Hi, Papabear:

Judging from the lovely drawing at the top of your page, I can tell you might also be a fan of coffee. Like a lot of people, I drink it virtually every day.

However, I've started to suspect that this is not a healthy habit for me. Despite being physically active, eating a good diet, and usually getting enough sleep, I frequently feel tired and unmotivated.

That's not good for anyone, but being a college student, it's really not good. There's so many things I need and want to do. I have a history of procrastination that I've failed to shake, and this lack of energy isn't helping. Obviously, not doing your work and meeting deadlines doesn't pass anymore for me, so I keep finding myself in distressful circumstances.

After some self-reflection, all the caffeine I drink (ranging from 1-3 cups a day) seemed to be an obvious suspect. I realized that after drinking coffee, I feel super energized for about 50 minutes, and then feel dead afterwards. So, I experimented with quitting. I found that my energy levels were more stable, but it didn't make that much difference. My energy was stable at a low level. And the draw of caffeine addiction never made my attempts to quit last very long.

(As a side note, I know that certain genetic traits can result in people being more sensitive to caffeine and having their bodies process it differently. I'm probably in that category. Some people aren't, and I feel like they don't take me seriously for that reason because they have a different experience.)

I tried talking to some trustworthy people about this, and they helped me realize that it was more about my fundamental lack of motivation that was the problem. I was trying to substitute caffeine for my lack of focus and motivation. Working on those areas seems to help, but I eventually slide back into the same behaviors--with caffeine crashes there to kick me while I'm down. Realizing that the coffee was a smaller variable than I thought makes it easier to convince myself that it's okay to drink.

This complicated situation has kept me from quitting caffeine permanently. But what do you think? Should I try going all the way, or do I just need to focus on being motivated more?

Thanks,
Murray the Rat (age 20)

* * *

Dear Murray,

There's nothing inherently bad about drinking coffee, and 1-3 cups is not too much (well, depending on cup size). There are numerous possible causes for your lethargy, both physiological and mental.

It sounds a bit like you are rather unmotivated. How long has this been going on? You're far too young to be feeling so sluggish. Have you seen a doctor? Do you have any other symptoms? Just for an idea, here are some of the things that can cause lethargy:

• thyroid problems
• kidney failure
• pituitary issues
• sleep apnea
• brain issues (ranging from meningitis to stroke)
• fever
• carbon monoxide poisoning
• dehydration
• stress

Since you don't have any serious symptoms like fever or pain, I think we can safely rule out stuff like meningitis and kidney failure. My bear instincts would suspect two more likely possibilities: 1) stress, and 2) sleep apnea or other sleep problems. For the latter, even if you think you are getting in 8 hours of sleep, this might not be sound, restful sleep. Do you know if you snore? Do you wake up feeling tired? You might want to get a sleep study done if you answered yes to either of these. Fortunately these days, sleep tests can be performed at home and you don't have to spend overnight in a hospital.

Stress can also cause feelings of being tired and even unmotivated. Other symptoms of stress can be depression, insomnia, headaches, digestive problems, decrease in libido, changes in appetite, increased heartbeat, and even acne. If you have some or all of these symptoms, it could be stress that is really the problem. The solution is obviously to try to reduce the stress in your life.

Bottom line is this: I don't think coffee is your problem; nor do I think you are just a lazy, unmotivated person. I think there is an underlying, more serious issue here that coffee just provides temporary relief from. Consider some of the above issues and consider talking to a doctor or nurse about your chronic feelings of lethargy.

Wishing you improved health and happiness,

Papabear

* * *

Hello again, Papabear. I’ve been doing some reflection/trying different things out, and I think I might have found the cause of the lack of energy I told you about. You don’t need to respond to this letter, but I’d thought I should share this because it feels important.
 
