#PsychUp Avenue - Depressants

 Depressants 

Unlike stimulants, depressants reduce arousal, alertness or awareness. Depressants do not get you depressed, but put you in a state of relaxation and reduce or lower your activeness. This usually affects a person's concentration and coordination. They also slow down a person's ability to respond to certain situations. An overdose of depressants can cause drowsiness, vomiting, unconsciousness and even death. 

Alcohol. Now, alcohol is the most commonly known and commonly used depressant, maybe because it is easily accessible and is always available. Someone might say that people seem very energetic when they consume alcohol, but this is because alcohol first relaxed a person's internal inhibitors. Inhibitors are basically your instincts that limit you from certain behaviors and so on, that's why when a person consumes alcohol, they act out of character. After relaxing a person's internal inhibitors, it starts relating the rest of the body, which is why the energy from drinking alcohol is short-lived and a person starts finding it hard to walk properly and has slurred speech. Let's not forget the vomiting that comes with large consumption of alcohol and how easy that "energetic" person passes out when they get into a bed...

Benzodiazepines are 'drugs' that enhance the effect of the neurotransmitter known as GABA. For the sake of not boring you with all the tiny details, this enhancement results in relaxing of the muscles, hypnotic or sleep-inducing effects, sedative and anticonvulsant effects. It might sound like it's a lot to take in, but basically, breathing slows down, muscle movement slows down, vision and speech also slows down. Keep in mind that these drugs are legal and are used for treating anxiety, insomnia muscle spasms and so forth, but they become illegal drugs when they are used by a person without a prescription and in the wrong doses, hence you can see the effects they have on a person. Long term and heavy use of these drugs may lead to death. Imagine being on drugs that relaxes your breathing and your muscle movement, an overdose of that drug would lead to less oxygen to your brain and eventually passing out. 

there are a whole lot of other depressants, but let's stop here for today...