Impacts-of-methamphetamine-in-Victoria-Community-Assessment-Penington-Institute

For both young men it was the escalating mental health issues which lead them to seek help.William described a psychotic episode after more than a week without sleep.“I’d been awake a bit over nine days, and I didn’t know whether I was awake or asleep... I hated theperson I’d become through my ‘friends’ at that point. And I looked at them all and they were all offtheir guts, and I thought ‘Nah, fuck ‘em’, and I went into the kitchen and grabbed a knife andthreatened to stab them all. I took a lunge at a mate. Nothing actually hit, but it was pretty trippy,and uncomfortable ... it scared the shit out of me because I didn’t know what was going on – Ithought I was asleep. And to wake up two days later after sleeping and just losing it because I wascoming down. There were a lot of holes in that room after that.”Beyond the psychotic episode William had while on methamphetamine, he has had an ongoingchallenge with regulating his moods since he stopped using methamphetamine:“That one of the things I’ve struggled with – dealing with the extremities of the emotions – I find thatreally difficult. I can self-moderate before it gets to that extent – but when it happens it’s very hard tostop.”Broadie was placed in a psychiatric ward after close to two weeks awake on methamphetamine.“They put me in the psych ward [for] nine days... [I was awake] just shy of two weeks, so it waseleven days... I was paranoid”Tasha, who said methamphetamine was every bit as dangerous as was sometimes made out in themedia, explained the physical exhaustion she experienced:“When you go for a two week bender, and you don’t sleep. You probably get four hours sleep out oftwo weeks, and your are not eating properly. You are just run down. I don’t know how to explain it,you’re withdrawing.”Self-harm and assaultsTwo of the young men spoke about self-harm including suicide attempts.“I’ve tried overdosing, hanging myself, gassing myself and cutting” - BrodieXavier said hurting himself and trying to kill himself were turning points,“I’d been up for two and a half weeks and me and my dealer had a falling out... the next day I feltreally guilty and tried to knock myself [off]... I realised how alone I was, how wrong it was –everything I’ve been doing. Some of the memories of the things I’ve done while being on it ... for meit was either get back on the right track or I was too scared I wouldn’t make it.”.Both young men had experienced an assault or an attempted assault on methamphetamine.“If the wrong person triggered me, it wouldn’t be a good outcome”56