Without going on and on, I think I’m sort of a technology addict. I’ve realized that I have very poor habits/boundaries with my device usage. I check my phone and all my various social media ‘feeds’ way too much, scrolling up and down again looking for something interesting. Then I’ll do the same routine again 10 minutes later. When I’m trying to do work, I’ll also check my phone or open new tabs and get carried away watching YouTube. If I get frustrated, I might look at furry porn and that takes up plenty of time and energy. I can waste hours a day, trapped in this cycle. I think you get the picture.
 
Now, I’ve tried ‘detoxing’ from these habits. I’ll alternate between going an entire day without those things, or I’ll set strict boundaries (with the help of airplane mode and this time-locked website blocker). At first, I was afraid missing out on whatever my furry friends were talking about, but I realized it you never miss much.
 
So far, the results have been pretty impressive.! The tiredness and lack of focus I told you about in my last letter is largely gone when I follow this new approach. The only problems come when I don’t follow it. I don’t know if it will solve all my problems, but I think it was an important step. And as you mentioned, I don’t always get high quality sleep, so that’s my next order of business.
 
I just wanted to share because I think it seems relevant. I feel like a lot of people are in the same boat I am but aren’t aware of what’s causing it. I mean, the devices provide so much instant gratification that I think it just exhausts your brain of it’s desire to do anything challenging.
 
I know these things are mostly a benefit and it’s all about ‘responsible’ usage, but I’m almost jealous of people like you who got to grow up without so many devices. :)
 
-Murray

* * *

Oh, ho! I see it was indeed a problem other than coffee LOL.  Tech addiction has become a serious problem. It used to be just video games, but now with smart- and iPhones and social networking, the problem has exploded. And, yes, it can interfere with work, sleep, school, and, ironically, socializing.

I, myself, have been a bit addicted with Facebook, I fear. When I was banned from it for a week (because I posted something anti-American by calling the government on their mishandling of the virus crisis), I did feel some withdrawal symptoms. That's good, though. It makes me realize I am on there too much.

Things you can do to overcome the addiction:

1. Set aside specific times of the day that are computer/phone-free. During these times you are not to answer a text, call, IM, or email. You are not to look at a screen.
2. Go outside! Do anything outside away from technology. Go for a walk. Walk your dog. Do yardwork. Go swimming. Go hiking. Fly a kite.
3. Read a book!
4. Bond with family and friends; talk to them and don't look at your phone.
5. Do something furry!

Good luck! Thanks for writing!

​Papabear

Dear Papabear,

I want to write to you about is cannabis. You see, medicinal cannabis is going to be legalised in the UK tomorrow [November 1] for only those who need it the most. If I’m correct, it’s for epileptics whom have had no success with other treatments. I want to say that this is great news and all that, but I’ve had this strong prejudice against cannabis since the first days I learnt what drugs were. I think I can pin it down to 3 key factors:

1. The UK education system used a lot of very strong anti-drug propaganda back in my day. Good luck finding anything from talktofrank.com [a drug advice site] that’s pro-weed.
   
2. Most of the people I’ve known in the past who were open cannabis users were... well, not very nice people. For example, one got himself so intoxicated, we returned home to find the kitchen full of smoke as he left a frying pan in the oven on full blast. Plus, he played gangsta music full blast, which I wouldn’t have minded if it weren’t for the deafening volume he had it at.
   
3. I particularly don’t like the concept of it being smoked or vaped due to the passiveness of it. I mean, you can’t exactly get drunk from smelling someone else’s beer (At least, I’ve never heard of anyone getting drunk in that manor). Not to mention it must play havoc on the lungs.

Since joining the fandom, though, I’ve come to discover that many of the friends I’ve made are cannabis users, to varying degrees, and even those who aren’t tend to have no issue with it. Not to mention a lot of celebs I like, like Morgan Freeman and Whoopi Goldberg, have been outspoken about their use of weed. So, I’ve found myself in this predicament where I’m trying hard to work all the propaganda, bad apples and smoking-bias’s out of my head ever since.

