Nirvana Head Shop - selling 'legal' drugs

[coritstoughoutthere]

Hi everyone, I tried a search and apologise if this has already been covered - if it has please point me in the right direction.
i have come here because I do not know what to do about this shop that has opened up in our town.

I have four children aged from early twenties to Primary school. I am pretty worldly, hands on and have a good relationship with the kids. They discuss lots with me - sometimes too much and try not to be shocked. Hopefully I offer sound advice to them as there is 'nothing new under the sun'

Now to my topic: this shop has opened up on the high street selling 'legal' drugs and quite frankly I am horrified. It only sells to over 18 with ID - oh that?s reassuring, not! How many of our kids have fake ID?

reading the review pages it is all 'drug speak' with induced effects similar to "speed" the "real thing" etc. some have reported side effects lasting for several days later, even weeks.

I could go on but will leave you to view their web pages.

I am deeply concerned. I now what Prof Nutt(?) stated about drugs: alcohol: horse riding and totally disagree. if you fall off your horse and break a leg is not the same as taking an ecstasy substitute and going into a coma!

Help - where do I go from here or am I alone in my utter frustration? I want to do something but what will be effective.....and lawful?

I don't think there's anything you can do; this is a shop selling legal "stuff", just like Tesco (who sell addictive substances such as tobacco and alcohol) or your butcher (who deals in dead animals). If you don't like it that these substances are legal I guess you could campaign against them (not the shop, there are loads of other headshops and you can even buy the stuff online) by taking the issue up with your local MP, but I doubt anything much would be done, so close to a General Election.

Incidentally, I agree with Prof Nutt, but that's neither here nor there.

Oh, and pharmacies (and indeed, corner shops and petrol stations) sell legal drugs too - will you be campaigning against the sale of paracetamol (which can cause a horrible death in really quite small quantities)?

Where have you been fr the past 30 years?

If they are legal, they will have been pharmaceutically tested. It's the law. They will be safe.

"If they are legal, they will have been pharmaceutically tested. It's the law. They will be safe."

You are wrong about this Colditz. "Legal highs" manufacturers have exploited loopholes in drugs legistation. They are not necessarliy safe and are not regulated.

Corits - You are not wrong to be concerned, but proportionately, it is more likely that alcohol will be a problem for experimenting teenagers than any other substance.

unavailable, I think you're right that they won't have been tested, but disagree that the manufacturers "exploit loopholes in legislation" - there simply isn't any legislation about them. If Parliament were to legislate on every mood-altering substance known to humanity, there would be precious little time left for anything else.

Having tried a few of these products in my feckless youth, as well as most of the illegal substances they're supposed to mimic, I would like to pass on to your dc (& anyone else who might be tempted), my verdict:

Mostly they make you a bit jittery. You can simulate this by eating instant coffee straight from the jar. (Actually, don't - a mate of mine did just that to get an overdue essay in & he went decidedly peculiar for 2 days)

Some of them also raise your temperature & make you throw up.

They will all tend to make you talk bollocks a lot & feel a bit poorly.

On the plus side, these products tend not to have actually killed anyone, or they'd have been investigated & banned, & you don't have to buy them off scary rip-off merchants in rough pubs.

& anyone who gives them a go & thinks they're the same thing as 'real' drugs, is likely to be very effectively put off proper drugs, thanks to all the jittering & puking.

Really appreciate your responses.

ravenAK thank you for your imput interesting to hear from someone who has 'tried' these things. but are they the same products? realising that weed in my days is comparatively harmless to the highly cultured stuff produced today as my sons and friends testify sadly, one ending up being sectioned. i know that may be an unusal but not rare occurance.

Some of my peer group now suffering with bi polar depression do wonder if it is a throw back to their pot smoking days, but then my grandparents took barbiturates like we take ibuprofen, so as I said nothing new.

colditz, this is no critism of you but many people have the same conception that if it is on the high street it must be safe and tested. they are not. just like many herbal remedies are also not approved and many, indeed are banned in other countries but freely available here.

these drugs have killed. one recent example is the medical student who took the ecstacy substitute.

I know one can buy paracetamol wchich can kill if more than such a small amount as 8+ are taken and that aspirin would be banned if produced today. it is very difficult to over turn accepted legislation. i suppose i am concerned that society is constantly 'dumbingdown'. habits which scandalised society 20 + years ago become accepted practices, sometimes for the good - i am not sure that accepting that people need to take mind altering medication is useful to us all and even more so to the individual.

thank you for allowing me the space to write this.

p.s. it wasn't my son who was sectioned so i will not be able to give support/ advice/ insight to anyone who has gone through the same experience

There was a documentary on BBC3 about these legal drugs. They took them to a lab and researched them. The conclusion was they are probably more dangerous than illegal ones.

