The Random Thought Thread

[Simba]

A little more info here

Baltimore Police investigating ‘questionable’ death of Ravens linebacker Jaylon Ferguson

A law enforcement source said it is a suspected overdose, but autopsy results are pending.

thebaltimorebanner.com

 

[jboy19]

Yeah I'm only going down the path of even partially blaming an organization when you find out they're complicit somehow, i.e. something like the Tyler Skaggs situation in MLB, where he had like trainers getting him opioids.

There's a strong possibly that nobody inside the organization, maybe save for a player or two who were close friends with him, had any idea he had a problem or even used.

As others have mentioned, statistically, there's people you associate with on a daily basis who are drug addicts, alcoholics, etc., and you'll never have a clue until something happens. Friends, Co-workers, family, etc.

I'm sure others have worse stories than this, but one of the Groomsmen in my wedding has been in and out of rehab for like 2 years now. I grew up with him, lived with him for a few years, talked all the time. We moved away and didn't speak as often later, but I knew pretty much everything about him for like 25 years, and not once did I ever see him do anything other than drink and smoke weed (which he didn't even do much of that).

Got a call two years ago from my Best Man telling me he'd been a heroin junkie for several months and they were checking him into rehab that morning. He'd been abusing Vicodin, Percocet, and various other pills since late in high school. Did an internship at a pharmacy for two years, got access to everything. Didn't see any signs of it or notice it for at least 15 years. Like pretty much everybody else, he couldn't afford the pills anymore, so he went the cheaper route.

I appreciate you sharing your friends' stories with me. I haven't had anybody very close to me (that I know of) struggle with addiction, just acquaintances and people I don't talk to regularly.

Just to clarify, I'm not blaming the organization for anything. I think they should try to see if there are more things they can do to help people who may be struggling. I don't personally know what they could do, whether that's providing education, support, resources. They might already be doing a lot. It's hard to find out what could help without being too invasive into players' lives.

 

[Deebo813]

if it was drugs, shit crazy.. its really a blessing just to have a strong mental man and not let yourself fall victim to that shit… dam dam dam

 

[RL52TheGreatest]

I appreciate you sharing your friends' stories with me. I haven't had anybody very close to me (that I know of) struggle with addiction, just acquaintances and people I don't talk to regularly.

Just to clarify, I'm not blaming the organization for anything. I think they should try to see if there are more things they can do to help people who may be struggling. I don't personally know what they could do, whether that's providing education, support, resources. They might already be doing a lot. It's hard to find out what could help without being too invasive into players' lives.

As I was reading the "Late For Work" article on their website this morning, I actually saw a video ad about addiction in the middle of the page which had Calais in it. I'm sure they'll continue to look at ways they can further assist their fans and players who are struggling, but, as was previously said in another post, there's only so much you can do to help people who are in that situation because they need to want the change for themselves.

 

[rossihunter2]

omg ive only just got back from work and seen all this

RIP Jaylon - by the sounds of it, the team loved him and he was a lovely person - so sad

 

[JoeyFlex5]

A little more info here

Baltimore Police investigating ‘questionable’ death of Ravens linebacker Jaylon Ferguson

A law enforcement source said it is a suspected overdose, but autopsy results are pending.

thebaltimorebanner.com

And there it is. Depression, benzo-opioid mix, and he was found at an empty house off of greenmount. He must have been in a bad place if he was copping and using in the vacants, an nfl player doing that is pretty surprising.

Xanax and opiates are an incredibly lethal combo. One slows your heart rate to a crawl, the other stops your brain from recognizing the trouble signals.

 

[NaturalBornHitters]

Xanax and opiates are an incredibly lethal combo. One slows your heart rate to a crawl, the other stops your brain from recognizing the trouble sisignals.

Very true and those pills are even more deadly if they are fake and pressed with fentanyl and God knows what else. And to top it off, these fake pills are very common and hard to tell the difference between real pharmaceutical and fake Cartel/Street shit and no, you're dealer "friend" won't be honest with you about if they are fake or not. They just want your money.

I've been off heroin for almost 6 years now, please reach out to me if you need help and I do mean that. I AM HERE TO HELP AND IT'S NOT TOO LATE!! (It would strictly stay between the two of us). It's a VERY dangerous game out there right now and the only thing guaranteed from it is Death, Institutions or Jail..

 

[JAAM]

And there it is. Depression, benzo-opioid mix, and he was found at an empty house off of greenmount. He must have been in a bad place if he was copping and using in the vacants, an nfl player doing that is pretty surprising.

Xanax and opiates are an incredibly lethal combo. One slows your heart rate to a crawl, the other stops your brain from recognizing the trouble signals.

Xanax is no fucking joke. I wish I never took that first pill

 

[Deebo813]

I wonder if he met the guy there to buy them

 

[rmcjacket23]

I appreciate you sharing your friends' stories with me. I haven't had anybody very close to me (that I know of) struggle with addiction, just acquaintances and people I don't talk to regularly.

