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We really need a new drinkable alcohol-like drug that encourages sociability but that doesn't metabolize into a literal body/brain-damaging toxin.

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I think what they are saying is that it is because of alcohol in these cases . Not that other things aren't a problem for your liver too.

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Or take responsibility and not drink. Some ppl are more prone to become alcoholics or abuse things. Recovery doesn't happen overnight or a week. It's a lifelong struggle for many. Avoid parties , bars, social events.

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Everyone would be drunk all the time then

I didn't read the article, but I decided that what it says is that people get half of their liver removed at 20 and it gets put on ice. Then, at 40 or 50, they have their destroyed liver removed and the half that they had removed at 20 put back in.

I didn't read it either and can confirm this is what it says

Marijuana infused drinks are the alternate option. They give you the "high" but so far hasn't to my knowledge inflict any long-term damage that I have read anywhere.

Kratom does the trick for me as a replacement.

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Is the new approach to drink more alcohol? God I hope so.

I wonder if anxiety is increasing among young people and whether this explains the uptick in alcohol-related liver disease. People self-medicate more when they are anxious, so there's that. But anxiety can also make people take risks out of fear.

"If I don't go to happy hour, I won't be seen as a team player and I won't get that promotion and thus I'll be some kind of a loser."

"If I don't do shots like the rest of the gang, they won't invite me to hang out with them and I won't have friends and thus I'll be some kind of a loser."

"If I don't do some pre-gaming before our dinner date, I'll be a nervous wreck the whole time and he/she'll think I'm a weirdo and they won't want to go out with me and thus I'll be some kind of loser."

I don't know if anxiety has increased, but I wouldn't be surprised if it has.

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Marijuana and alcohol highs are not really the same and can't really be used as a substitution for someone looking for the other

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Friendly reminder for drinkers to not use acetaminophen (Tylenol). It's a bad combination.

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/322813

How dare you suggest drinking is a bad thing for alcoholics to do. /s

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I mean thousands of years of human civilization we've been drinking alcohol and we haven't even remotely addressed this problem properly, but "don't drink"... damn, that must be the missing piece of advice that alcoholics needed all this time.

It can't possibly be more complicated

True but my point was that it's currently the closest thing on the market. I drink alcohol and I've had marijuana drinks. There is a difference but I can't think of anything else that is close and readily available.

If I changed nothing, I would be part of this statistic. Instead, I found recovery cuz some other drunks carried a message that I could be sober and my life would get better. Thanks to AA, stopdrinking sub, SMART recovery, years of intensive therapy, and the gift of desperation caused by organ failure, I will celebrate 10 years clean and sober tomorrow.

If you drink heavily, you feel that life is pointless, nothing good will ever happen for you, and that you lost the ability to control and enjoy your drinking, I was once in your shoes. The hardest thing I ever did was ask for help, but I believe in you. We can recover from a seemingly hopeless state of mind and body.

Kava. It can cause dependence and health problems but probably less than alcohol.

Edit: I am not promoting kava, I’ve never even tried it myself, I am coming from a harm reduction perspective

Don’t forget to avoid social settings

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Lol yes, thanks bro. Be sure to turn off all ads and media that feature alcohol as well. I think there's a lever for that somewhere.

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Synthehol it is, then.

My brother died from Tylenol, alcohol overdose. A very painful, and slow 4 day death.

I've lived the 2nd example.

Your circle of friends can definitely get smaller when you quit drinking. Shared interests and all that.

a confounding issue, which is widely known in the hepatology community, is the liver is already breaking down earlier and earlier from metabolic disease. More and more young people are developing fatty liver from diet and this accelerates in the presence of alcohol. Sure, some people burn their livers super fast….. but have a heavy drinker with no confounding metabolic disease vs a heavy drinker with fatty liver from poor diet and your gonna see the one with fatty liver from diet have issues decades earlier….

