OPINION
MONDAY. APRIL 25. 2005
PAGE 7A
WWW.KANSAN.COM
Steve Sack/STAR TRIBUNE
MCLEOD MADNESS
Study drug causes columnist to suffer convulsive episode
It is the perfect study-drug: Easier to get than speed or cocaine, cheaper than a double espresso at Starbucks, and it wears off in about 12 hours without giving you a hangover.
BETSY MCLEOD
hmcleod@kansan.com
Adderall, the study-medication of choice among college and high school stu
dents, is an amphetamine used to treat attention deficit hyperactivity disorder as well as narcolepsy.
In short, it could be classified as a quasi-dosage of speed that helps you concentrate. For someone with severe ADHD, like me, Adderall is a godsend, except when it sends you to the hospital.
Not that spending six hours in the emergency room wasn't fun, but it wasn't exactly how I wanted to squander a beautiful Monday afternoon. After passing out and going into convulsions at Mrs. E's, I found myself strapped in the back of an ambulance, a four-inch IV sticking out of the back of my hand, and wondered to myself, "what the hell just happened?"
A baffled emergency room doctor couldn't really give me an answer, but he speculated that I was reacting to the Adderall I'd been prescribed.
Basically, the Adderall — which is known to produce side effects such as anxiousness, irritability and insomnia — had reacted with my other prescription to cause a severe anxiety attack, and because of the lack of sleep I'd been getting.
I started lashing out in seizure-like convulsions, which all led to two weeks of visits to hospitals, neurological tests, CAT scans, and in short, everything but the complimentary tour bus ride to hell.
So is everyone that takes Adderall at risk of this fun and riveting experience? No, but there are lots of factors to consider before you pop these pills without a prescription.
According to the Genelex Corporation, which specializes in the genetic makeup of reactions to drugs, when you take any type of medication it is deciphered and distributed by a
big command center in your liver. The catch is that because of genetics, everybody's liver metabolizes drugs at a different rate and in different wavs.
Certain medications react with one another in positive and negative ways, and when you are prescribed a medication, doctors make sure you won't be taking anything that will cause a negative reaction.
So while popping an Adderall to study all night is relatively harmless to a perfectly healthy student, it could be fatal to one that takes a drug, which doesn't metabolize correctly with an amphetamine.
According to the FDA, a person that takes an antidepressant classified as an MAO inhibitor or a person with heart problems, an overactive thyroid or high blood pressure should not take Adderall.
Because of 20 international reports of sudden deaths caused by Adderall, the Canadian Health Department has withdrawn the drug from the Canadian market.
According to Health Canada, a Canadian federal department that educates the public about health issues, these deaths were not caused by misuse, overdose or abuse of the drug, but because of mostly medicinal related strokes and heart-related deaths. Adderall is also known to cause hallucinations, difficulty breathing, irregular heartbeats, impotence and diarrhea.
Basically, the bottom line is that while one pill probably won't kill you, you should check out your medical history to make sure it won't send you to the hospital. It's a highly addictive drug, and can be fatal in large doses. Fellow students, please learn to be more responsible with what you put in your body; it's the only one you've got.
Tune in next week for an interview with Joe College: "Hey, it could kill me, but seizures shmeizures, I've got to study. Pass the pills, please."
- McLeod is an Overland Park freshman studying pre-journalism and French.
TWO WOMEN, ONE VOICE
Legacy of Pride Week thrives even after ban
With Pride Week at the University of Kansas only last week, it seems surprising that it is already time for reflection.
The elections came and went, Jim Solmonese, the Human Rights Campaign president, visited campus, the Kiss In, Tim Bergling lecture, Ouver Awards ceremony and
MAUREEN WARREN
ALLISON HANSEN
opinion@ransan.com
Kristie Stremel concert are all over. So much affecting queer campus life has occurred in April.
This year's Pride Week had the theme: "Liberty and Justice for All?" With a state constitution that now outlaws the marriage of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Kansans as second-class citizens and the threat of a national amendment looming on the horizon, some might think queer people have reason to creep back into their closets.
We have news for the hate-mongers: We are not going back to the closet. The mistake in attacking rights that were non-existent before the election is that a common enemy has mobilized the LGBT community.
Kansans for Fairness formed to fight the amendment but will continue to work collectively long after the amendment was passed.
They have media recognition, resources including a list of over 130 clergy member in Kansas opposing discrimination, and a renewed spirit.
You might be asking yourself how the community spirit could be renewed after a statewide defeat. To understand this, one needs only to examine the history of the LGBT rights struggle here at the University of Kansas. Q&A's History
which can be found at www.ku.edu/-qanda gives a glimpse into the 35-yearstrong student organization.