Just to clarify, I'm not blaming the organization for anything. I think they should try to see if there are more things they can do to help people who may be struggling. I don't personally know what they could do, whether that's providing education, support, resources. They might already be doing a lot. It's hard to find out what could help without being too invasive into players' lives.

It's pretty much just like any other "help" they could get. Can only offer assistance if they know its a problem, or if the person wants help. Organizations can get people to do drug seminars, flood them with education, etc., but end of day, they can't infringe on people's freedoms. Can't go into people's houses searching for drugs, contraband, etc.

I think back a good 20-25 years ago when schools used to bring D.A.R.E into the schools to educate children about drug usage. There were some videos I remember them showing of what people looked like when they OD, and it scared the shit out of a lot of people. That being said... I think when we educate children, we make them think that like all addicts look like skinny, strung out, homeless people that just wander the streets panhandling for drugs. While there's no shortage of that, there's a TON of people who are completely "functional" as human beings while being addicts. They have successful jobs, careers, families, children, spouses. Some seem like they haven't got a problem in the world.
Pretty good example here. Got a pro athlete, seemingly in the best shape of his life, whole career ahead of them. Hard for children to visualize a pro athlete being a drug addict.

But here we are.

 

[JO_75]

The destruction of Dan Snyder is going a beautiful thing to watch. Have to wonder if Snyder sent out lewd photos to other owners or anything else the NFL was covering up. Seems Snyder may take the NFL down with him.

 

[Nurps]

And there it is. Depression, benzo-opioid mix, and he was found at an empty house off of greenmount.

That is so incredibly sad. Wow.

 

[JoeyFlex5]

Very true and those pills are even more deadly if they are fake and pressed with fentanyl and God knows what else. And to top it off, these fake pills are very common and hard to tell the difference between real pharmaceutical and fake Cartel/Street shit and no, you're dealer "friend" won't be honest with you about if they are fake or not. They just want your money.

I've been off heroin for almost 6 years now, please reach out to me if you need help and I do mean that. I AM HERE TO HELP AND IT'S NOT TOO LATE!! (It would strictly stay between the two of us). It's a VERY dangerous game out there right now and the only thing guaranteed from it is Death, Institutions or Jail..

Good for you getting yourself clean man, I thank god every day that I managed to keep myself away, because I wouldn’t have the willpower or mental state to live in the mind of a recovering addict, I couldn’t even imagine having to live with that in the back of your mind all day every day.

My father was essentially a lifelong heroin addict, he reminds me so much of bubbles from the wire, it’s striking, his example is what I believe kept me from ever getting involved in drugs. Didn’t stop me from drinking my fucking face off for the first 5 years of my adult life, but I kept off of opiates, I always feared them because of my dad. Lost my best friend almost a year ago exactly, after he was clean for like 2-3 years, he relapsed and none of us knew, and he passed in a very bad place, I hate this shit man.

 

[JoeyFlex5]

Xanax is no fucking joke. I wish I never took that first pill

Never understood Xanax, shit just puts me straight in a coma, I’d rather be awake if I’m gonna be on a drug. I was always partial to E but now I just be smoking my weed and chilling.

 

[rmcjacket23]

The destruction of Dan Snyder is going a beautiful thing to watch. Have to wonder if Snyder sent out lewd photos to other owners or anything else the NFL was covering up. Seems Snyder may take the NFL down with him.

I mean this is easily one of the biggest waste of taxpayer money I've ever seen. When you've got even Democrat congressman who are out there being like "what the fuck are we doing here", you know its a farce.

Nothing is going to come from this. Any sort of "Congressional investigation" is going to be half-assed, at best (because it's the Government... they never do anything full-assed" and even if Snyder ever does actually show up for questioning, his entire legal team is going to know that it's just one big farce. He could easily just lie his ass off about anything they ask, knowing they've done and won't do any investigation whatsoever.

 

[JAAM]

Never understood Xanax, shit just puts me straight in a coma, I’d rather be awake if I’m gonna be on a drug. I was always partial to E but now I just be smoking my weed and chilling.

Man E was pretty bomb in my younger days. Xanax has always served a purpose for me. I can see why others would hate it

 

[JoeyFlex5]

It's pretty much just like any other "help" they could get. Can only offer assistance if they know its a problem, or if the person wants help. Organizations can get people to do drug seminars, flood them with education, etc., but end of day, they can't infringe on people's freedoms. Can't go into people's houses searching for drugs, contraband, etc.

I think back a good 20-25 years ago when schools used to bring D.A.R.E into the schools to educate children about drug usage. There were some videos I remember them showing of what people looked like when they OD, and it scared the shit out of a lot of people. That being said... I think when we educate children, we make them think that like all addicts look like skinny, strung out, homeless people that just wander the streets panhandling for drugs. While there's no shortage of that, there's a TON of people who are completely "functional" as human beings while being addicts. They have successful jobs, careers, families, children, spouses. Some seem like they haven't got a problem in the world.
Pretty good example here. Got a pro athlete, seemingly in the best shape of his life, whole career ahead of them. Hard for children to visualize a pro athlete being a drug addict.

