Safer using
When you buy
Healthier using tips
Ways
to use
Safer slamming
Ways to use
There are a few ways that guys do Tina. For the most part,
the methods depend on which orifice you put the drug in and
whether it’s a solid, liquid or smoke when it goes in.
Each way of doing the drug involves a different ritual. It
also takes a different time to kick in – some methods
deliver the drug to your brain faster. Remember, faster isn’t
necessarily better – faster can also mean more addictive
and it can involve more potential harms.
Swallowing
How it’s done:
Can be taken by putting it into empty gelatin capsules (available
at most health food stores). Other people mix it into water,
juice, soda, or add it to coffee to make ‘biker coffee.’
Then there’s ‘parachuting’ in which the
Tina is wrapped in a small bit of toilet or tissue paper then
swallowed.
Time to get off:
About 20-60 minutes – slow and gentle, depending on
how much you take and what is in your stomach.
Things to watch out for:
This method involves the fewest risks. However, it’s
not without risk, especially if there are contaminants in
the speed or if you have stomach troubles, like ulcers.
Swallowing drugs offers advantages to other ways of taking
them:
• Your body has a safety mechanism for anything swallowed
that could be dangerous to you – you tend to throw up
or vomit.
• Drugs are absorbed more slowly through the gut therefore
the positive and negative effects of the drugs tend to be
less extreme; however, they tend to last longer.
• The risk of getting HIV or the Hepatitis C virus (HCV)
is greatly reduced from swallowing a drug.
Strategies to reduce risks:
Fill the capsule yourself, or think twice about taking one
someone else prepared, because you never know what could be
in it.
Snorting
How it’s done:
This is appears to likely be the most common method of use.
The crystals are chopped up into a powder using a razor blade,
knife or credit card. This is easier if you crush the shards
while still in the baggy first. The powder is inhaled directly
into the nasal passages through a straw, rolled up bill, or
through a ‘bumper.’ Once inside the nose and sinuses,
the drug is absorbed by the blood vessels of the mucosal membranes.
Time to get off:
Up to 5 minutes.
Things to watch out for:
Snorting drugs tends to destroy the tissue in the nose. The
lining of the nasal passages is fairly delicate and can be
injured leading to nosebleeds, sinus trouble, and in some
cases permanent damage to the nasal structure. Sharing straws,
bills and bumpers can transmit all types of germs from the
common cold and flu to HCV.
Strategies to reduce risks:
Chop it up fine, fine, fine! Big chunks in your nasal passages
can cause damage and often don’t get absorbed by the
bloodstream. Don’t share straws or bills. If you’re
trapped on a desert island and have to share a straw, clean
between use. At a certain point, snorting becomes an ineffective
way of delivering the drug because the nasal passages can’t
absorb any more of the drug due to congestion, over-use or
permanent damage. Give your nose a break - switch the way
you do it and try swallowing it.
Smoking
How it’s done:
The drug is heated in a glass pipe until it turns to smoke,
then it’s inhaled into the lungs where it enters the
blood stream.
Time to get off:
less than 1 minute
Things to watch out for:
Smoke irritates the lungs, which can lead to breathing difficulties
and coughing. It’s also most likely carcinogenic. People
with asthma, emphysema, and other lung problems are particularly
at risk. If you are smoking Tina, you are most likely going
to consume larger quantities of the drug much faster than
if you are snorting or swallowing. Keep in mind, the time
to get off is much quicker and the high is more intense, therefore
the tendency to develop an addiction using this method is
much greater.
Strategies to reduce risks:
If you can, try to set limits on how much you smoke or how
often you choose to smoke Tina.
Booty Bumping
How it’s done:
Think turkey baster! The speed is dissolved in water then
a syringe without a needle is used to ‘bump’ this
solution of Tina into your ass. The drug is absorbed by the
blood vessels in the lining of the rectum.
Time to get off:
up to 5 minutes
Things to watch out for:
If you bottom after booty bumping, you’ll have something
else in your rectum besides your absorbent blood vessels and
his big dick. You’ll also have a somewhat abrasive powder
which can increase chances for internal abrasion and condom
breakage. If there isn’t a condom on that dick, you
will increase the risk for abrasions both in your rectum and
on his dick, and increase the chance for exchange of blood.
Possible damage to the mucous membranes, burning, or tearing
of the tissue of the rectum, will put you at high risk of
transmitting HIV and other sexually transmitted infections
(STIs).
Strategies to reduce risks:
If you booty-bump and bottom make sure he has a condom on.
Make sure you use clean water to dissolve the Tina. Don’t
share booty bump syringes – you could be sharing more
than a good time - you or he could end up with Hepatitis,
parasites or any number of diseases.
Hot Rail
How it’s done:
The tip of a short glass stem, or the middle of longer stem,
is heated until its red-hot. The end of the stem is placed
over a bump or line. The heat vaporizes the Tina and the vapor
is inhaled, usually through the nose.
Time to get off:
less than 1 minute
Things to watch out for:
As with smoking, the vapor may be carcinogenic and can definitely
irritate your lungs. Since you rail through your nose, so
there’s also irritation of the nasal passages to consider.
The stem will be very hot, and can burn you or someone else.
Strategies to reduce risks:
The stem used for railing could transmit HCV. Have your own
stem and, if you have to share, try and wash the stem between
uses and users. Keep your eyes on the hot stem before, during
and after railing. And have a glass or metal tray or dish
to put the hot stem on after you've done your hit.
Slamming
How it’s done:
Tina is injected directly into the veins with a needle and
syringe. Other known ways of injecting Tina are ‘muscling’
- injection of the drug into muscle, and ‘skin popping’
- injecting the drug under the skin. Muscling and skin-popping
are both painful methods you really risk abscesses and infection.
Time to get off:
up to 2 minutes
Things to watch out for:
Slamming directly into the veins is the most dangerous of
all methods, as this bypasses all the defenses the body has
to protect its blood supply. If the skin through which you
inject has bacteria on it, you can develop an abscess at the
injection site. Anything you use to prepare your hit can transmit
numerous diseases such as the Hepatitis B, HCV and HIV. Don’t
share any of your works (needles, syringes, cookers, tie-offs,
etc.). Any contaminants in the Tina will be injected directly
into the bloodstream.
Strategies to reduce risks:
We have a whole section about this topic, click
here.
 TIP: Please
refer to the ‘Resource
Guide’ for needle exchanges in Toronto.
Adapted from Tweaker.org with permission
|
