question (for a story) about cocaine effects

[kindkit]

I'm writing a story for which it would be helpful to know about the effects that taking (snorting) cocaine would have on a regular recreational user. I haven't even tried googling this because I feel certain that everything I get will be either anti-drug propaganda or pro-drug propaganda, and neither is useful to me.

Information about both the immediate effects (what's a cocaine high like for a regular user?) and the longer-term effects of regular cocaine use would be helpful. Since the story's in the POV of someone else (who has used cocaine in the past but isn't high during the scene in question), I'd especially like to know about behavioral effects. The character who's high isn't trying to hide the fact.

He then goes on to drink a substantial amount of alcohol--four double whiskies--in a short time period on top of the cocaine he's already taken. Again, anything you can tell me about the effect of mixing alcohol and cocaine would be great.

I'd prefer not to write the character in question as an addict, so I guess there's a subsidiary question, which is: is it possible to use cocaine fairly regularly and not become addicted? (Sorry if that's a stupid question. I was raised in the US during the anti-drug scare of the 1980s and was bombarded with the propaganda that all illegal drugs are instantly addictive.)

Anonymous commenting is fine; I've switched off IP logging.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

I'm quite possibly the wrong person to reply because I don't drink, but in the early eighties I was more than happy to use whatever amount of coke was on offer. The thing about cocaine is that if you don't hate it, you pretty much love it. I never came close to addiction (luckily) and when free coke disappeared (i.e., when all the coke-using folks I knew had either quit of their own volition or had ended up in treatment), I stopped. But I could still feel the unending rush of adrenaline and the sense that I could accomplish anything. I could still taste the strangely numbing aftertaste on my lips and fingertips and tongue, could feel the bittersweet slide of cocaine-tinged saliva down the back of my throat, and for...a while, still wished that somebody - anybody - would say "Hey, do you want to do a line or two?"

90% of the people I knew who used cocaine regularly (snorting only) in the early eighties never became addicted, but since nobody knows if they're going to be the one to get addicted the very first time they use the drug, I wouldn't recommend it to anybody, even though I enjoyed it 2/3 of a lifetime ago).

As far as being able to tell if somebody else is high on coke? I suppose. There's a certain manic quality...and a lot of licking of lips. But honestly, most of the people I knew didn't show any particular signs of being high.

Cocaine with alcohol though...reaction time, decision making ability, everything is much worse than either alone, so 1 + 1 = 5?

(I decided to make this un-googleable too)

still Beth :)

[kindkit]

Thanks so much for all this information!