1982_12 The Daily Collegian December 1982

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Cocaine
CSUF students pay high price to indulge in 'rich man's' drug
T
X   h«
-By Jean Vevon
n the Henry Madden Library is still as
hundreds of heads bend over textbooks, intently study
tng. A blond man absorbs his computer information in his
private cubicle, while in the back of his mind he thinks of
"I've been looking for you," he says to the woman
standing over him. He hands her three $20 bills as he
sighs, "Ah, great," examining his new purchase.
Toot. Snow. Blow. Snort. Nose Candy. Coke. And on
and on
They all mean'the same thing: Cocaine, tlie "nch
man's drug." On the street, a half-gram of cocaine goes
lor about $60. A Krtle steep for a few highs. But it's use is
becoming more acceptable and popular, and more peo
pie are using it, including college students.
How prevalent is cocaine use among college students,
and how can a student afford to shell out $60 for a drug?
Some interesting facts were discovered; surprising to
some, not so to many others.
College students are notoriously well know for their
limited budgets and meager living quarters. Yet, a recent
informal survey showed that a majority of CSUF stu¬
dents polled have tried cocaine and use it "frequently" or
"often " A smaller number said they had never tried it.
When asked why they used cocaine, some students
answered. "It's a better high than booze or pot," or "1 was
curious about the effects."
One person offered. "It's fun Cocaine allows the user
to experience heightened consciousness — it's a kx:k,
it's especially enjoyable if you're able to do something
which requires a lot of creativity, i.e., dancing to the
Clams or skiing."
Another said, "I really don't 'use' it. It's a mind-
expanding drug and I need and enjoy mind-expanding
experiences."
Joe, (not his real name), a business student, said he
has been using cocaine since he was 18 years old.
Although he is unemployed, he manages to have cocaine
"in binges."
"Cocaine is enticing and I don't know why. It can be a
real dangerous drug, especially to somebody who's got
access to money."
How does an unemployed student afford cocaine?
"Well, a lot of times the way I do it is my girlfriend and I
split a half a gram for a special occasion or something. So
that would mean that we wouldn't be going out to dinner
that week. The problem there, is once you do that and
say it's only a little bit, maybe a quarter gram-then you
say, 'Well, maybe we better do that again.' So you go
back and you get some more.
"There have been times when I've kicked myself in th/
butt for doingjt, for sure, because of the cost. There are
pfenfy of peejMe that get into it, and just deplete their
bank accounts."
Joe said that in the span of a couple days, he has spent
as much as $250 on cocaine, for his use alone.
"Sometimes I just fiddle around with my expenses, and
say, 'Well, I won't go out, or won't do something else,' so
that I can buy some..
"I was going to buy some clothes.and I haven't gotten
any clothes, not even a shirt. It's so stupid to spend that
money, ljke — boom! — fifty bucks, or a hundred bucks
8 shot, and this stuff is inate, this is a hedonistic urge!"
"I don't have any bills, see. 1 live at home, so all the
money I have is for the car, schoolbooks, and taking care
of myself. But most of the rest ol it is disposable income
that I use to (party) with. So I've got it over other people
who have the constraints of paying for an apartment and
things like that."
Working temporarily early this year, allowed him to
save some money, which he occasionally dips into for
Joe said that he tends to go on binges with cocaine,
and realizes at times that "you have to get serious," and
"But if you're doing something special, it's more fun
So is it better in small quantities?
"I won't say that, because it's somethinq that begs you
to have large quantities. I can see where it could be
addicting. I've never gotten to that point. The part has
scared me before is doing a lot at one time. A friend of
mine that sells a lot of it and I used to do about an eighth
of an ounce in a night, which is about three-and-a-half
grams, just between us You're just amped, you know?
You stay up all that night and most of the next day," he
"Another time, at a concert, where we had done so
much, and started early in the morning. By the time the
concert started, we were just riveted. You're stiff. You
can't move your head, you joints are stiff. It's uncomfor¬
table, real uncomfortable. A little bit is fun. It's just Eke
anything else,' if you drink too much, you're not going to
'There have been times when I kicked myself in the
butt for doing it, for sure, because of the cost There are plenty
of people that get into it, and just deplete their bank accounts.'