I too would have been one of these statistics almost 11 years ago. Depression, disability, and a generally sucky life led to full-time drinking and I couldn't stop for more than a couple of hours without getting violently ill. I was placed in a skilled nursing facility to live out my last 30 days in as much comfort as possible. While in withdrawal delirium, I tripped and fell and shattered my leg. I ended up staying 3 1/2 months. After going through that, the last thing I wanted to do was drink again. My liver wouldn't take it again. I attended AA for a year and realized how fortunate I was to have the day-to-day fight to stop taken out of my hands. I was also very fortunate to have the support of my parents through the whole thing.

I'm so sorry.

In my festie days we would just put a drop or two of acid in a decent sized water bottle and sip off it throughout the day.

See a therapist, get help. Alcohol is big business so there's that aspect. But failing to take personal responsibility for yourself first is a sign of weakness that hurts you. Say what you want but if you're an addict the world doesn't care much. You have to want the help. It ain't easy. Growing as a person never is.

Weak men make excuses like you do. Takes a strong man to overcome addiction and I'm sure aside from pop tarts you have no clue about the issue in reality.

Isnt kava linked to liver or kidney issues?

My in-law family all likes to get together and go drinking. It ALWAYS end in someone getting mad or upset. My wife has never drank nor will ever start. They would always get onto her for not wanting to have fun and telling me to slow down drinking. Now that I have slowed my drinking I see how annoying they all are while drunk and how most of it is just fake drunk love. Ironically they all judge me for smoking weed despite it being legal in the state I moved too.

Ever since I stopped going out with them they have since turned to the youngest 16 year old and trying to get him to start drinking. Like how are you going to be mad as a grown adult I smoke weed but then encourage your underage children to get drunk with you because you're a depressed adult who likes company in misery..

Sorry just going on rant. Cutting out drinking is making me not able to stand these people and hurting our relationship. Meanwhile just about every other aspect in life and my relationships with people who care is improving

If people don't respect your choices and encourage you to drink... they aren't good people IMO

Yes, but at lower rates than alcohol.

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Sorry for your loss, friend

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Sorry to hear that. My son tried to commit suicide by taking 45 paracetamol and the doctor said that without the antidote it would have been the same outcome for him.

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I enjoyed Kava until I went to the doctor with hives. When he told me it was probably from the Kava I insisted it wasn’t until I was driving home and realized my denial. Stopped taking it and the hives went away.

"New treatment" = mental health The headline made me think it was something actually new

When did you graduate from Clown College

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I’m sorry for your loss similar thing happened to a close friend passed away on 4th day right before liver transplant was to be performed…She was like a sister and far too young. May God grant you healing, peace and ease.

Ibuprofen is not much better with heavy alcohol intake. That combo destroyed my buddy's stomach and esophagus. Puking blood regularly is no fun. Sad reality is that aside from perhaps THC most of the painkillers we have are very bad ideas for alcoholics.

I wonder how much of a "Social Lubricant" alcohol is vs a placebo, I mean obviously slamming back shot after shot and being absolutely blitzed surrounded by other drunk people is one thing, but if you're only gonna have 1 or 2 light beers how much of the socializing was because of the alcohol vs other factors(atmosphere, ritual of drinking,

Me and my Spouse have started buying NA Beers. They're actually pretty good and honestly if I had to choose between only having one "normal" beer and a NA one, if I a not trying to get tipsy I'm choosing the NA one because there's literally no reason to be putting alcohol in my body.

There's actually a pretty big explosion of NA drinks going on now, I remember trying NA beer like 3 years ago(before the pandemic) and it wasn't exactly great(the NA Stella's didn't seem that bad to me).

Really, I think during the pandemic everyone who was working from home everyone had the "oh oh oh, I'm going to be naughty and DRaank on the job tee hee" urge for a week or too (did anyone else remember the virtual happy hours?) And then we all had a come to Jesus moment of "holy crap I shouldn't be drinking like this" and we al realized we only had maybe coffee and tea as a non water option and we want something different now

Sorry for formatting

https://www.npr.org/2022/01/21/1074133992/non-alcoholic-beer-na-guide-best-dry-january

The real problem is that the majority of human societies have spent the past few millennia centering huge parts of their culture around drinking literal neurotoxins, to the point where it’s considered weird not to get at least mildly buzzed on a regular basis.

