In a club or rave setting, an ecstasy user might dance nonstop for hours, "feeling" the music with a heightened sense of awareness. However, repeated incidents have shown that crowded clubs prove a bad setting for ecstasy use. The drug's side effects can be intensified by heat, exercise, and dehydration.

Although there are health risks associated with drinking at any age, some risks are unique for minors. A 1997 study by researchers at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) found that the age at which one begins to drink has a dramatic impact on the chances that one will develop alcohol dependence. Those who take their first drink at age 13 have a 47.3% chance of becoming alcohol dependent during their lives. For those who delay drinking until age 16, the odds drop to 30.6%; those who wait until the legal age of 21 have only a 10.0% chance of developing alcohol dependence.

Codependents are driven by compulsions, or a sense of extreme responsibility and urgency that a particular action be taken. The codependent believes that success or failure will depend on acting in a certain way or completing a particular task. Initially, the compulsion may appear to be a positive force for the codependent, such as making lists. However, the codependent cannot abandon the compulsion without feeling anxious or fearing failure. Codependents feel they do not have any real choices about what is happening to them. They feel compelled to do any number of things: keep the family together, stop the drinking or other drug use, save the family from shame, work, eat or diet, be religious, keep the house clean, and on and on. Compulsions create excitement and drama. As people battle their compulsions, simple decisions, such as what to eat or how much to work, are turned into life-or-death struggles. These dramas temporarily give the codependent a feeling of purpose and vitality. Compulsions also take up a lot of time and keep people from confronting their deeper feelings. Codependents often get locked into compulsive behaviors to avoid more painful feelings of fear, sadness, anger, and abandonment. Like the addicts in their families, codependents deny reality. Alcoholics often deny that they are abusing alcohol and remain unaware of its impact on their lives and their relationships with family members, friends, and coworkers. Codependents show exactly the same denial. They often refuse to see that a family member is addicted, or they refuse to acknowledge that their children are being hurt. Shame and the compulsion to keep things under control cause codependents to deny the problem. Like addicts, codependents are unwilling to accept that human willpower has its limits. Just as alcoholics believe they can control their own drinking problem, codependents think they can control their loved one's alcoholism if they just use enough willpower. They keep trying to control the situation through their own force of will, not admitting that they need help with their problem. Codependents firmly believe that their failure to cope is caused by their personal inadequacy. When they cannot control the drinking, drug use, or other addiction of someone they love, they blame themselves for not trying hard enough—or for not trying the right way. When codependents take too much responsibility for another person's recovery, it keeps the alcoholic or addict from seeing that only he or she is responsible for his or her own recovery. In this way, codependence actually increases the likelihood that a drug or alcohol problem will continue.

When heroin was first introduced to the medical community at the beginning of the twentieth century, it was used to help people overcome opium and morphine addiction. Heroin was considered a "step-down" drug. However, the cure was worse than the original addiction. It is no coincidence that heroin was the first opiate product declared illegal in the United States. Once a dependence is established, it is very difficult to end.