"Yeah, I think it could be addicting, sure, especiallyf
you start doing something Kke freebasing, which 1 ntva
Joe, like the majority of students interviewed, sai
they are not addicted to the drug. Most use it as
recreational substance. Few have gotten into freebasing
or mainlining (injecting) cocaine.
But there are students at CSUF who do freebase,
associate with people who do. One full-time student,
Mark (not his real name) freebased and was a chronic
user. While living in Oakland, his habit had ballooned:
spending $500 a week.
Freebasing, Mark explained, is taking cocaine ar
mixing it with another substance, usually some type of
chemical wash. The mixture separates impurities from
the cocaine and ether, which leaves pure cocair
top. The cocaine is then drawn off, and laid out
surface to dry, where it crystalizes. This process makes
the drug water insoluble, which means it
injected, so it must be taken in gas form.
"When it's inhaled through a base pipe, it goes stratfl
to the brain," Mark said. "I remember the first time I ev
hit a pipe. I was sitting on the edge of the bed, and Ic
remember the feeling. I thought that the ceiling a
scraping against the top of my head. Wow."
However, the drug-related deaths of two of his clo
fnends convinced Mark to move to Fresno and give
his expensive and dangerous hobby.
"Now, I'm actually a former user," he said. "I've tri
to get into the school thing. I moved from a totally indoc¬
trinated drug neighborhood. But I still indulge sons
times. I can't get all the way away. -
"I was working two jobs. I had a full-time job at i
private elementary school, and I was working for Units)
Postal Service, which was another hustle. Many good
jewelry, electronic sets, computers — UPS sends e
thing! And there were ways to hustle there.
"For instance, I ' happened' upon five video _,-_
recorders. I sold the five of them for $125 each, and Wrt J"""
Mark quit both his jobs and freebasing the day befa
he moved to Fresno, after witnessing the death of his hi
close friends.
"One of them was like a brother to me," Mark m
"You know how people say, 'He was like a brother I
me.' Well, he was. He and I grew up together, the fir
time I ever moved out was with him, and we did a lot i
drugs together. I had known him since we were 15.
"One night, in fact it was my birthday a couple of ya»
back, and 1 hadn't seen him in a couple of months. Sou
hooked up, and got an eighth, and we cooked it up. Wl'4
just sit in front of the pipe and watch football games. Aa
he took one hit, and he closed his eyes, like he
holding ft, and he never opened 'em up."
Mark's friend died of an overdose that night, becau*
of the accumulation of the drug in his system. That
the first in a series of events that pushed Mark away f
=A12  DacambacIO, 1M2S
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lamc, charging extra for it.
His house was always full of people," Mark said. "And
found myself down theirquite a bit. I went over there
ne mght, and he had been busted in on by a bunch of
ilks five guys I was told, and they all had guns, and they
nptn-d all of the guns in him. They said, 'Your money or
aur drugs' and he said 'I don't have none,' so they took
Karen, (not her real name) a graduate student at
'SUF  uses cocaine frequently and *d& jt ,0 rriends.
1m h of the time she ends up paying for the coke she has
sed instead of turning a profit.
"M. e x - boyfiriend was into dealing it, so he had a lot of
ali ne time. Then, when we broke up it became a sort of
cumpetition. He was dealing it so I thought, 'Well,
•hoot. I'll start dealing it, too.' I could have made a lot of
off of it if I hadn't snorted it up, and used ft on my
ten I first started dealing, 1 spent $1,200 of my loan
i cocaine. I probably sold three-quarters of it and par-
d a quarter of it. I think that time I broke even.
"Ii was quite an experience," Karen said. The most
werful thing about my cocaine experiences and deal-
3 it was the amount of friends that 1 had when they all
Jnd out that 1 had ft. It cause a lot of problems with
endships. Although, I used it. I would take it around
■hies and let people know that I had it, because it's
finitely asocial stigma. If you have coke, it's like driving
Mercedes.
ople expected me to give them cocaine, not only
to them cheap or at my price, but they just
ted me to party it with them. And when I didn't,
railed me stuck up."
e guy in particular, who she thought was her friend,
ed her a different side of his personality.