I’ve done a ton of research about cannabis since then. So, I know the difference between CBD-based and THC-based varieties (essentially, it’s the THC kind that makes someone high). I know that the CBD-kind can work wonders to cure/suppress all kinds of medical and psychological issues. I know that even the THC kind is neither as addictive nor as dangerous as a lot other substances, legalised or not. And, I know that legalising it would both increase business and probably make it a lot easier to manage since it’d discourage people from using the black market to get their fix.

But, despite all these positives I know about... I’m still uncomfortable about the prospect of it being legalised. It’s not like I’m denying these facts about it at all, it’s just that they’re not working to change my mind for whatever reason. The friends I have are good people, and I don’t want to think bad of them just because they might use wacky-backy once in a while.

So I ask, how do I get rid of this prejudice against cannabis which I’ve had for so long? How do I make myself okay with it?

Hugs,
Charleston

* * *

Hi, Charleston,

What follows is simply my personal opinion on the subject, so take it with a grain of salt. As with anything else, there are good and bad things about weed. Let’s begin by why weed was illegal and had a bad reputation in the first place.

Why was it considered bad? I can sum it up in a few words: weed has been seen as the drug of the poor and the foreign, and so a campaign of criminalizing and stigmatizing marijuana was initiated by the elite. There is an excellent article about this here. It has nothing to do with “drugs are bad,” since the wealthy and the corporate have been pushing drugs for centuries (from the Opium Wars to today’s opiate crisis in the medical community, rich people are drug pushers of a disgustingly immoral sort).

Naturally, this orchestrated stigmatization perpetrated by those in power includes the public education system, which is where you were indoctrinated into believing weed is evil. Word of advice to all those reading: public education is a scam to brainwash children into becoming good little cogs in the machinery owned and operated by those in power (educate yourself by searching for books in the library and book stores and read read read).

In the last few years, the government stigmatization of cannabis (in America and worldwide) has changed to be more favorable because of three things: the preponderance of evidence that cannabis has many medical benefits, that it is really no worse for you than alcohol, and because there is a lot of money the government can make through taxation if it is legalized.

Moving on to your personal observations with weed users. I know several people who use it (smoking it, eating it, or taking it in pill form), and they are all very nice people. You, apparently, have met a lot of unpleasant people who like to imbibe. The fallacy of reasoning here is that using marijuana makes you a bad person when, in fact, you are simply encountering bad people who happen to use marijuana. Marijuana doesn’t make you a bad person; being a bad person makes you a bad person.

I agree with you that the smell of weed is unpleasant and that those who don’t like it and don’t want to be subjected to it should be free of such a pungent environment. I feel the same about tobacco smokers (except pipes; I love pipes) and people who blast unwanted music in my ears. This is a matter not of weed but of manners, civility, being a polite person. These days, many people forget what it means to be considerate of others. Again, that’s not weed, that’s the decline of manners in society. So, when you come across friends blowing smoke in your face, politely ask them to take it elsewhere. If they don’t respect that, then they aren’t very nice friends. Tell them you don’t object to their using marijuana; you just don’t like the smell. Perhaps they can have some edibles instead?

You are completely within your rights to not like weed and to not use it, but you should also respect the fact that weed is here to stay, whether or not it is legal. Recognize that people have different likes that don’t necessarily reflect your own and accept that, as long as they aren’t doing any harm to anyone, they have the right to enjoy cannabis.

But friendship is a two-way street, and your friends should acknowledge just as much that you don’t like weed, and they should respect your boundaries, too.

Make sense?

​Hugs,
Papabear

Dear Papabear,

What are the benefits of psychedelics, if any? I ask this because it may or may be possible certain ones may be legal someday. It's not like they are all bad; it's just ... is it right from a moral stand point to make certain ones legal in Canada?