But here we are.

Every institution that has attempted to educate and prevent drug abuse has failed miserably. DARE was an absolute joke, scare tactics that faded by the time these kids got to high school. Then there’s the whole incarcerating the everloving fuck out of people who have undiagnosed mental illness which fuels an addictive lifestyle, and making sure these people don’t integrate back into society by putting them through parole and giving them records which prevents employment.

Literally everything has failed, and it’s easy to see why, because their plans were fucking stupid to begin with.

War on drugs… fucking please. Yeah let’s militarize those who are paid by our tax dollars to protect and serve, and wage war on an ideology that attacks some of our most vulnerable people.

 

[Deebo813]

Very true and those pills are even more deadly if they are fake and pressed with fentanyl and God knows what else. And to top it off, these fake pills are very common and hard to tell the difference between real pharmaceutical and fake Cartel/Street shit and no, you're dealer "friend" won't be honest with you about if they are fake or not. They just want your money.

I've been off heroin for almost 6 years now, please reach out to me if you need help and I do mean that. I AM HERE TO HELP AND IT'S NOT TOO LATE!! (It would strictly stay between the two of us). It's a VERY dangerous game out there right now and the only thing guaranteed from it is Death, Institutions or Jail..

You a real one

 

[rmcjacket23]

Every institution that has attempted to educate and prevent drug abuse has failed miserably. DARE was an absolute joke, scare tactics that faded by the time these kids got to high school. Then there’s the whole incarcerating the everloving fuck out of people who have undiagnosed mental illness which fuels an addictive lifestyle, and making sure these people don’t integrate back into society by putting them through parole and giving them records which prevents employment.

Literally everything has failed, and it’s easy to see why, because their plans were fucking stupid to begin with.

War on drugs… fucking please. Yeah let’s militarize those who are paid by our tax dollars to protect and serve, and wage war on an ideology that attacks some of our most vulnerable people.

On the whole DARE thing... I think scare tactics worked on some. Like I can't see any scenario where I ever inject myself with drugs. And a lot of it is still the scars I have from seeing people doing it and watching the reaction to it.

The biggest problems I see is
a) they spent so much time convincing everybody that if you used marijuana you were destined to end up a crack addict, which of course, is laughably absurd. We know so much more about marijuana usage now than 20 years ago, and its laughable how ignorant our "education" was for children back in the day. Like I'm not even saying people should use marijuana, but there's a pretty straight forward way that people can use it, recreationally and medicinally, safely, effectively, and with little to no detriment to anybody else.
b) maybe I was naïve to it back then, but something tells me prescription drug addictions weren't nearly as prevalent when I was in school. I don't remember a single education discussion involving abusing prescription drugs. Feels very much like a "new" problem so to speak.
Nobody knew what the fuck an opioid was. Nobody knew that opium was being described recklessly by doctors throughout the country, and that people could basically get all of the "effects" of heroin usage without shoving a needle in their arm.

It just goes back to the whole premise of "what does a drug addict look like". When I was a kid, they were just homeless junkies or fat lazy kids, red eyes, eating buckets of Party Mix. They never got good grades, they were always stupid, never participated in sports, extracurriculars, etc.

Pretty much 0% of that was true.

I think the scare tactics mildly worked. But what they actually taught you about drug usage was complete bullshit.

 

[NaturalBornHitters]

Good for you getting yourself clean man, I thank god every day that I managed to keep myself away, because I wouldn’t have the willpower or mental state to live in the mind of a recovering addict, I couldn’t even imagine having to live with that in the back of your mind all day every day.

My father was essentially a lifelong heroin addict, he reminds me so much of bubbles from the wire, it’s striking, his example is what I believe kept me from ever getting involved in drugs. Didn’t stop me from drinking my fucking face off for the first 5 years of my adult life, but I kept off of opiates, I always feared them because of my dad. Lost my best friend almost a year ago exactly, after he was clean for like 2-3 years, he relapsed and none of us knew, and he passed in a very bad place, I hate this shit man.

Thanks dude. You're truly doing yourself a solid favor by staying away from all that bad stuff, just keep it up because it just isn't worth it. Yes I'm no longer actively addicted, but I still suffer from regret and depression over it. I put my family through hell and it's something I think about every day like clockwork.

And I'm sorry about your best friend, it's rough. I lived in a sober house for a year and a half after rehab and so many of my former roommates have passed since, it's so fucking sad man.

If your dad is still running and gunning, I'd be willing to talk with him. My old sponsor has hookups for free beds in rehab. I'm always here.

You a real one

Thanks dude, I try. I figured I lived and fought through it and people helped me, so I might as well be open about things and try to help as many folks as I can. I'm always up for kicking addictions ass lol