.'hen 1 wasn't home one rime he and his buddies
> into my apartment and stole a gram, which was
h about $120.1 think they would have stolen more if
could have found it. There are a lot of really close
calk - my neighbor saw them come in the screen, and
so they called the police. The police came after they had
already left, and they looked around. But to them it
looked like nothing had been taken. Sometimes I used to
leave cocaine just fined up on a mirror on my dresser,
and if the police would have come then. I definitely would
have been busted - and it's a felony. After that I really
didn't want to have anything to do with it."
Karen has started selling cocaine again, despite her
initial scare. She said the thought of having cocaine in the
house now doesn't bother her. "I'm really casual with it
now, just because I've become so used to it.
"Dealing is business — you're there to make a profit.
But my weakness is doing business with my friends."
The lasting physical effects of cocaine use are limited,
according to Dr. Gene Ondrusek, clinical psychologist at
Veterans Administration Hospital.
Ondrusek did his po*t-doctoral training at the Univer¬
sity of North Carolina at Chapel HiO, where he and other
psychologists and psychiatrists did government re¬
search in pharmacology. One of the tests they con¬
ducted was the effects of cocaine. For the research, they
used human subjects in the laboratory, doing cocaine.
Some of the things the doctors looked-for were cardiac
function, blood pressure, heart rate and some subjective
effects.
Much of the testing focused on freebasing, since it was
a new way to use cocaine and was gaining much popular¬
ity. The doctor»test*d the subjects tofind th*difference
in the effects of cocaine when it was freebased, snorted
"Well, essentially the route of freebase utiKiation is
very efficient," said Ondrusek, "and give* a trerrwrrrious
rush that is unlike either the snorting or the injected
cocaine. It has a tremendous abuse potential in term* of
getting people involved with it and the craving that fol¬
lows at the end of the do»e — rt/s very intense."
Ondrusek said that cocaine freebasing is physicaDy
addle ting in large doses over long periods of time.Ther*
is a definite tolerance and. withdrawl syndrome, and a
very perswtent craving that lasts a long time."
Only in very rare instances does snorting and intra-
veneous injecting lead to the same type of addiction that
freebasing does, Ondrusek said.
"We came up with the notion that it's not so much the
drug, but the way it's used which produces dependence.
"Cocaine is not completely safe, but you have a lot
more problems and deaths with otheT drugs by far," he
said. Snorting cocaine is usually not dangerous, Ondru¬
sek said, and before the introduction or popularity of
freebasing, a study showed that in a five-yearspan, there
were only eleven cocaine-related deaths, eight of which
'Cocaine is pretty much of a brief drug," Ondrusek
said. The big problems come when you use it for a long
period of time consistently. If you use a lot of it for a long
enough time, you do develop some problema *uch as a
paranoid p*ycho*i*. Essentially, it works much like
amphetimine*. You'll hear voices, you'll think people ar*
following you, youl become very *uspiciou* and para^
noid and guarded. But that usually clears up within a
few days after you stop.
"The bad effects of cocaine occur while you re using rt,
and go away quickly, whan you «top. unfik* alcohol or
h*roin. whtnt, wh*n you Mop, then you're in trouble."
Freebasing i* different, however, Ondrusek said,
because it is inhaled.
"You're mhskng into you lungs thi* heated mattnai
which » also anesthetizing, ao you won't fact rt, so rt'»
very *a*y to damage your lung*, becau** you're no
longer aware of th« MMtJbM that t*l you tfM*fa£
Freabaaer. develop avch * craving lor a*m cocain*
tiurt thay fW * atawt imr»*M*^ *top u^
<kpi^lT*w«ut^.T1^p*^aspar^taM
Ondruaak that whenever th*y would cough, rh*y wosM
»««tl»*#«naiidca**to«tri»rtanycoeaiaa«kM
have bean in their Kings from fraabaaing, and u*e it owar.
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