Fortunately, all we need to to is invent time travel and alter the course of civilization as we know it, and the problem will be solved!

I’ve been clean and sober for 11 years and the boom of non-alcoholic beverages and mocktails has been great for me in the last few years!

I’m so sorry, that must have been unspeakably hard as a parent, and obviously your son must have been in such a painful spot to take that action. I hope you’re both doing well now.

That’s fucking rad! Congrats on your sobriety! Let’s keep trudging the road of happy destiny ❤️

It was a tough time but we got through it. The guilt I bear for not doing anything about it when I first heard him vomiting, well, I don’t think about it much anymore.

He’s now the proud parent of two boys and will be moving into his new house later in the year.

Honestly with the health boom and everything we know, I can kinda see drinking beers casually kinda going the way of tobacco. Like if some one "just wants to drink one or two after work to relax" it's gonna be NA beer.

Shrubs too! They're cocktails that use vinegar instead of Alcohol! Need to start making myself those as well!.

Congrats on the Sobriety!

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‘Brave new world’ my friend

I have that. Because of alcohol when I was younger. I lucky caught at a younger age. I had type two liver cirrhosis. I quit drinking, helped a lot. I can’t reverse my liver damage but I can maintain a healthier living style but exercising and eating healthy. Eating healthy is a big deal with liver cirrhosis and I cut out sodas.

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There is a difference between smoking and drinking though. America went through prohibition and that failed miserably. Finally the message about smoking got through for the most part. Also I’m kind of a health nut, the health industry is booming and more x-fit and big box gyms and personal trainers exist, but the world is getting fatter still. The addiction to sugar is real, just ask all your coworkers if they’re willing to only eat meat and veggies. I’d figure 98% of health problems go away, less diabetes/heart/ back and arthritis easily. Easy to say, hard to do. I know I’ve done it for half a year, all health markers improved and fat was lost. HDL up and triglycerides down.

I wouldn't say it makes you brave, but I'd say it makes you not care.

Apparently the way it makes people/groups more social is that as a depressant it slows you down and it stops you from picking up social ques. So a sober person might see a yellow light and not talk, a person who has drunk a little still sees a green light and goes right ahead

GHB? It's illegal but I don't really know how bad it is for you.

Prohibition wasn't voluntary though. I think there's gonna be a sobriety wave soon(like in 10 years or something), dry January is a thing, and people are starting to take breaks from drinking. Although it might be from more of a "I don't need the excess calories" rather than a "alcohol is bad for you", ibknow personally when I'm out of shape my desire to drink goes down massively, and if I do it ends up being something harder like rum or whiskey(of which I'll probably dump half of it anyway).

I dont necessarily think suger is the issue in and of itself, I think it's just absolutely everything about modern life subconsciously forces you to eat to healthily if you're not specifically looking out at all times

I’m so sorry. My brother did it intentionally, got scared and went to the emergency room, and they didn’t do anything. By the time he went to a different hospital, it was way too late. All his organs just shut down one by one. What a terrible way to go.

I really hope your son is doing ok, and in a better place now.

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>but if you're only gonna have 1 or 2 light beers how much of the socializing was because of the alcohol vs other factors(atmosphere, ritual of drinking,

If that's your normal amount of drinking then you don't have liver disease to worry about in the first place so.....

Which would be an excellent alternative if LSD were a legal option and not one of the most tightly controlled drugs in the country, if not the world.

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Not a doctor, but I think it's 1 standard drink for a guy and maybe half that for a women per day is the max that you can have and not have it affect your liver over time.

There are people who don't binge drink, but drink constantly, "only" having 1 or two beers a day means you're drinking 7-14 beers a week, probably of varying alcohol contents(and a standard drink is way smaller than people think).

Yah you're not gonna die from alcohol poisoning, but the point is that this stuff builds up and sure people have it sneak up on them and they don't realize it until it hits them

Just give us legal access to other drugs. I sure as shit would rather be nodding off or stimmed up wankin my dick fruitlessly trying to get off when on crystal.