Sergie

* * *

Dear Sergie,

Good question :-3 Some people, such as, famously, the late Dr. Timothy Leary, have promoted the benefits of drugs like LSD. There are those who say it has a spiritual effect, allowing people to experience things they could not in the mundane world. Scientists who have studied drugs such as psilocybin (psilocybin, baeocystin, norbaeocystin, and psilocin are all hallucinogens found in eleven different mushroom genera), speculate that this is because psychotropics bring down the barriers around our sense of self, our ego, and make us feel more open-minded and connected to the world around us.

While there have not been any major studies on the effects of hallucinogens just yet, there have been a number of smaller ones involving a couple dozen subjects. Focusing on psilocybin, they concluded hallucinogens have benefits for both healthy and mentally ill patients. For those with various emotional and mental illnesses, the drug has been found effective for such disorders as depression, anxiety, and addiction (one study reported successfully curing 80% of test subjects of nicotine addiction). When administered to healthy patients, the drugs have notable effects on personalities. They tend to make people calmer, more creative, more focused, compassionate, tolerant--in short, NICER people! Interestingly, these effects can be noted with a single dose of a hallucinogen and can last over a year.

There is an important caveat to this, however, which is that psychotropics do have risks. For some people, they can cause "bad trips," as people who dropped acid in the Sixties and Seventies used to say, which can make you go literally nuts. For this reason, should drugs like psilocybin be approved someday for medical use, they should only be administered by skilled physicians and not taken recreationally. Taking the wrong dose of these medicines is highly dangerous.

So, when you ask about whether hallucinogens are good from a "moral" standpoint, I would say they are as moral as any other medication might be. There are many potential benefits for them that I don't think we should ignore and that require further research by the medical community.


Hugs,
Papabear

Hello, Papa.
 
I don't know if this counts as much as a question as it does as a desperate cry for help.

Also, this is going to take very long to read, so take as much time as you need to respond, and to anyone who reads this, I hope it's at least helpful for you.

I have written to you before back in the day when I had a different fursona and I had no problem in letting everyone know who I was and what 'my situation' was, back when I was still a manipulative man child desperately looking for excuses to latch onto the carefree nature of my childhood - avoiding the responsibilities that adulthood brings. I've been telling myself for the longest time that it's okay to be childlike (having childlike interests) only to disguise my immaturity. I'm aware it's okay to collect plush toys and keyholders and play games and all that stuff, but I've been using all that scheme as a scapegoat to keep myself from becoming an adult. I have finally turned 24 just today and I'm still as stuck as I was when I was 18 and I spent a whole year doing nothing after high school.

I haven't lost it. I keep being manipulative, I keep getting jealous and envious and angry over petty things, enforcing the idea on myself that I'm worthless and therefore I have the 'right' to be upset over ridiculous things, and I constantly compare my personal value with others so as to keep telling myself that other people are better than me and that that's the reason why I don't make it in life.

In fact I'm getting everything mixed up. So, if you don't mind reading a bit more than usual for a question, here are a few anecdotes that might give you a better idea of my current emotional and mental state.

I had been doing a Fluoxetine treatment for little over six months and I had decided to drop it because I told myself I don't need pills to do well in life and feel better, and for some time it seemed to be true as I was in fact doing better.

I don't know if it's got to do with me having left the pills, but now I get more and more hysterical more easily, getting upset over the smallest remarks, pretty much like my 2nd girlfriend used to do, who was by far the most manipulative person I've ever met - she used physical illnesses to keep people held by the b@lls, that's how far it went.

Last Friday I was in the university's cafeteria and, scrolling through Google+, I found a particular post in a fetish themed community I was following; someone had republished a picture of a furry I really like/d with another fur (a picture that they themselves would have never shown me), and if anyone has known me for a long time they would know I lost my sh!t over it; my face went hot and my hands and legs went cold, and I was so angry I wanted to punch the table and make a hole in it if I could have. I saw myself getting back to the old days of getting upset and angry and full of hatred over something that somebody else would never have (seriously, it's ridiculous). And most importantly, I realized that I was essentially being so overly sensitive over everything so as to get back to my man-child days of trying to manipulate people with my anger or sadness.

