Cocaine & Crack

Cocaine is the drug that has contributed to the damaging of American society over the past fifty years more than any other, affecting a multitude of people at all socioeconomic levels. In the form of crack, cocaine has devastated the urban inner cities, destroying families and amplifying the growth of gang culture across the country.  Cocaine can be snorted, injected or smoked as free-base and in the form of crack. The street names of cocaine include blow, charlie and snow while crack is called rock, wash and stone. The effects of cocaine, more intense when free-based or smoked as crack, include powerful stimulation, a sense of confident well-being and extreme alertness.  Because the crack high is so intense, users find it extremely difficult to control. As the effects wear off, a craving comes upon the user for more and more, particularly enhanced when smoked. Frequent use can lead to consistent feelings of restlessness and paranoia along with sleeplessness and confusion. Users can die from an overdose, particularly when injected or smoked, and high profile disasters have included the basketball player Len Bias and the comic Richard Pryor. Snorting cocaine can permanently alter the inside of the nose, leaving gaping holes and sinus damage. Chasing the intense high of crack, users often repeat the dose over and over, leading to potentially fatal heart attacks.

It is essential to realize that crack is no longer a “ghetto” drug. Used by persons across the board, the craving for the high insinuates itself into their lives, disrupting normative patterns of behavior. Both cocaine and crack addicts soon find their habits almost impossible to control and incredibly expensive. This sudden form of physical and psychic slavery leads the individual to break laws and perform actions they would never have considered in the past. The only way to end this cycle is by stopping use altogether. Similar to heroin, however, cocaine and crack addiction become woven into the framework of the addict’s life. It takes a well-built program of recovery to set the individual free from the chains of cocaine and crack. ONE80CENTER has extensive experience helping cocaine and crack addicts achieve sobriety and introducing a program of sustained recovery into their lives.