Surely that will depend on which legal highs you're buying? There are plant-related ones (like this stuff) and others designed in labs - like these. Of course, either category can be "dangerous", but how are we defining "dangerous"? Potentially lethal?

Prof Nutt's point was that some illegal drugs, particularly cannabis, is less dangerous than some legal drugs, such as alcohol and tobacco. I've never heard of anyone taking a lethal dose of cannabis, it's certainly less lethal than paracetamol.

It's not always about lethal doses is it? it's often about long term effects. The problem is alot of these new drugs have not been around enough long enough to know what long term damage could arise.

If this stuff is as crap as RavenAK says, there won't be long-term consequences, because people won't repeat the experiment.

We had a shop in the town where I grew up who sold "legal" drugs, they had a weed equivalent, some kind of poppers that sort of thing, shelves and shelves of it. Actually there was one in another town I lived in as a teen - they are both still there, I think we have 3 shops whre I am now.

Wjen I was younger (muh younger) my friend and I thought it would be sooooo funny to buy some and go and smoke it in Mcdonalds (you could smoke in there in those days) - cause its like, legal, init - obviously we got thrown out and didn't bother doing that again - nor did we buy any more of the legal stuff. It was pants.

I honestly think anyone who is going to take drugs will take drugs, people who do not want ot take drugs will not bother at all. I can't see the market for these legal ones having such a massive market - the main reason I am fairly sure is that there has been no real backlash against them in the 30ish years or more they have been available. No great run of people becoming ill, no great hunk of people becoming addited to legal drugs and so on.

Can I get the award for most garbled post ever please?

These legal drugs are not safe and I speak from bitter experience.

Before me and dp met we both dabbled with real ecstasy in our youth, when we'd been together a short while we took a camping trip to Newquay and for a 'laugh' decided to buy some legal ecstasy type tablets from a surf shop. I honestly expected them to do very little as they were bought in a shop, in attractive packaging and expected them to be a novelty item.

To say we were both off our heads was an understatement, we were awake for 3 days and 3 nights, were hallucinating wildly, eyes the size of saucers etc. The idiots we were back then (i'm only talking 2/3 years ago ) couldn't believe our luck and decided to buy more and then ordered some off the internet.

We would take them every couple of months or so and be up for days. The reality of how dangerous they were however became apparent when I found dp having a fit upstairs after taking them one night. We stopped taking them after that but for a good year I suffered from terrible anxiety attacks, would see thing that weren't there, and dp started hearing voices.

Luckily this has all passed now, but I can't believe something you can buy legally in a shop or over the interent could do such a thing. They were far far stronger than any real ecstacy pills me or dp had ever taken and their effects lasted far longer.

I don't know if its the same ones this shop are selling, but these were called Party pills by a company called London underground. They are not safe.

I would concur with whoever said that some of the "legal" highs are more dangerous than a lot of illegal drugs.

A lot of substances will send you off your head - paint thinners, glue etc but they are very nasty chemicals. The reason that illegal drugs are illegal is that a lot of people have taken them, someone has noticed, and a new law has been passed to make it illegal. The law can't keep up with the speed at which new substances are created - eg new types of amphetamine which don't have the exact chemical makeup of the banned one, so are legal, but are actually nastier.

I am pretty liberal with drugs and personally would rather take ecstacy (as estimated about 1 million doses taken every week with hardly any problems ie must be pretty safe) than take my chances with some random chemical, even if it is legal.

OTOH if it's herbal highs they are shite and won't do anything IME

Good example here see GBL not illegal but is pretty dangerous AFAIK

ImSoNotTelling - you are absolutely right, i had not thought of it that way. legislation is just not keeping up with the new chemicals being produced. Likewise some are legal such as alcohol because they are 'socially acceptable'. my concern is we become desensitised to all this c**p being produced and weary of fighting every battle that it then becomes accepted behaviour and legal.

short term it may not be doing any harm but long term....

Thaldomide short term cured morning sickness...

really interesting hearing different view points, thank you.

Hey, I am student doing an assignment on legal highs,

I was wondering if you could tell me if you think there is enough advice on legal highs for parents?
enough advice for children?
if you knew they were being miss-sold on the internet as other substances?

Legal highs are very dangerous for teenagers and young adults who still have developing and maturing brains. We need laws such as in ireland where these substances are banned and new ones cant be marketed in the uk and sold to our children. Id like to know how many teenagers actually know what they are and whats in them? How much education and awareness do you need as parents?

Joe, maybe you should start your own thread rather than resurrecting one that's 5 years old?