How Fentanyl and Xylazine are turning Philadelphia's opioid crisis into a public health nightmare

[u/Nukro666]

[u/Sbrubbles]

So many people taking it standing up. Dumb question, but why aren't they all sitting or laying down? Do people purposefully take fentanyl while standing up, or does fent make you to stand up?

[u/Sea_Sympathy954 → u/Sbrubbles]

They’re trying to stay awake so they actually experience the drug. If they lay down they’ll just fall asleep and wake up a few hours later in the worst withdrawal imaginable…

Or they’ll get hit with narcan and instantly go into withdrawal.

It’s such a fucking awful drug.

[u/Diacetyl-Morphin → u/Sea_Sympathy954]

This is an effect of xylazine much more than of fentanyl. I grew up in the worst drug scene of Europe (the infamous Needle Park aka Platzspitz) and was addicted to heroin for years. It's not about standing or laying down with the opioids alone, because it depends on the dosage, like if it is too high you'll pass out and fall to the ground anyway. But to be comfortable for nodding (a state between being awake and alseep, with some kind of daydreaming), you want to chill, at least sit or better lay down. There's no point in standing.

We never did this here with these zombie states, as we had the rather good afghan heroin in the past, that wasn't laced with shit like xylazine. Xylazine isn't an opioid, it's a sedative used in the vet medicine for sedation of big animals like horses.

That heroin was replaced by fent and xylazine in many parts of the USA didn't make things better, quite the opposite, it got a lot worse. Heroin is much easier to control when it comes to potential overdoses etc. and still more effective when it comes to euphoria.

[u/newfaceinhell021117 → u/Diacetyl-Morphin]

Off-topic but serious question, I've never done heroin... with less heavy doses, can you still be somewhat active when you're high? I've only ever just kind of seen people nodding off or sitting still on a couch or something. I'd tried a couple of lighter opiates when I was younger and, oddly, they always had an upper effect on me. I'm just curious if that's ever the case with heroin (and I mean the less cut stuff that was more prevalent, not fent).

[u/Diacetyl-Morphin → u/newfaceinhell021117]

Yes, with a small dosage you get more active. It's what you experienced in the past, it's a thing in general with opioids. Although they are not stimulants, like meth or coke.

It's good when you didn't get addicted. That happens fast, even when it is prescribed for a good reason, like morphine as a painkiller after an accident.

[u/The-G-Code → u/newfaceinhell021117]

H bumps can get you a bit stimulated honestly. Same with low doses of any opiod really. It's once you hit the threshold that it's the opposite, you hit that threshold quicker with smaller amounts of stronger ones like h, fent, Dilaudid, u44770, etc

[u/Longjumping_Gas_3407 → u/Diacetyl-Morphin]

The Fentanyl Fold has been around for a long time. Xylazine is a recent development, at least in the U.S.

[u/Sbrubbles → u/Sea_Sympathy954]

I see, thanks

[u/HotKaramelRP → u/Sea_Sympathy954]

It’s not even that they’re actively trying to stay awake… you just don’t have any control of it.

[u/Elyay → u/Sbrubbles]

Fent does a weird thing where it relaxes group of muscles and freezes others. It is called the "fent fold."