One time we snorted heroin before I started using it to any degree, and he didn't get off on it, and he told me about it. He said, " I spent ten bucks for it and I didn't get anything out of it." After the first time I shot it, I just went and told him, "Wow, I didn't have anywhere near the same experience you had-I thought it was great!" And he said, "Did you snort it?" and I said, "No." And that's when it started. And he started with this business about-he's my best friend-" I suppose I'm going to have to start watching my stereo equipment now." Just trying to lay it on like that. And then he started going into this lecture: "Once you start you can't stop; you do it once, and you're going to be hooked for life; stop while you can." And I just thought that the best way around this, I guess, is not to mention it.

It was clear from our interviews that nonusers could not believe that heroin could be used in a controlled way in a social gathering. As one subject put it:

R: I'd hear about it from her: "You're going to turn into a junkie; I don't want to live with a junkie." And I'd be getting all sorts of hassles all over the place. So a lot of times I just wouldn't say anything about it. I'd just get off, and I wouldn't say anything about it. And then, if she says to me, "Your eyes look like they're pinned; did you get off or something?" "Oh yeah, I got off." But unless she explicitly mentioned that, a lot of times I'd wear my glasses around the house to make it so that my eyes weren't-right out there. I kept it from her.

Users with significant others who were nonusers could run into an additional complication: criticism that was leveled not only at themselves but at their friends.

I: What does your wife think of your friends? R: She doesn't like them at all.

I: Why?

R: Because she feels they're influencing me.

I: In other words, if they weren't around you at all and they didn't call you, you wouldn't even use on weekends. Is that it?

R: No, I'm not saying that. It's just that I'm a lot more apt to use when I'm out with my friends.

Despite the brave front they put on, our controlled heroin users knew that they were doing something extremely dangerous. Especially unpleasant, even frightening, was the association with addicts that usually was required in order to obtain the drug.

R: One of the major problems with chipping is getting involved with the heroin subculture. One of the incredible problems arises when you only buy a gram or so. The people that you buy it from tend to call you back twice a day for two weeks, at least, and it's quite a hassle getting. First of all, you're always getting burned. You never get a really good deal. You're constantly getting harassed by these people on the phone. Every call is an invitation to join the addict subculture or the habitual using subculture, and there's nothing you can do about this. People you are buying from are in this subculture.

Association with junkies might not only lead to increased use and potential addiction but also to the risk of arrest.

I: Is that where you score-ten the street? R: Always on the street, practically.

I: Is there some reason for that?

R: Well, yeah, because the people are visible. I know one place where it's a house thing, but his dope is terrible. I wouldn't even go there as a last resort. I mean, if it came down to that I just wouldn't even get high. I

wouldn't consider it. And that's within walking distance of my house. I: So that means you'd have to go to a scene set up for that.

R: Yeah, which is why that thing happened the other night. They'd been hot in the area for, I don't know, a couple of months now. There've been police around and they've been shuffling from one corner to another, and this and that, and it's been, you know, touch and go. You've got to look in the mirror all the time you're down there. And as a matter of fact, I was there about, I think about ten minutes before they got busted.

The degree of association between our controlled subjects and opiate addicts varied. Some subjects had none because they bought through an intermediary; most of the others had contact only in the process of buying, but a few interacted with addicts in a variety of ways. All, however, were scared of becoming like the compulsive users they had seen.

I: As you see it, when you were using it, did you identify yourself as an occasional user, a chipper, as-?'What was your relation to your identity or image?

R: As opposed to an .addict or a nonuser? I: Yes.

R: I considered myself just that, somebody who knew the junk world, who knew what went down in the street life, but yet who wasn't an integral part of the street life. I was separate from it. I had one foot in it, and one foot in the life of the nonuser. When I worked in the organization and when I worked in the program, things like that kept that one foot out, kept me from jumping in the fire with both feet. And so I was in a unique position where I could observe. Once you're really tied up in it, it's really tough to observe. When you've got both feet in it and you're encircled in it, it's really tough. But I was fortunate enough to keep one foot outside of it, so that I could observe, and see what danger could fall upon me if the other foot were dragged in.

The next subject's fear of addiction acted like a sanction or rule to keep her use controlled.

I: And why did that period end?   '

R: I got to a state where I had no choice except to get pulled into the heroin scene for myself, which meant that I would have to do a lot of things, prostitute myself and stuff like that-a lot of heavy stealing. I couldn't see that it would lead to anything. I had higher horizons all the time.

This fear of crossing the line and becoming an addict or, more exactly, a junkie-because it was the life style as much as the actual physiological addiction that was terrifying-had to be dealt with. Subjects went to great lengths to deny their fear and to establish external controls. The next man, who couldn't bear the suspense, had to test himself once and for all to see if he could tolerate addiction without becoming a junkie. The experiment he carried out would be labeled counterphobic in ordinary psychiatric parlance.

