#safer use

[trans-axolotl]

US Harm Reduction Resources

continually updating, not a complete list. feel free to add on any resources you find helpful.

Free Safer Supplies:

Each organization will have different supplies, but generally, harm reduction orgs provide things like syringes, safer snorting + smoking kits, Narcan, condoms, lube, and wound care supplies. Each org has different policies for how to get supplies--some do deliveries, some have drop in centers, some only do one to one needle exchange, some are more flexible.

Next Distro: mail based syringe provider for certain states. Also mails free Narcan.

NASEN: national map of syringe providers

a lot of harm reduction collectives aren't going to have their information listed on big national websites--it's always worth searching "harm reduction in my area" and seeing what's around you. Even if you don't live in a big city, there might be a harm reduction organization in your state that can help you find someone closer to you. there's a lot of rad people doing underground work who want to be there to help you who aren't as easy to find online. If there's street medic collectives, mutual aid groups or groups like Food not Bombs in your area, you can ask people in them who might know where to find harm reduction services in your area!

Drug Users Unions:

Drug users unions are activist groups made for people who use drugs, by people who use drugs! Drug users unions do advocacy work to end criminalization, as well as providing vital community support. Many drug users unions are also inclusive of sex workers and work to decriminalize sex work as well. You can search for "drug users union" in your state.

Urban Survivors Union: National, has resources for creating drug users union

Chosen Few: Drug users union for Black drug users in DC

San Francisco Drug users union

Sex Work Advocacy Groups:

Organizations that do decrim advocacy and provide support for sex workers.

Sex Worker Outreach Project USA- National, has chapters in many states.

Black Sex Worker Collective

Sex Workers Project

How to Use Safely:

Guides, videos, toolkits for safer use!

Harm Reduction Coalition Resource Library

Getting Off Right: A Safety Manual for Injection Drug Users

Safer Crack Smoking

Safer Snorting

Safer Hormone Injection

Levels of Risk: Veins

Wound Care video w/ ASL

How to Use Fentanyl Test Strips

DanceSafe-testing kits, including reagent testing kits!

Erowid-shares experiences people have with different drugs, dosages, what things to expect

Bluelight- another forum for discussing experiences with drugs.

Drug Interactions Checker

Sex Work Resources:

Tricks of the Trade by L. Synn Stern: tips for street based sex work

A Quick and Dirty Sex Worker Safety Toolkit

Girls Do What they Have to Do To Survive by YWEP

Dis/Organizing: How We Build Collectives Beyond Institutions by Rachel Kuo & Lorelei Lee

Tryst Blog

Hotlines:

Never Use Alone: 877-696-1996. Overdose Prevention Hotline--Volunteers stay on the phone with you while you use and call emergency services if you overdose.

HIPS Hotline-​​​1 (800) 676-4477. Emotional support for drug users and sex workers. Does not work with cops.

feel free to add on more resources. love + lube <3

[chronicallycouchbound]

hi I had a question about your cannabis post

i don’t know much about cannabis so sorry if I misunderstand smth

but I don’t understand what “safe” drug use implies,, how can drugs be safe? what’s safe drug use??

i probably have a very narrow view on this topic, so id like to know more

on a different note id like to thank you for your content, I feel that ive learned a lot from this account :)) thanks!!!

(feel free to ignore this)

It’s important to first recognize that more things are drugs than we normally consider: alcohol, tobacco, nicotine, caffeine, cannabis, are all drugs just as much as opiates, benzos, etc. Any medication is a drug.

Any drugs have the ability to be used properly and safely as well as the potential to be used negatively or harmfully. Drugs are morally neutral. Even addiction is morally neutral.

Alcohol can be used to cut loose with friends on the weekend, but it can also be used to cause poisoning. Tobacco can be used to calm down after an argument, but it can also cause cancer. Opiates can be used to manage severe pain, and can also cause overdose.

People have always used drugs historically, and in order to survive, people often need them. Using substances can also not just be medically or recreational, there are spiritual and cultural reasons as well. Some people need substances to manage their emotional or mental needs (especially without supports otherwise).

Any drug can be safe. It’s all in how it’s used, as well as within context.

Safe use looks different for everyone, but personally, I try to encourage methods that are harm reduction focused.

