Tag Archives: drug

Chanukkah

Chanukkah: (n) a lesser Jewish festival, lasting eight days

America is apparently doped up, and the drug of choice is freedom. Yes, it is possible to have so much freedom that there is no restraint.

We need to learn the difference between giving respect and giving attention.

For instance, anyone who is struggling with gender identification should be given the respect and space to make that journey. But when such
a group of people is less than one percent of our country, giving them too much attention is flat-out ridiculous.

The same thing is true with Christmas and Chanukkah. At last count, there were eight million Jews in the world. God bless them. (Or Jehovah bless them, depending on which one is more appropriate.) They have a celebration which falls near Christmas. It should be given respect.

But it cannot be given equal attention to Christmas.

It is absolutely ludicrous. You do not make things fair by making everything equally as important. Chanukkah is a holiday for fewer than eight million people. Christmas, on the other hand, is celebrated by three-and-a-half billion.

Numbers do make a difference. Otherwise, we don’t have Democracy. The more votes a candidate gets, the better chance they have of being elected.

So in my opinion, it’s “Merry Christmas to one and all,” and to our Jewish friends, “Happy Chanukkah.” It is NOT “Merry Christmas and Happy Chanukkah.”

They are not equivalent and it is an irrational idea to presume that both should be given equal attention.

I’m glad I live in a country that gives respect to all participants, but I do not want to live in a comical environment, where we attempt to achieve equal attention.

 

 

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Amphetamine

dictionary with letter A

Amphetamine: (n) a synthetic, mood-altering, addictive drug, used illegally as a stimulant and legally to treat ADD in children and narcolepsy in adults.

Thirty seconds to explain what it does and thirty seconds to scare the crap out of you over the side effects.

That is the construction of the normal commercial on television advertising a new drug.

We need to get away from the concept that drugs are miracles.

Perhaps they are miracles in the sense of describing the Grand Canyon if you’re only viewing it from a safe distance or in some sort of slide show.

But if you’re standing on the edge of the Grand Canyon and leaping head-first into the abyss, it loses some of the glow of its “miraculous.” Then it just becomes a bunch of rocks smashing your brains.

Here’s my truth: use as few drugs as possible.

For me, this became fairly complicated when I was diagnosed with diabetes. They recommend you try to keep your blood sugar down through diet and medication. But with this particular condition, the doctors began to introduce other peripheral possibilities which they decided to pre-medicate by giving me additional drugs, which, separate from their helpful tendencies, are basically poison.

Just as ministers want to make you a sinner and politicians want to put you into a voting block, physicians feel useful when they discover ailments in you.

I don’t hold it against them. It’s their profession. After all, in the process of being paranoid, even crazy people avoid obstacles and difficulties.

But drugs are nothing to mess with–especially amphetamines. It is beyond comprehension that we pump our children full of chemicals to get them to be attentive when it used to be handled in the schoolyard at recess by somebody throwing a ball at your head and saying, “Wake up, Billy!”

It’s not that I recommend the crude treatment of children to one another. But I am not convinced that rattling the human body with deadly potions is a better alternative.

I am not an individual who places great faith in holistic medicine.

I am not against prescribing cures for those who are hurting.

It’s just that I think the truly mature human being needs to step back from any diagnosis, and before popping a pill of purpose, ask if there is any other way.

Because when drugs get done with human beings, they mostly addict us and hurt us.

Therefore, we should only welcome them temporarily … and cautiously.

 

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AMA

dictionary with letter A

AMA: (abbr.) American Medical Association

Much to the chagrin of a physician or two who have crossed my path, I look on the medical field with the same level of respect–and caution–that I do with politics and religion.

I know that doctors want me to have faith in them and to accept their diagnosis and treatment without question. But like politics and religion, medicine has things it does well and other things yet to be achieved.

For instance, politics affords us a rudimentary form of democracy which is certainly better than any other style of government presently available. But it also thrusts upon us politicians, gridlock and a ridiculous amount of debate, which stall needful expansion.

In the same fashion, religion stands as a symbol of goodness and kindness in a world gone mad, while simultaneously translating the mercy of God into the misery of restrictions.

The American Medical Association is much the same. Although they offer many advances, it is undoubtedly true that much of what they do will be viewed in the future as the equivalent of placing leeches on the body of the ailing George Washington.

It’s just important to understand:

  • What medicine knows and what medicine doesn’t know
  • What religion does well and what religion does poorly
  • And how politics advances the cause of humanity, and also how it can deter

So here’s a clue: don’t do anything until you understand. And that doesn’t mean that you should comprehend, or why don’t you “get it?”

