Over some time, chronic use of some drugs can lead to short term and long-term effects on your physical and psychological wellbeing, depending on the type of drug depends on the impact on your health, in this post we will be focusing on the psychological effects on a person as well as their friends and family, especially children, as a result of the use of different types of drugs. This topic is important to me as I believe it is very important to raise awareness of the effects and impact drug abuse can have on your psychological health, and its especially important to my discipline of Criminology because the use of drugs, especially illegal substances which have a large impact and correlation with crime and understanding why people may commit a criminal offense as well as raising awareness to hopefully dissuade people from using illicit drugs in order to lower the crime rate and thus the strain on our justice system.
Mental health and disorders
A large portion of those who are addicted to drugs are also diagnosed with other mental disorders and vice versa. “In 2015, an estimated 43.4 million adults aged 18 and older experienced some form of mental illness. Of these, 8.1 million had both substance use disorder and another mental illness.” [1] Evidently, this means that there is a direct correlation between chronic and continued drug abuse and mental health issues and psychological wellbeing.
The image (left) shows just how severe the impacts of illicit or illegal drugs can have on the body and more specifically the mind, chronic use of illegal drugs can lead to many mental and cognitive issues ranging from anxiety and addiction to psychosis.
These are the main psychological impact caused by the influence of drugs on your mind and mental health. The article containing the above image also states “Dual diagnosis of substance misuse and mental health problems are common. The prevalence of psychiatric comorbidity among drug users in Europe varies depending on the study but is around 50%. The most frequent psychiatric comorbidities among people who use drugs are major depression, anxiety and personality disorders” [2] this quote provides further evidence of the psychological effects drugs have on a person; this unfortunately is not a commonly known statistic which highlights the need for awareness to be raised surrounding the dangerous effects drug use can have on you.
Additionally, the psychological effects drug use has on a substance users’ family, especially children is often overlooked whilst reviewing the harms of using illicit substances, distress and damage to a person’s mental wellbeing could be caused by someone they know and care about using drugs. An example of this could be a parent being caused stress by knowing their child is potentially using harmful substances. However, more specifically we can observe the impacts that can be had on children and families when someone close to them such as a parent is using drugs which does not necessarily mean a child will experience abuse, but it increases the risk to traumatise and psychologically damage them and can cause a range of later issues such as:
· Physical and emotional abuse or neglect
· Behavioural and emotional problems
· Having to care for their parents or siblings
· Poor attendance at school or low grades
· Experiencing poverty
· Being exposed to drugs or criminal activity
· Being separated from parents [3]
All these issues can cause serious long term and short-term psychological harm to children and families and can further subject the user to more psychological harm due to guilt and other consequences brought on by these outcomes.
One of the many reasons that’s drug use is so dangerous is due to the high risk of addiction partly due to how they may affect your brain chemistry. Many drugs known as stimulants such as Cocaine and ecstasy, these stimulants provide short term effects, consisting of but not limited to reduced tiredness and increased energy and confidence, these short term effects can lead to addiction or chronic drug use, which may result in other problems that may indirectly impact a person’s mental health, for example it may cause indirect damage to mental well-being due to financial issues in turn affecting the mental health of the drug user and those around you. An example of how it may directly affect your mental health is how some stimulants alter your brain chemicals by increasing chemicals such a dopamine leading to your brain compensating and producing less of that chemical such as dopamine this means your brain will end up having a lack of dopamine which is linked to depression.
In Conclusion, the aims of this blog post were to spread awareness of the serious implications on mental health of a drug user and those around them especially in a family situation with children and it was produced in hopes to deviate people from following through with using drugs to reduce the damage that these substances can cause to a person and their families.
References
[1] SAMHSA, Center for Behavioural Health Statistics and Quality, National Survey on Drug Use and Health, 2014
2 EMCDDA (2015a). Comorbidity of substance use and mental disorders in Europe. Available at: http://www.emcdda.europa.eu/system/files/publications/1988/TDXD15019ENN.pdf [Accessed 27 March 2017]
3 (NSPCC, 2021)
NSPCC, 2021. Alcohol, drugs and parenting. [Online] Available at: https://www.nspcc.org.uk/keeping-children-safe/support-for-parents/alcohol-drugs-parenting/ [Accessed 10 March 2021].
[1] SAMHSA, Center for Behavioural Health Statistics and Quality, National Survey on Drug Use and Health, 2014
[2] EMCDDA (2015a). Comorbidity of substance use and mental disorders in Europe. Available at: http://www.emcdda.europa.eu/system/files/publications/1988/TDXD15019ENN.pdf [Accessed 27 March 2017]
[3] (NSPCC, 2021)
NSPCC, 2021. Alcohol, drugs and parenting. [Online]
Available at: https://www.nspcc.org.uk/keeping-children-safe/support-for-parents/alcohol-drugs-parenting/
[Accessed 10 March 2021].
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