Harm reduction can look like:

• Safe supply of substances to ensure that people are getting unlaced stuff.

• Education so people know how to avoid accidental consequences of their use.

• Access to unused syringes or works to prevent blood borne infections.

• Having a designated driver or trip sitter.

• Sitting with someone while they use in case they have negative effects.

• Access to naloxone/Narcan to reverse opioid overdoses.

• Starting with a lower dose and going slow with use to ensure you’re getting the intended effects.

And harm reduction is so much more than just about substances, it’s things like seatbelts in cars and condoms and STI testing. It’s the lesser of two evils and a primary focus of harm reduction is that it keeps people alive above all else.

Some people like to say “harm reduction keeps people alive long enough to get sober” but I personally feel like sobriety isn’t always the solution for everyone, nor is it accessible to everyone.

But yeah, safe use exists, and most drugs ARE used safely every day. That’s what a pharmacist’s whole job is for.

•

I appreciate this ask, I’m always happy to talk about harm reduction. I co-founded a local harm reduction organization and have done a lot of advocacy around this— everything from reversing ODs, speaking on panels, testifying for bills with the ACLU, training communities on how to administer Naloxone, distributing safe use supplies, etc. I have a lot of personal experience with addiction and feel very passionately about this. I was tired of my friends dying and I just want to make the world a safer place.

[cia-no]

Terzo Halloween di fila a lavorare.

Ma la ketamina è davvero così buona? Mi raccomando non la prendete a stomaco pieno e non bevete bevande calde!

[novelconcepts]

I Saw the TV Glow is such a uniquely, devastatingly queer story. Two queer kids trapped in suburbia. Both of them sensing something isn’t quite right with their lives. Both of them knowing that wrongness could kill them. One of them getting out, trying on new names, new places, new ways of being. Trying to claw her way to fully understanding herself, trying to grasp the true reality of her existence. Succeeding. Going back to help the other, to try so desperately to rescue an old friend, to show the path forward. Being called crazy. Because, to someone who hasn’t gotten out, even trying seems crazy. Feels crazy. Looks, on the surface, like dying.

And to have that other queer kid be so terrified of the internal revolution that is accepting himself that he inadvertently stays buried. Stays in a situation that will suffocate him. Choke the life out of him. Choke the joy out of him. Have him so terrified of possibly being crazy that he, instead, lives with a repression so extreme, it quite literally is killing him. And still, still, he apologizes for it. Apologizes over and over and over, to people who don’t see him. Who never have. Who never will. Because it’s better than being crazy. Because it’s safer than digging his way out. Killing the image everyone sees to rise again as something free and true and authentic. My god. My god, this movie. It shattered me.

[chronicallycouchbound]

Additionally, if someone has other health conditions, withdrawals of other substances that might not normally be lethal, can be.

But I’m also on team “leave homeless people alone and let them have autonomy to make their own decisions about their lives because being on the streets is hell and we should cope however we need to”

People seem to forget homeless people have more needs than food especially to get out of that situation and there tend to be way more resources to get free food than to get things like menstrual products or clothing or hygiene items you have no idea what a homeless person needs money for or how much they have or if they’re saving. And yes, once again, they might NEED drugs. Alcohol withdrawal can literally kill you. You can’t give someone money or assistance with strings attached and pretend you’re doing it for anybody except yourself. That’s to make you feel better, not help them

[technically-human]

Confessional... things get complicated when you're a ghost.

@i-am-as-normal-as-you-are asked for, and this is a literal quote, "R!Edwin going to a confessional (full angst)" so yeah... full angst indeed.

[oobbbear]

I’m back on doll making so here’s a little sunny for the warmup :]c✨

His eyes weren’t originally planned to look like that but I umm messed that up so I added an eyelid to cover it now he has this smug face going on which I honestly like more than the plan hehehe

[puppetmaster13u]

Prompt 172

So the team might be a bit lost. And a bit in danger. And were separated but have at least fixed that. 

But it’s definitely not their fault right? After all, you can’t expect anything when fighting Klarion! But uh, there’s something big approaching through the green and floating things, like big enough to make waves, and no one wants to get anywhere close to whatever it is. 

Danny- newly molted into his adult ghost-form- just wants to say hello to his sort-of cousin’s friends, and would like to also get them away from the deep area of the Zone where the beings would not be afraid to nab a living being for a collection or two. 

