The price of doing drugs
25 August 2008
Getting high on drugs might seem like another part of the world with all that excitement initially, but when this fun turns to fear, one might as well wish for a time machine to go back and erase the past. Pushkar Chhetri reports.
Tenzin (name changed), 28 has been doing drugs since he was 14. He has experimented with everything from marijuana, tablets to injecting Proxyvon. “I started using correction fluid and dendrite in the beginning not only for a high but to prove I was a tough guy,” said Tenzin.
After a few years of education in Bhutan, he continued his education in Kalimpong where Tenzin became addicted to tablets. “Kalimpong was a whole new environment and to stay away from home meant a lot of freedom in terms of what I could do,” he remembers.
His experimentation with tablets soon manifested into addiction within a few weeks time. “It was cheaper and easily available and I started having two tablets of Nitrosun-10 and five tablets of Relipen after each meal,” he said, recalling his increasing fetish for tablets.
He narrated how his education was a mess following which his parents called him back home from Kalimpong and decided to admit him to a rehabilitation centre. “I could not study because when one is addicted, the only things that comes to one’s mind is the ways and means to arrange for a day’s quota,” he said.
Tenzin described how he soon started venturing out desperately for money as his relatives would not give him any. “I still remember how I sold my black Levis jeans and steel-toe boots for Nu 450 so that I could score some stripes of Proxyvon and syringes,” he said. “My parents decided to send me to a rehabilitation centre in Nagaland hoping it would help me quit drugs but instead, things became worse.”
He described how there were guys at the rehabilitation centre who would bring syringes and Proxyvon secretly and inject it during break time in the toilets. “When there are people around you doing it the temptation is too hard to resist,” he said, adding how he started injecting 0.5 ml of Proxyvon after which his dose increased to 2.2 ml.
His injecting became more frequent. “I used to look for nerves and veins where ever possible to inject,” he said reciting an anecdote, “I had no nerves left on my arms or my toes and after hours of effort, I found a vein on my leg but since I injected it on the wrong one, a wound developed on my leg which started growing day by day.” He said how he nearly had to get rid of his leg as the wound started to rot and since then, he has been struggling to quit doing drugs.
It’s been about three months that Tenzin has stopped using drugs but it still isn’t over as he struggles every single day fighting the withdrawal symptoms. He said how he suffers from a perennial cough and cold, insomnia, rheumatism and memory loss. “I try to sleep but I can’t because I have breathing problems at night,” he said that he even goes through temporary paralysis. “At times when I am sleeping, I can’t move my hands for an hour or two,” he added.
“A few months ago, I had problems while urinating and a severe abdominal ache and when I went to the hospital, the doctor could not give me a pain killer injection as he could not find any veins to inject the medicine,” he said. At present, Tenzin is under going kidney treatment.
Nowadays, Tenzin is most of the times at home and bedridden. “I am old enough to earn my own livelihood but I am too weak to work,” he said. “I have been to job interviews, but I don’t seem to do well as I don’t have any self confidence,” he said that he was becoming anti-social. Tenzin said how, while home alone, he weaves plans for the future only to find out in the end how incapable he is of doing anything productive.
“I have master plans but no determination to do things that I plan,” he said.
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Loading ...Zakar for Friday July 30 2010
20th Day of the 06th Month - Iron Male Tiger Year
Auspicious for: Carrying out daily chores and making offerings.
Inauspicious for: Starting construction of new house, sowing seeds, planting flowers, entering the new house, shifting houses, calling upon superiors, starting business, doing charity works in the name of deceased, taking out dead bodies, paying grain debts, undertaking long journey and holding discussion.
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whatever ur expriernce u said all syptoms and all, all i had seen in my husband’s behaviour he promised me he will never take proxyvon tab he use to take 6 strips tats is 60 -70 capsuls. but one day i dont know he took some tab and came home he was having meal with me suddenly he started shaking and within 30 sec he lost his life its been 18 days now i still cannt find the reason of his death i know he dint took heavy dose tat day may be one strip, looking up in his past he use to take so many at a time but wat happened that day may be he stoped in between and suddenly took tats way or he use to take all kide of pharmacitucal drugs together like fortwin inj, nitravate 10 mg, katemin ing. please if u have any info on this please email me.