Alcoholism sucks and it just becomes a chore at this point. Quick, run to the store just to feel normal and kill the shakes.

Fun, everyday is an adventure to quell this bullshit, peace be upon you that have mouthwash on hand, at least you have something.

I don't like this article lol

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My partner and I go for zero-alcohol beers, then drop water soluble THC in it (benefits of Canadian weed legality) and that's been a game changer for us.

Can confirm it’s not a quick effect like after 15 minutes. Taking Tylenol and Alcohol at the same time or even if you take Tylenol 15 minutes before drinking alcohol is a slow walk to saturating liver enzymes and creation of a toxic byproduct. People will be admitted to the floor due to seriousness of condition.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK441917/ This link is about acetaminophen toxicity. The only treatment for acetaminophen toxicity is acetylcysteine.

Things have a way of getting around.

Dude meth addiction is not better than any other. Been there and it’s an ugly ass road. Legal weed or even coke I can back. But not crack, meth, opiates. And really not sure if I actually back those others. I used to use anything I could get my hands on and I hate that part of my life.

Maybe just having safe havens to use is the answer. So if you OD (which I did and luckily got saved) people are around to help you

If you follow the science there's basically no account of alcohol that is good for you. They said, in the majority of cases, a healthy human body will deal with light-moderate drinking.

> I wonder how much of a "Social Lubricant" alcohol is vs a placebo

Depends on the person. Some people already have lower inhibitions in social situations.

Stone people will sit in a corner, catatonic in a social situation without "lubricant"

Could you take acetylcysteine to mitigate possible damage from the combo?

My wife joined a weight loss support group that meets over Zoom. She told me that everyone (~10) on the call (except her) said that they were casual drinkers before the pandemic but it turned into a problem since the pandemic. Obviously, the empty calories are bad for their goals, but my wife and I have suspected that more and more people turned to alcohol during the pandemic/stress of day normal life now. This seems to support that.

As I understand it, the liver issues mostly came from unscrupulous extract sellers who were using the stems and leaves.

Basically, you drink the dried & powdered roots of the plant, but for a while there was a big boom on making pills with extracts. Demand exceeded supply and some people started using the parts of the plant not traditionally consumed. These parts have some other compounds in them that you don't want (similar to how tomato and potato leaves contain solanine), and now people were taking basically concentrates of them. This is where you get problems. The roots have hundreds of years of traditional consumption in Polynesia, the leaves, not so much. Supposedly they were traditionally used as an abortifacient, so probably not something you want to drink.

Among those who drink traditional varieties of kava in Polynesian cultures, I do not think the liver problems have been well documented. Which doesn't mean it doesn't cause problems, it could also be due to it being a relatively less studied topic.

Thank you!

I wish you continued healing ❤️ It sounds like there’s a lot of beauty in your lives now.

Alcohol still killing people. Meanwhile THC is over there being all illegal and curing cancer. Seems legit. Smoking: yes. Drinking: yes. Cancer cure: Illegal.

Paracetamol is bad for anyone in anything exceeding the stated dose. Would not be licensed for over the counter use these days.

Thank you

Paracetamol for non-Americans.

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I don't really like the taste of alcohol, so when I go out with friends for happy hour, I usually nurse one cocktail to their two or three beers. I am lucky that this doesn't bother them and that no one in the group is trying get wasted.

But when I know the situation is a "let's get wasted!" one, I just can't with that. I am at that stage in my life where I don't care if this means I don't have a lot of friends. The way I see it, if a person doesn't want to be my friend unless I get wasted with them, they don't really want to get to know me as a person. They just want a drinking partner. I would rather be lonely than be that.

Do not use ibuprofen either, not good for the kidneys.

Fuck...

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The number of times I have seen people do this and nothing happen is insane but cripe, after reading that article I will be spreading the word to those that do this. I didn't even know it was that bad for you to do.

Tylenol was my go-to hangover reliever for a lot of years. I popped a couple at least a few times a week. I stopped using it when this issue first came to light.

r/stopdrinking helped me a lot when I decided to stop drinking.