[quantumfeat72]

part of assassiffrin's bonnie hangout! he has a bit of a different fighting/teaching philosophy than canon siffrin...

(unshaded version of one of the panels under the cut because i'm proud of it and it's hard to see in the actual comic)

[trans-axolotl]

okay also semi related post. I think it is really silly when people make all these posts about how adderall is so different than meth and start saying demeaning stuff about meth users when they’re discussing the artificially created adderall shortage. the two drugs are both stimulants and yeah they are not chemically identical but they are enough the same that I currently know of a clinical trial where people are piloting adderall as a form of MAT for meth users. (Which has been really popular with the participants so far, people were telling me they liked having access to a consistent supply of adderall and were interested in reducing their meth use to only a couple times a week instead.) so maybe we should start thinking a little bit more about how there’s a lot of propaganda sensationalizing and stigmatizing meth use and stop blaming people who use meth for a shortage that the DEA is causing!!!

[the-artist-grimm]

Would it be a bit ironic or adorable if Anthea sang 'You'll Be in My Heart' from the Tarzan movie to Aym and Baal when they were dealing with nightmares to help them sleep?

OMG-ironic I guess considering their hearts don't beat??? XD

But in all seriousness I've actually thought about Anthea singing to the boys! I kinda like the idea of them singing 'Edelweiss' from The Sound of Music to lull them to sleep-my own mother loved the film when I was little, and back when she would still sing to my sister and I while kissing us goodnight it was always 'Edelweiss'.

(now for obligatory LORE)

As Anthea and Narinder work on their relationship they take turns who sits in bed with the kits and who pulls up a chair-neither can leave really without risk of one of the boys waking up looking for them only to be gone, so for those first few weeks neither get much sleep. They take turns keeping watch-that way someone can hopefully catch nightmares before they fester, or at least be there if it's their name called. It drains them both a LOT, but hey they're parents-a little sleep loss is nothing when it's your kids.

[lillapillas]

Thinking about how Neil reached under his pillow for a gun and found andrews arm instead, how andrew wanted to be closer to him, how he trusted neil enough to dispose of one of his arms, left it useless and held down by neils weight so he could sleep knowing he was still there, still beside him, still alive and warm and breathing

[starry-bi-sky]

Blood Blossom lore for the Blood Blossom Au

Blood Blossoms -- otherwise scientifically known as rosa hemato -- are an extinct genus of flower from the rosaceae family that disappeared from the mortal plane in the late 1600s due to over-foraging from settlers during the Witch Trials. Prior to their extinction, they were already a rare breed of rose because of an evolutionary trait resulting in their main source of energy being ambient ectoplasm.

This means that blood blossoms only grow in areas where there are unusual levels of ectoplasm present. Regardless, however, only one or two bushes of blood blossoms can grow, as too many of them results in the ectoplasm being sucked out with no room of replenishing back to its original levels. This kills the blood blossoms in return. So a balance has to be met.

Blood blossoms have a mildly unsettling appearance. Their namesake, "blood blossom", comes from the blood red appearance of their petals, which start out as a vibrant red but steadily grows darker with age similar to blood drying on a page. Their stems, leaves, and thorns are, rather than green, a rich black-purple color. The center where the pistil sits is the typical yellow, however, it takes on the appearance of a yellow eye peering through the petals.

Blood blossoms emit a sweet, fragrant scent that allows them to not only attract bees, but also break down ectoplasm for consumption. See, what it does is that it discharges some of its pollen into the air, which then "latches on" to ecto. As the pollen begins to float down to the ground, the ectoplasm then sinks into the soil for the blood blossom to then draw into its roots. It gives the ectoplasm a physical body to latch onto, which it then uses to consume it.

Despite having a symbiotic relationship with ambient ectoplasm in it's natural habitat, the interactions it has with ghosts is an entirely different story. To ghosts, Blood Blossoms are terrifying, opportunistic parasitoids capable of consuming spirits whole if given the chance. Ghosts give off significantly more ectoplasm and when the blood blossoms sense that, they emit more pollen in order to consume it. Which is where the whole "blood blossoms are natural ghost shields" thing comes from.