Most telling is the 1984 "Fagbusters" incident. There were white t-shirts being worn on
campus "with a ghost in a red circle with a slash through it. It was modeled on the "Ghostbusters" logo, only this ghost had long eye lashes and a limp wrist with 'Fagbusters' emblazoned above it" according to Ruth Lichtwardt.
Her writing is included in "A Stroll Down Gavhawk
Lane," the introduction in a book on the history of the KU LGBT community.
Steve Imber, the student selling the shirts was trying to cut funding for Queers & Allies — then called the Gay and Lesbian Services of Kansas.
You can read the entire story on the Q&A site. The important thing to note is that according to the site, the homophobic circumstance's "lasting impact was in politically mobilizing GLSOK members, many of whom ran for Senate and were elected. Funding was assured for 1985, 1986, and so on."
As you can see, you just can't hold the LGBT community down. Attempts to do so will only muster our population. How does this play into Pride Week? The answer is visibility.
The display of queer culture, whether it is an author like Susie Bright's lecture, an awards show to highlight student, faculty, staff and community members who are outstanding, or a concert by singer/songwriter Kristie Stremel benefits us all.
The LGBT community feels pride and camaraderie while heterosexual folks, the allied and the uninitiated alike, can participate in and enjoy the fruits of a thriving culture.
April has been a turbulent but truly revolutionary month in the state of Kansas. Pride Week 2005 is one more chapter of the history of KU queers making their voices heard amid the bigoted calls for our silence. Happy Pride KU!
Warren is a Garden City senior in art history and oil painting. Hansen is a Spring Hill graduate student in social work.
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Gay community shouldn't actively seek controversy
In response to David Ta's letter on Friday, the idea of needing controversy to expose a homophobic society is like saying we need a house fire to expose a house.
The LGBT community is doing a great thing with "Pride Week" by helping to promote tolerance and acceptance in a conservative state; however, trying to raise a controversy in Kansas isn't a real challenge and only hinders progressive thinking.
where they began.
Ta complained that the picture featured in the Kansan of two women hugging was "not even controversial" and that "it wasn't of two guys kissing or even two guys hugging."
Yet, it showed two people who care for each other, and that is what the primary objective should be; that love is not able to be defined or regulated by laws, and does exist between people of the same sex.
If controversy is all you're after, very few people in the Midwest will be sympathetic toward your cause.
Controversy begets controversy and everyone ends up
How is showing two men kissing going to spark any more acceptance than women hugging?
Showing men dressed as women may be fun for the already accepting, but perhaps more moderate measures in a conservative state might be in order.
Let's face it, risqué doesn't sell in Kansas. Define your market, and work with what you've got.
It's a shame that a majority of people in Kansas don't have open minds and shape their egos on stale, dogmatic principals; but if progression is really your goal, placate the audience by showing the equality of love in all forms, and with all people.
Don't simply do it for the controversy.
Eric Schaumburg
Prairie Village freshman
English
▼ REPORT CARD Pass:
- The Granada. For hosting Iron and Wine, and their "Southern-fried sound" that was so sweet for listeners that it was like pouring honey in their ears.
Benson Chesang.
The winner of the invitational mile at last weekend's Kansas Relays went out with some of the best milers around and finished ahead of them
Fail:
Everything But Ice.
We were saddened to hear they might be closing soon. Where else will students be able to get pilsner glasses with names and logos from restaurants nobody has ever heard of?
❖ Dog walkers.
Thanks for putting them on a leash, but please pick up after them.
Free for All
Call 864-0500
It really bothers me that a salmon can find the exact spot it was born in a river but after two classes I can't remember where I parked my car in a parking lot.
Free for all callers have 20 seconds to speak about any topic they wish. Kansan editors reserve the right to omit comments. Slenderous and obscene statements will not be printed. Phone numbers of all incoming calls are recorded.
For more comments, go to www.kansan.com.
I can't believe they're saying a 2.7 average GPA is too high, I've heard so many times that my 2.5 in biology will be pretty much worthless, and now they're saying that they want for over half of students in KU to have a lower
GPA than 2.97 Does that mean they want over half of the students at KU to have a completely worthless degree? Because that's what they've been telling me.
Free For All, can I just say that seeing Wayne Simien today walk out of Fraser Hall and looking at me totally made my day. Oh my goodness, it
Is it just me, or does Snow Hall smell like a wet dog?
totally made my day. And I think that I'll get a good grade on my biology test. Thank you Wayne Simien.
I just saw an old man driving a car with spinners on it.
Whoever it was who wrote, "Real feminists are pro-life," on the sidewalk doesn't know what it means to be a feminist or pro-life.
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EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS
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