It’s already been banned in six states, the District of Columbia, and a handful of cities and counties. Critics who want kratom banned say teenagers can easily get their hands on it. Kratom is in the crosshairs of regulation and may not be legal for long. Online vendors like Dee, however, import high-quality kratom straight from Indonesia and sell it at a lower price than store-bought brands. Overpriced, low-quality commercial stuff is silently marketed as a legal high in gas stations and smoke shops, where it often sits next to things such as glass pipes and amyl nitrites (poppers). But Kratom is having something of an identity crisis. use kratom, according to the American Kratom Association (AKA), an advocacy organization. Users mix kratom with juice, brew a tea, or simply do the “toss and wash” method of choking down a spoonful of the powder and chasing it with a drink.īetween 3 and 5 million people in the U.S. Chronic pain patients and recreational users also take kratom for the subtle euphoric effects it provides. The main alkaloids in kratom reach the mu-opiate receptors, quieting the withdrawal symptoms that make opioids so hard to quit. Addicts are turning to it as a non-narcotic alternative to classic opiate-replacement drugs like methadone or buprenorphine, in the hopes that it is safer and less addictive. Kratom has long been used in Southeast Asia for its pain-killing and mood-boosting properties, but the plant has only become popular in the U.S. He does it by using a largely unregulated plant called kratom, a coffee-relative that can grow up to 100 feet high in the jungles of Indonesia, where much of the kratom sold in the U.S. Oren Levy found a new identity as John Dee, a sort of shadowy do-gooder who helps opiate addicts kick drugs.
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It came in the form of two sandwich bags full of greenish powder - and a big, warm hug. His black, square-framed glasses and furrowed forehead gave him a hawkish look.ĭee’s lips melted into a smile when he saw James, for whom he had prepared a carefully curated withdrawal kit. Dee’s skin, carved by several sharp wrinkles, seemed tightly stretched over his facial bones.
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A diamond-shaped white patch showed where his curly black hair started to recede, as if death had been coming but beat a quick retreat. Dee had spent about a third of his life copping prescription painkillers and heroin at Brooklyn housing projects. His face seemed to James not 40 years old but 40 years besieged.
The door to the building swung open, and a man emerged whom James only knew by his thick Brooklyn accent and pseudonym, John Dee. This time, he was determined to quit opioids this time James was after a chalky, bitter-tasting powder that would tickle his opioid receptors just enough to keep him from a full-blown withdrawal. He could satiate himself with one last handful of the oblong yellow pills known on the street as “bananas.” Yet James hadn’t come for his usual medicine. (“Eric James” is a pseudonym he asked not to use his real name for fear of repercussions at work.)Īt another building in another neighborhood, the money in his pocket could get him well for a few hours. It would thunder in his brain and strike lightning through his bones, if he didn’t do something about it. The onset of physical withdrawal was still a few hours away, but he could feel the storm gathering. The effects had worn off by morning and left him with his daily pre-dose feeling of lethargy and dread. He had taken his last oxycodone at 6 o’clock the night before - about 15 pills, all in one go. James, a 35-year-old freelance graphic designer with warm brown eyes and buzzed hair, sat on a bench outside of a brown brick apartment building, his fingers sweeping across the screen of his phone as he waited. The taxi stopped on a quiet side street in an Orthodox Jewish neighborhood in Brooklyn. So, on a Sunday morning in March 2019, with $150 in his pocket, he climbed into the backseat of a taxi, hoping that a 15-minute ride would bring him to the end of a 15-year habit. He did not want to go through all of that again. But worst of all, the fog would set in, clouding his thoughts. But he knew the opening bars of the overture well: In a few hours, the muscles in his lower back would start to spasm his knees would rattle his nose would run. Eric James had about a day before the dope sickness really kicked in.