Their sweet scents and vibrant colors made them popular upon discovery for perfumes and dyes, and when eaten taste sweet and slightly bitter, almost irony. Which is another reason for their namesake. During the Salem Witch Trials it was theorized that blood blossoms could expel the sins/demons from someone's body when consumed and prevent possession, or when surrounded by the roses, would trap the demons inside it's host body which would then be burned to banish it back to Hell along with the soul of it's host.

Which made them incredibly popular in executions, exorcisms, and Mass.

They could grow anywhere in the world so long as there was an adequate amount of ecto present.

Surprisingly enough, they do not commonly grow in or around gravesites due to a competitor flower nicknamed "rest in peace lilies" which, despite their name, are actually from the asparagaceae family and have more in common with bluebells. They're more modernly known as everlast bells. Ghosts prefer them over blood blossoms because they have a similar effect on ghosts as poppies do on the living where it sends them into a restful slumber. Hence their nickname "rest in peace lilies". The dead loove them.

In the Ghost Zone, their effects on the dead are far more potent than when they grew in the living realm due to the excessive amount of ectoplasm. They also grow much faster, so ghosts treat their appearances on islands similar to how one treats mint or kudzhu after finding it growing in their lawn: with extreme prejudice. And a lot of terror. Ghosts tend to rip them out when the flowers are not in bloom, or burn them when they are.

Their appearances in the Zone aren't much different than what they looked like in the living realm, with only a few mild changes like their thorns being sharper, their petals being more angular, and their eye-like center actually looking more like an eye. It's theorized that the Infinite Realm versions of blood blossoms gained very mild sentience, just enough that it almost feels like their eyes follow you when you pass by them, like a painting. Nobody is willing to test that theory.

To a ghost, getting caught in the hooks of a blood blossom means a slow, agonizing death akin to thousands of needle-sized mouths eating you all at once. The pollen doesn't stop until the ectoplasm is all broken down. Blood blossoms in the Ghost Zone are very much capable of eradicating a ghost entirely, core and all, with no chance of return. No passing go, no reconstruction, just complete oblivion.

Danny, prior to his poisoning, had severe allergic reactions when in physical contact with blood blossom in his human form. Rashes, blistering, hives wherever the blossom had physical contact with, inflammation, you name it. Luckily that hadn't been something he needed to worry about since they're, well, extinct.

[tmos-time]

guy whos been using the zosan tag like diet erisol for months: yeah i think eridan could be convinced to get into one piece. yeah ill do that for @erisolweek free day

(if any of the japanese parts are clunky or off in any way, thats on me for only having translation pages and absorbed one piece knowledge to go off of, LOL. unfortunately, headcanoning that trolls can use languages like theyre just accents doesnt give me the power to depict it flawlessly)

[tanglepelt]

Dpxdc

Danny reveals phantom to his parents. They immediately jump ships to support Danny. That is their baby. Why would they think he was lying? Clearly they let confirmation bias cloud their heads. They have non bias research to conduct!

Unfortunately for them. The GIW does not like this change. Clearly the fentons have gone crazy. They must be mad scientist! The GIW of course reports them mainly to get them out of the way. Can’t have people spreading propaganda that ghost Ms are sentient. They can’t have that.

Maddie and Jack don’t come in easily. Instead they flee. Not letting thier kids get hurt. Of course they locked down the portal before they left. All they needed to do was get set up in a new city. Keep the kids safe after all.

Gotham was to obvious. Why wouldn’t they flee to ecto rich environment. Danny would be to obsessed with hunting down Superman in metropolis. Ever since the reveal Danny had been letting his ghostly instincts out more and more. The whole alien thing would cause to much obsession.

Besides. Technically they were wanted by the government. Couldn’t draw attention with Danny stalking the supers. Which whatever. Maddie and Jack would fight them if it came down to it.

They ultimately decided on central city.

There is enough that happens there to keep eyes off them. They absolutely totally could stay low to the ground. They couldn’t hide out with any relatives. Plus if it came to it. They were certain they could at least talk to the flash before anything violent occurred.

Maybe he would even listen.

For now. They would just prioritize Danny’s and jazzs safety.

[nattikay]

Vurur alu Ingyentsim Ayramä hasey sìmi! Just finished the Secrets of the Spires story!