Understanding Cocaine Comedown
Cocaine comedown is a term used to describe the severe crash that comes after the effects of cocaine wear off. Put simply, for every high, there’s a trenching low, and cocaine’s lows are some of the worst one could experience, especially for addiction sufferers. Expounding upon that, cocaine crashes can be nearly unbearable for those who have a high level of dependency. Therefore, the longer a cocaine-dependent brain goes from the last use, the worse this crash can get. Dangerously this is how cocaine crashes can lead to a perpetual cycle of endless use.
How Does Cocaine Affect the Brain and Body?
Cocaine stimulates overwhelming amounts of dopamine production, accelerating your heart rate and raising your blood pressure. Because of these hyperactive effects on dopamine-related neurotransmitters, excessive feelings of euphoria and energy are produced. With prolonged use, these heart rate and blood pressure effects take a long-term toll on your vital organs. Also, over time, the brain adapts to the presence of cocaine through developed dependency. This means when dependency is developed, your body and brain require a certain amount to avoid experiencing difficult withdrawal symptoms.
What Causes a Cocaine Crash?
A cocaine crash is a natural bodily response to cocaine use. This is your body’s way of telling you it can’t handle it. That is to say, because of the overwhelming amounts of abnormally produced or stimulated dopamine, your mind and body require a deep recovery period to restore natural dopamine levels. To compensate, your body crashes, resulting in extreme fatigue during this harsh recovery period when your body attempts to heal. In extreme cases, these severe cocaine crashes can result in cocaine dependency even after a single use.
Physical Symptoms of Cocaine Comedown
Cocaine crashes are hard to hide, especially if you’re aware of the red flags. Here are some of the most common symptoms to help you spot a cocaine-induced crash.
Extreme Lethargy
After the high effects of cocaine wear off, your body is overcome with intense fatigue. This fatigue can stem from drug-induced sleep disturbances or occur regardless of how much sleep you get. Cocaine crashes, therefore, will likely result in you not wanting to do much of anything for several hours or even days. If this describes you, don’t let these lethargic patterns from cocaine use bog you down. Get help today.
Persistent Headaches
Once the body comes down, the cocaine’s rebound effects are most prevalent through the headaches they cause during the crash period. These can feel similar to a hangover or even border migraine levels depending on crash severity. This symptom can make any sound appear magnified, exacerbating headache symptoms. If you experience this symptom following cocaine use, it means you’re suffering from the hallmark effects of a cocaine crash.
Full-Body Aches
Uncomfortable aches and pains throughout the body will often persist during a cocaine crash. The duration of these aches varies depending on personalized factors such as level of addiction, history of use, and bodily reactions. In some medical detox cases, doctors may prescribe medications to abate the severity of these aches as your body restabilizes. Rest assured, these withdrawal symptoms and cocaine crash aches are only temporary discomforts en route to blissful sobriety.
Abnormal Appetite Alterations
Cocaine crashes have very diverse impacts on individual appetites. For some, it can heavily suppress food cravings. For others, it can intensify these cravings. These contrary influences on appetite depend on how addiction corresponds with mental and physical cocaine effects, which differ per case. Whichever one describes you, both are equally unhealthy and can compound into negatively impacting your psyche.
Body Swelling
Psychological Symptoms of Cocaine Crash
Oftentimes, physical symptom manifestations are a reaction to mental impacts that tell the body how to respond. Bearing that in mind, here are some psychological impacts of a cocaine-induced crash.
Depression
When dopamine production is overstimulated to unnatural degrees, the mind goes through a reparation phase. During this mental healing period, your mind will starve yourself of producing these “happy” cells to counteract. As a result, it’s very likely to experience bouts of sadness or depression to linger until the mind recuperates. This psychological symptom makes battling a drug crash alone a dangerous task and should never be attempted without professional treatment.
Attention Deficiencies and Struggles Focusing
Coming down from a cocaine high makes focusing on any priority, regardless of importance, a nearly impossible task. This then becomes an immediate hindrance to an occupation schedule that doesn’t wait around for cocaine crash symptoms to subside. In turn, this can result in trouble at work, including potentially losing your job. This also makes common home or daily tasks suddenly difficult to perform. You can remove these cocaine-induced attention struggles by reaching out to us to get the help you need.
Unfounded Fears and Paranoia
Cocaine use, especially in cases of cocaine crashes and withdrawals, can increase anxiety levels to dangerously high degrees. These fears can consist of severe paranoia about things such as social anxiety, unfounded health concerns, or other various fears. In some cases, cocaine use can induce anxiety disorders that require dual-diagnosis treatment to overcome co-occurring mental disorders in conjunction with addiction therapy.
Elevated Irritability
One of the mental effects of coming down from cocaine involves increased irritability or being quick to anger. Once your dopamine-deprived mind begins the reparation process, your mind has very little tolerance for interaction and patience. This frequently manifests itself in being very moody, angry, or short-tempered in even the simplest of social interactions or circumstances. This puts your work-related and personal relationships at risk without the proper anger management techniques.
How Long Does Cocaine Comedown Last?
Cocaine crash effects range between hours and days because of the fluctuating individual factors involved. Individuals with lower tolerance and dependency levels are likely to experience a shorter duration of cocaine crash effects. More addicted individuals, on the other hand, can expect several hours or days to overcome these withdrawal and cocaine crash effects. Regardless of which category you fall under, the only way to properly and safely detox is through professional treatment.
What’s the Difference Between a Cocaine Comedown and Withdrawal?
A comedown from cocaine, though bearing many striking similarities to withdrawal symptoms, is very different from an actual withdrawal. A comedown from cocaine is simply a natural bodily response to normalizing chemical and neuronic frequencies that have no underlying dependency. Cocaine withdrawal is quite the opposite. Withdrawals specifically occur because of a mentally or physically developed dependency that spurns a mental or physical withdrawal response.
Coping Strategies for Managing a Comedown from Cocaine
Though cocaine crashes differ from cocaine withdrawals, there are numerous similar coping strategies you can utilize to manage a crash. Physicians will help you incorporate any of the following coping strategies into your daily life.
Healthy Nutrition
During a crash, your appetite may go haywire, craving fatty or greasy foods to compensate for the lack of “happy” dopamine production. The truth is healthy foods like fruits, nuts, and greens have the best impact on minimizing the uncomfortable symptoms associated with cocaine crashes. On the other hand, greasy foods will have the opposite and negative effect on your physical and psychological state.
Meditation Treatment
Journal Your Emotions or Speak to a Loved One
Everybody needs a vent and everybody benefits differently through diverse venting techniques. Some experience burden relief from journaling their feelings while others receive that same relief from opening up to a loved one. Everybody is different, but not having a vent for your pain, emotions, and struggles keeps those emotions unhealthily bottled up. If you struggle opening up or expressing yourself, speaking to an individual treatment counselor confidentiality may help you open up.
Seek Help for Cocaine Use and Recovery
Accepting the fact that you need help is the most difficult obstacle to overcome in rehab. The benefits of our unparalleled services will give you immediate relief from the support, attentiveness, and personalized care you receive. We’ll show you the way to a happier, healthier, and sober you. We’re eager to begin this healing journey with you and be there for you every step of the way.
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