I stopped 2 years ago and I worry that drinking a NA beer will do nothing but put the taste back in my mouth and make me give in to temptation.

I personally don’t do NA beer for that reason, but just the variety of options beyond pop is awesome!

Give me some unsweetened and flavored fizzy water and I'm good to go. Maybe some Earl Grey tea if it's not too late.

Stop spreading disinformation. THC is not a painkiller. this has been well established in scientific study.

Advocating for Personal Responsibility?

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Are you me? For real though, I'm up for safe spaces to use. I know addiction can be tough as fuck but some people just need relief from the real world. Hard or soft substances, matters not, as long as said person isn't put in a position that endangers themselves or others.

Also also, meth addiction really sucks but alcoholism is the fuckin worse. The whole dying thing isn't cool and if you're epileptic that sorta makes things worse.

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I am absolutely opposed to any form of alcohol consumption, but even more against backward toxic men who believe there can talk to other about strength or any nonsense about "you have failed as a man". you are responsible for the decline of humanity.

I am absolutely opposed to any form of alcohol consumption, but even more against backward toxic men who believe to want to talk to other strength or any nonsense about "you have failed as a man". you are responsible for the decline of humanity.

Everyone's different of course but I was a full fledged craft beer nerd, now 4 years sober. I drink maybe two 6 packs of craft NA a year, it's nice for tailgates and parties to not feel weird but they're not cheap and the calories just feel empty.

haha, I probably would have stopped years before, but I discovered the local brewery scene.

Yeah, it's a dangerous "hobby" for sure. Tons of lining up for releases, trading beers, seeking out breweries on trips. Just became such a burden.

I'm sure COVID when all the breweries around me were delivering it would've been a nightmare at home.

You find out your "friends" aren't really friends at all, just drinking buddies.

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I’m recovering. Most addicts are just addicts, they can truly get or become addicted to anything. There is no changing that. The key is to become addicted to healthy things, like weight lifting, running, eating nutritious foods, etc.

Once you can replace bad habits with healthy habits 1/2 of the battle is won. The rest is still a challenge but it’s a helluva lot easier when you have a reason to stay clean. That reason is YOU!

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Hmm...sure helps with my arthritis. Off all opiods now.

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Cannabis beverages exist. Can be psychologically addictive, sure… but it’s not going to destroy your internal organs nearly as badly as alcohol. And no hangover.

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Same here. AA wasn't for me, but r/stopdrinking was a huge help for me. Good people there.

Here ya go buddy: https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/services/drugs-medication/cannabis/information-medical-practitioners/information-health-care-professionals-cannabis-cannabinoids.html

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I love cannabis and use it for pain, but I did find this recent study that found essentially there is no difference between a placebo and thc for pain relief, but it is more complicated than that I think.

https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/does-cannabis-actually-relieve-pain-or-is-something-else-going-on-202212082863

many drugs that work on the same receptors as alcohol (GABA mainly) already exist they're just illegal

I've heard people say that they drive better with cannabis and that it can cure cancer

You are not likely to be prescribed acetylcysteine by your doctor beforehand if you intend to take a pill before getting hammered and then take Tylenol for the headache, like 1 hour after stopping to drink. I should also state that the chemical composition of N-acetylcysteine contains a sulfur group, meaning the medication will smell. It is known the tablet form is horrible to take.

Just keep drinking water to stay hydrated. I drank a bunch of Pedialyte to stave off a headache with better success than Gatorade.

Yeah I mean, there are probably a lot of benefits that we haven’t discovered, but there are also side affects we probably aren’t aware of. IMO there is no such thing as a miracle drug and no one should be driving while high.

I don't know if you are nitpicking THC vs cannabis in general or if you are referring to a neurological definition of pain that isn't the common definition, but for the millions of us who get very effective relief for pain symptoms from cannabis, you sound like someone with a biased agenda, and frankly ridiculous.

