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Termyn8or -> RE: Which way would you go? (10/16/2008 8:44:05 AM)
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misst, interesting selection of reading material. After you finish it you will probably be the best one to answer your own question.
I have a few questions as to whether it would be possible to manage this side effect. You might want to have a look at the latest SSRI thread in health and safety. I tried not to piss people off there but I am not so sure I succeeded. Some people on SSRIs go "postal" so to speak, like the Columbine shooters.
One good question is what is the time frame in which the patient is dangerous ? I mean if they generally will kill within a month of the end of the program, that last month could be inpatient. However if they could kill years later such a step would be quite impractical.
Actually I would say that if two out of a hundred are going to kill someone innocent or at random, I don't mean their ex-drug-dealer or someone else they may have killed anyway, I would not want to see the program continued. If the risk could be contained somehow, maybe the success rate makes it worthy.
The time frame is still important. If you have to lock them all up for two months, or take them on a retreat or something like that, it might be worthwhile. Also, if those with the tendency for this abberation could be identified early, that would go a long way in selling it's worthiness.
Normally I am against these things, trading one drug for another. Like methadone treatment for heroin addicts. From what I've heard, methadone is addictive, has withdrawal symptoms and most of the drawbacks of heroin, but you just don't get high.
However of late my opinion is changing, partly due to the SSRI thread and partly just reviewing my life experience. (which includes those I have known) Some people just get so hopelessly addicted that there is just about no way to stop them. You can put them in prison for ten years and the first thing they want when they get out is their drug of choice. Well maybe some sex, but the drug is at least number two.
In the SSRI thread I of course came out against them. However I wound up at odds with some who say they would not be here without them. Everyone is being civil of course, but this is a real disagreement.
In the psychological sense, the patients in your book might be the most addicted of the addicted. There may be no other treatment whatsoever for them. I tend to think that in those who kill, there is something in their mind that is not addressed and is subliminated by the drug.
Do they kill after they discontinue the drug ? Or can it happen anywhere near the end of the ninety days, which would indicate that a tolerance is being built up.
Think about it, if they can nail down a time frame, and each patient even has to go to jail for a couple months, imagine the alternative. You could be laying there in your own piss figuring out who to rob to get your next fix, and possibly wind up earning yourself a hell of alot more than two months incarceration.
Would you trade two months of your life to forever off a drug that was killing to, and being quite efficient about it ? Not eating, aging fast, whoring yourself out, ripping off family and friends eventually becoming a loner. Or perhaps you already are a loner and have had to move a few times because there are people after you.
Which brings us to that, about the killing, what if someone shows up from your past who you ripped of or screwed over in some big way looking for revenge ? It happens. What if they kill those people in self defense ?
There may be answers in the book. Let us know, because it is tough to make a call right now due to lack of detail. And the analogy to cancer, apply it. Severe drug addiction is similar to a cancer. I am not talking about someone who likes to burn one after work, I mean the hardcore ones.
T
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