Move out on the basis of your own understanding.

Several years ago I told my personal physician that a certain medication made me feel sick, and rather than lowering my blood pressure, was actually raising it. She doubted my assertion. So the next time I went in I brought a report, explaining that the pill was under scrutiny and needed to be carefully administered. She was still not convinced, but I insisted that she take me off the medication. When she did I started feeling better.

Two months later the drug was removed from the market.

This is not my doctor’s fault; she was following the precepts of her particular religious practice. It was my responsibility to avoid something I didn’t understand.

There are many things I don’t understand about politics and religion–and also medicine.

But rather than assuming I’m ignorant, I just choose to delay joining the party … until I’m sure of what’s in the punch.

Adrenalin

Words from Dic(tionary)

dictionary with letter AAdrenalin: (n) a hormone secreted by the adrenal glands, esp. in conditions of stress, increasing rates of blood circulation, breathing, and carbohydrate metabolism and preparing muscles for exertion.

I wanted a shot of adrenalin just last night. It’s the body’s cocaine, you know–except no policeman picks you up because you have white powder on the tip of your nose.

The trouble with adrenalin is that it is only available when we find ourselves at our worst. It’s a drug the body secretes when we are stressed, frightened to death, or overly angry about some situation.

Actually, one of the questions I would like to ask God is about adrenalin–because giving adrenalin to someone who is already insanely imbalanced in their judgment is like selling a gun to a person who is deranged and might go out to shoot people in the workplace. (Wait a second. We DO that …)

Truthfully, what I need when I’m trying to find my car keys and about to burst into fury is a shot of Valium. (“Chill out, Pilgrim. We’ll find the keys, and if we don’t we’ll go back in the house and toast up a frozen pizza and watch reruns of The Waltons…”)

The LAST thing in the world I require when I am scared by an unexpected bogey man, is to have my heart rate suddenly go up to 180 beats per minute, stealing my breath and depriving my brain, which needs to accessed for escape plans, of oxygen.

My mother told me that when I was a child that I got bronchitis so severely one night that my heart stopped and I couldn’t breathe. Our local doctor gave me a shot in the heart of some adrenalin. (Now, I don’t know if this was true or not. I love my mother dearly, but she was known to spin a yarn, and I don’t mean to make a sweater…) But if any of it IS true, and I did require that drug to start my breathing again, I am grateful.

But it tells me how potent it is, and how dangerous it can be at the wrong times. I suppose if I were in a car accident and someone I loved was underneath the back wheels and I was suddenly required to lift the car up, adrenalin would be helpful.

But feeling pumped, driven, intoxicated and drugged at a time when I probably should calm down is not helpful.

So as far as adrenalin is concerned, like so many things in nature, I do see the purpose … I’m just not really clear on the application.

Adequate

Words from Dic(tionary)

Adequate: (adj.) satisfactory or acceptable in quality or quantity.dictionary with letter A

 Five steps to building a loser (for after all, they ARE manufactured, not born):

  1. Teach him or her that they were born special and unique. (For if you’re going to fail and not measure up to the standards set around you, you need to be able to forgive it by mentioning your individual genetic configuration.)
  2. Tell him or her that all they have to do is their best. (Being human, our best is eventually defined as the amount of energy we are willing to expend at any moment on any situation.)
  3. You should also tell them that they deserve praise for just trying. (Addicting people to praise is leaving them to believe that they’re going to be able to acquire the drug on the street. They won’t.)
  4. Let them know that excuses are the same as apologies. (Can we make this clear? An excuse is the opposite of an apology. An excuse is asking someone to understand why it was completely impossible for you to achieve the goal. An apology is an admission that the goal needed to be achieved, and unfortunately, you fell short.)
  5.  And finally, communicate to him or her that everyone wins. (Matter of fact, print certificates of participation, place gold stars on their sheet or make sure the pizza party planned for the winners is diluted by including everyone who lost.)

We live in a world where we honor people who train, excel, pursue and win the prize.  There is usually only one.

Contrary to Mr. Webster (or Ms., so as not to be sexist) adequate is not satisfying. Adequate is also not acceptable.

Adequate is when people inform us that they don’t believe we can do better. It is why we will not put up with an adequate doctor, an adequate plumber or even an adequate person washing our car.

What we expect from others we need to apply to ourselves. Since we know there is no reward for the first mile and blessing only in the second mile, how could we ever think we should be applauded … at the half-mile mark?