I went and told this furry how I felt and things between me and them have been really awkward since then, as I'm not even sure how s/he feels about it and I'm almost certain I left a horrible impression (I know I in their shoes would have been creeped out as hell, or pissed at least). But most importantly, and as far as my own issues are concerned (which are the only thing I can actually make a dent on), seeing them in my contacts list is only a permanent reminder of my current emotional and mental decay. I'm 24 and I keep doing the same things I did when I was 18, which were already immature and harmful in their own accord back then.

The most important thing, and the MAIN reason why I'm writing this letter to you (gee, it took me so long), is because all of this is heavily interfering in my main concern, which are my studies, or lack thereof in my case.

It's the second time I'm going through the same course—I lost a whole year last year, and in doing so I also wasted a great job opportunity to earn a lot of money just looking after my brother's house while his partner and him were on a holiday trip to Europe, also throwing our relationship down the sh!tter with how I evaded that responsibility. So I did nor one thing nor the other.

You would think that being the second time I'm doing the first year of this career, I would have some experience and I would be studying harder. But in fact, I'm as lost as I was last year and everyday I'm about to give up. Sometimes I even feed myself with negative thoughts about jumping off the bridge I cross every Tuesday and Thursday night on my way back home from volleyball lessons.

Basically, I'm constantly falling back into the vices of deceiving myself with "I'll study later" and investing time and emotions into internet stuff, putting so much thought and energy into it that getting upset over internet events can already ruin my day to the point that I no longer have any motivation to do anything else. That day when I saw this picture of this furry crush with someone else, I was so upset I took a bus back home and told my mother that "algebra class had been cancelled" just so I could give myself an excuse to sleep all day. That's how far it goes.

So here's the question: What do I do?

Anonymous (age 24; Argentina)
 
* * *
 
Hi Furiend
 
Question: did all this bad stuff happen after you stopped taking Fluoxetine?  Are you still not taking it?
 
[Note to readers: Fluoxetine is an antidepressant designed to also lessen anxiety, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and panic attacks. It should be dispensed only under a doctor’s supervision.]
 
Papabear
 
* * *
 
It wasn't immediately after I stopped taking it, but I'm still not taking it, and in all honesty I don't want to keep on taking it because I don't want to rely on pills to grow up as a person.
 
* * *
 
Hello, again,
 
Okay, well, there is a clear correlation between your not taking your medication and things getting much worse for you. I understand and sympathize with the fact that you don't want to be on medication, but sometimes people need medicine. There is no shame in that, and there is no shame in your taking Fluoxetine any more than there is shame in someone with a heart condition taking medicine so that they can live.
 
It is very common for people such as yourself to suddenly decide--usually against doctors' orders--to stop their medication. This is unwise and often leads to a lot of pain and suffering. Just because you are on medication doesn't mean that it is the thing responsible for your personal growth. That's all you. Indeed, NOT taking it is making it MORE difficult for you to become the kind of person you wish to be.
 
I am not a doctor, so I am not comfortable stating for certain this is what needs to be done, but I would very strongly recommend you go back to your physician and talk to him or her about this. My prediction is that the doctor will prescribe the Fluoxetine again (it seemed to be working) or possibly change the dosage or try a different medicine if it makes you feel better. Also, talk to your doctor to see if there might be things you can do to, over time, lessen the dosage or even, eventually, get off of it, but stopping it abruptly on your own without medical advice was not the thing you should have done.
 
Some people think it shows weakness taking medicine. Actually, it takes great strength to admit you have a problem and follow your doctor's orders. Keep working on your condition and perhaps it will improve in the future, but for now, I'm fairly certain you need to get back on Fluoxetine, hon.
 
Good Luck,
Papabear
 ​