I used to take N.A.C. as a health supplement it's an amino acid, and did not ever smell like sulfur, a bit like vitamins at worst. I took it on the basis it can help create glutathione, and reduce inflammation. It's actually one of the pills I will put in my mouth before finding water to drink since it tastes like a gelcap and then nothing if it dissolves. You can buy it at a health food store no dr. needed. No this doesn't mean you should od on tylenol or ever take it if you can avoid it.

thats a good idea, because weed beverages always have too much thc to just be drank as a bottle.

I was a musician for years (70s/80s/some 90s) giging mostly across Canada so long drives and lots of cannabis smoked. I would rather be with a driver who smoked pot then drank. No cannabis can not cure cancer but it does help ease the adverse symptoms of treatments for cancer. CBD basically fixed my loss of Cartlidge in my knees but it takes a long time to work. And even my dentist approves of me using it to reduce inflammation after dental visits. SO CBD and THC for a hangover works very well. There are many more compounds in cannabis that the medical/scientific community are finding. https://bluebirdbotanicals.com/blogs/understanding-cbd/meet-your-cannabionoids

Been smoking cannabis for 50 years now with no adverse affects. Quit smoking tobacco 6 years ago and my lungs are fine now but I still smoke cannabis. You can not overdose with natural cannabis. It is not like hard drugs. We know the effects of tobacco on the body and the number of people it kills world wide but it is still legal. Same with alcohol. Sugar. Processed foods and so on.

And as a plant you can make everything from medicine, paper, rope, plastic, food, and many more things. And it grows quickly in all sorts of environments.

I'm not surprised. I'm one of those, I guess. I drink too much; a few fifths of vodka a week. My doctors tell me I need to quit. I worry about cirrhosis somewhat.

Getting blackout drunk makes the empty time between work & sleep go by quicker. And I don't really have anything to live for. No friends, no family, bleak future. So, while I don't have cravings and I'm not physically addicted to alcohol, I can't think of a good reason to stop and extend my life.

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Yeah there are definitely a lot of good things about it, it’s the only drug I use, I don’t even take over the counter pain killers. My whole family uses it and my dad has used it for 50 years ish as well. It’s much safer than other legal drugs, like alcohol and tobacco. However, due to the fact cannabis has been illegal for so long, there are side effects some users suffer that have not been studied. My dads doctor recently indicated there may be a link between his high blood pressure and cannabis use for example, as well as this digestive issue he’s been having. I still think the pros outweigh the cons, just saying there is more research that needs to be done.

Wow. You've got to find something that excites you and make you want to live. A hobby, a craft, working out, something, anything.

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That is true and can be said about most medications. I have lived in both the US and Canada. I know the Canadian government is very strict on approving new drugs, as in new to the system. Since legalization across Canada you find fewer than expected reports of cannabis related issues. Of course with driving we see far more alcohol related charges than cannabis. And other then stupid people leaving edibles out for kids to get, very few medical issues. Of course everyone reacts differently. I fully expect mushrooms will be legalized here shortly with microdosing being popular. Psilocybe cubensis and others in this family is even safer health wise than cannabis. Did you watch Dopesick? Look it up, great depiction of oxi contin.

BTW thanks for the conversation.

I've tried for a long time to get better. A decade at least. Nothing seems to help. Tried a lot of different meds & therapy. Tried things I used to enjoy and new things I think I might. I've given up hope that I might be happy or content one day. I don't even remember what they feel like.

Anyways, my post wasn't meant to focus on me. Just to provide a window into the people in the article that're effected by this. The future looks bleak, there's no chance for many to improve their lives, and our government only seems to care about making the rich richer. It's no wonder that depression & alcoholism are on the rise.

Some of you really need to get on the marijuana train and stop binge drinking. It's legal now in many states, and you don't even have to smoke or vape it.

I'm cured!

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Reasons I am glad to be 5 years sober.

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Kava kava?

Good move on avoiding the NA beer (which isn't even fully NA). That was my brother's big mistake, and the taste came back 10-fold.

Combining physical and mental health treatment! What a novel concept!

Liver issues have to be increasing over. NAFLD is likely going to hit many many adults. Avoiding it is hard it seems