R: They were all going through withdrawal when they came into the hospital.

I: Is that why they were there?

R: Yeah. Some of them much more seriously than others. And I got to learning about the nature of withdrawal, what it was that these guys were actually kicking, and what the nature of the habit was, whether it was a physiological process or whether it was psychological. A couple of them looked downright scary; they looked like they were going through hell. And a couple of them it didn't seem to phase, they just got chills and put up with it. But in the course of talking to them about their experiences, I became convinced that they were addicted to the rituals and the life style much more than to the substance. And so I wanted to experience that myself. Shortly after that time I bought a whole lot of heroin and did it daily for ten days.

I: Were you using it by yourself in that period?

R: Yes, although other people were aware that I was doing it. No one was sharing in my heroin. I had bought it for myself, for this experiment, as I thought of it at that time.

I: What was the object of the experiment?

R: To see what it would do to me. To see what quitting would be like. I: What happened when you stopped?

R: I was nauseated. I had chills for about four or five hours. And I had a headache for two days. Other than that, it was an adventure.

Those occasional users who were in close contact with addicts invariably had experiences that indicated how real the horrors of addiction could be. R: I got him into the clinic-if it wasn't for me, I don't think he would have gone. And he went to a halfway house, and I got really mad at him 'cause he wouldn't stay there. He split from there and he was facing jail. (This was a few years back.) And he said, "Well, damn it, I'm not going, they're crazy up there." So I went down, I went there [laugh]. This is Good News House and I went down there; I went there and I stayed there. He was sick; they sat him in a chair for about eighteen hours, looking at a wall. I knew what was going to happen-you start to get sick after you've been sitting there all night. He left after a day and a half. I stayed a little longer with him. I said, "I see what you mean" [laugh]. I think I did a lot of trying for him. The way I look at it, I tried to get him into a lot of different places.

I: Do you worry about his drug use now?

R: No, he's a big boy now. I worry more about myself. But he said he wished he could do what I do now. Just chip a little bit-I really think that's something.

Since almost half of our subjects had had a brush with addiction before they settled into a long-term controlled using pattern, they knew what they had to fear:

R: Yeah, he would shoot up more than I would. I: More times?

R: No, not necessarily more often, but more

I: More stuff each time? More junk each time?

R: Right. And I also had pains, so I was sure it was something we ate or something like that. But not like him, I wasn't hung up on anything. Also, I was taking care of him. It's common with women to be able to just pass over their own physical ailment to [laugh] take care of their men. I really became conscious of it, of what it meant to be strung out. And then I was very careful. And I tried to be careful with him. It was hard to control him. He went through that a few times, kicking, like that.

I: Did you ever have to go through that?

R: No. I mean, once in a while, I would get an upset stomach or something, but that's the most I would get.

I: But you would continue to use even after that?

R: Yeah. But much less than I did before. It was not an everyday thing. I'd do like two days and then purposely abstain for a day.

The fear of being like a junkie, that is, accepting addiction and an addictive life-style, was very real to those who had had extensive contact with addicts.

R: I've seen plenty. The one time I woke up and thought I was sick scared the shit out of me. I told you about Penny-I used with her the first time. Six months later Penny was a whore and a cheap whore at that. She had been busted three times for boosting. I guess she couldn't even do that right. She just needed lots and lots of bread to keep that habit going. Doing it the way I do it, every other weekend or so, it doesn't cost me that much. I just don't want to see any more junkies. I just want to stay as far away from them as I can.

The fear of becoming an addict or a junkie or of being arrested was bad enough, but there were even worse concerns. Most of our subjects observed social sanctions that were really safety precautions to minimize the risks of an overdose and of infection. Yet they all had horror stories to tell.

R: I started shooting heroin for a while, but then I knew of some people who OD'd and died, and then I got pretty paranoid about sticking a needle in my arm. I was thinking that any time I stuck a needle in my arm, I was a potential OD and dying. And I felt anyway that cough syrup and Doridens produced about the same effects that heroin did. You know, the nod, the high, but you don't get the rush.

And once in a while the horror "story" became a reality for a controlled user.

R: It was really weird because I never had anything like that happen before, and then all of a sudden every vein in my whole arm just swelled up and turned red, and I could just see it climbing right up my arm, and I did it in this arm, and it was only from here to here. So I figured once it gets there, that's it, "see you later." And I thought, well, what should I do? And I thought, well, I'll just boost it. And I just kept boosting it, because it was to late at that point to do anything about it anyway, so I figured I might as well just enjoy it while it was there.. And I said goodbye to John, I did. I said, " I think this is it And the two of us were just really freaked out.

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