How much imodium to get high

The days when you could walk into a drugstore and buy a box of opium-soaked tampons have gone the way of the steel-boned corset , but plenty of law-abiding drug consumers still use over-the-counter medications to get high while racking up rewards points. While robotripping is out of vogue mostly , the legal high du jour comes from the active ingredient in anti-diarrhea drugs : loperamide.

If the thought of eating 20, 30, or more Imodium tablets makes you feel skeeved out and a little scared, that's because it should.

Loperamide is addictive and cardiotoxic , but people aren't using it because they're idiots in search of a cheap high -- the reasons go deeper than that, and implicate not only the disease of addiction, but the US medical system as a whole. Howard Wetsman , chief medical officer and founder of Townsend Addiction Treatment Centers , lays it out and mercifully avoids scatological humor.

Some users report effects ranging from moderate sedation to mild euphoria. So, in short, loperamide is a legal, cheap, readily available opiate substitute. Did you read the sentence above this paragraph? That should answer your question, but to break it down further, there are basically two reasons. The first reason is because some people like the experience of being high and will try just about anything to get there.

I used to be that person, back in my robotripping days. The second reason is because they're weaning themselves off opiates. Wetsman says far more people fall into the latter group than the former. Because the US is experiencing what Dr.

Wetsman calls an opioid crisis. He says the seeds for this epidemic were planted about 30 years ago, when both the government and non-government agencies such as the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations began requiring doctors and hospitals to do more about treatment of chronic pain.

Some studies showed patients with chronic pain couldn't get addicted to opiates, which goes to show you that not every study can be trusted. Wetsman says. Hospitals can lose their accreditation if ratings plummet -- so they may put pressure on doctors to push pills, too.

Wetsman adds. The tide may be turning. The Centers for Disease Control issued guidelines for prescribing physicians that limit patients with chronic pain to no more than three months of narcotics.

Although loperamide is not an opioid drug, when used in very high doses it acts on mu-opioid receptors, which are the same receptors that initiate addiction to opiates, like heroin, morphine, and fentanyl. The amount of loperamide that is needed to help relieve opiate withdrawal symptoms is extremely dangerous. A normal dose of Imodium is 2 milligrams to be taken up to four times a day. A person who is attempting to take Imodium to get high is taking up to milligrams a day.

The euphoric effects that high doses of loperamide have for an opiate addict is at best minimal. Opiate addicts have reported that taking Imodium at large doses does decrease the withdrawal symptoms but does not get them high. At dangerous doses, loperamide crosses the blood-brain barrier, which will allow the opioid receptors to produce endorphins and other neurotransmitter reactions that cause a person to feel better.

The effects of loperamide only minimize withdrawal symptoms; it does not compare to the euphoria that heroin, Fentanyl, or other opiate drugs cause. When a person increases the dose past, what is recommended for any type of OTC drug or prescription drug, they risk enduring serious medical problems and death. The history of persons taking Imodium to get high began as early as the s.

The Federal Drug Administration did not class Imodium as an over the counter drug until Before that, it was in fact, classed as a controlled substance, not unlike cocaine or and other illegal drugs. Now that there is a greater awareness of people abusing Imodium the FDA drug safety communications announced to the public this September , that they will require limits on the amounts that can be sold in the packaging of loperamide.

These changes limit each carton to no more than 48 mg of loperamide and require the tablets and capsules to be packaged in individual doses. Some individuals are taking high doses of loperamide to treat symptoms of opioid withdrawal. Loperamide acts on opioid receptors in the gut to slow the movement in the intestines and decrease the number of bowel movements. It is safe at approved doses, but when much higher than recommended doses are taken, it can lead to serious problems, including severe heart rhythm problems and death.

There have been numerous reports and documentation about people damaging their hearts and bodies as a result of taking loperamide in very high doses.