pangs for cannabis today but resisted

Good luck tecomsin!
The longest I ever went without smoking was 4 months. I'm a daily smoker and have done for 5-6 years now.

Well I've lost track of what day in my quit it is. I've not had a relapse or a slip. It is still mostly in the morning that I want to reach for my pipe. It is when i feel life is too much and I just want to crawl under my blanket and stay there. My son is living with me now and it is nice to have company but he is sleeping in late until noon time and not applying for jobs so I am quite fearful of this turning into a bad situation where I'll either be supporting him for life or kick him out of the house. He says his coding is rusty so wants to improve his skills before applying but he spends most hours just playing video games and not working on his skills, although he does work a little bit every day. Well my smoking pot will not solve any of these problems, or my loneliness and the fact that I have only a few rather distant friends. I wonder if I get sick again who will take care of me.

MJ made me really anxious and paranoid. I only used it because it made music sound fantastic.

Hey cool09,

I've had that effect from MJ. I honestly believe that I never would have been paranoid psychotic if I hadn't abused cannabis. It has some beneficial effects, basically numbs me to all my problems and makes life lighter, my thoughts seem clearer and my head seems brighter and lighter, but the downside is the paranoia and long term anxiety. I do think I'm less anxious than a few weeks ago when I finally stopped. I was only consuming a little bit, not like when I am psychotic when it is all day long without respite. I wish I could have the beneficial effects of cannabis without the downside. It also helped with chronic pain or so I thought. On the other hand my pain level is not too bad atm. My main frustration in life is that I have so few friends and no one I can really count on if things go downhill for me.

Congrats on sticking with your goal.

I think many of us are in a bind when it comes to having people we can count on should things go south. Even my pdoc and my PC doc are retiring in a couple of months. They are close friends, but they have each been there for me through lots of trials.

I am lucky to have a very dependable husband. Very lucky. He's very devoted. If he left or passed on, where would I be? I think about that a lot. We are both getting older. Rambling, sorry.

I hope your son comes through and meets your expectations soon.

Thinking of you.


WC

I used to get high and loved it. But I had to put up with the tremendous anxiety and paranoia it caused. I don't need anymore anxiety.

Day 18:

WC, I think about this every day because of my overall fragile health situation, so I appreciate your thoughts. You are fortunate and blessed to have a husband you can count on. Right now I am having another pang for cannabis. It seems to happen regularly in the morning and once I get through that I am ok for the rest of the day.

cool09, yeah the anxiety would go through the roof and then I would smoke more to temporarily quell it only to have it roar back stronger. It was a positive feedback loop. I'd only get paranoid on it when psychotic but then I am paranoid all the time. In many ways my psychosis was a break from anxiety. An escape from my grim reality.

Thanks to both of you for following and commenting here. It helps to have the feeling that someone is listening and cares enough to respond.

I follow along with your thread. I just don't post much as I have a prescription for pot and use it regularly. I am proud of your success. I quit smoking years ago and remember how hard that was. It takes a lot of strength. I hope you celebrate every milestone. :-)

Hey TheSadGirl,

Thanks for your input and I appreciate your moral support. Quitting smoking cigarettes was the toughest addiction I ever had to break. Pot is not as hard but I still do have moments where I almost ache for it... hence this thread.

I'm not anti-pot and know it helps lots of people and has also helped me with nausea from chemo and a chronic pain condition. Unfortunately in my brain it has untoward side effects in addition to the good effects. I definitely enjoy my existence more when I am running a buzz as long as anxiety doesn't take over... and I look back on the fact that my psychotic episodes didn't start until I resumed pot after more than 25 year abstinence,

All my episodes were when i was continuously consuming a little bit at a time all day long. I'm not one of those people who can moderate my use because when the buzz starts to wear off my anxiety shoots through the roof so I take another toke until I feel better.

I have a close friend with very high anxiety and depression, etc. She has moved to an area where MJ is a part of the lifestyle. She has started smoking MJ from the time she gets up until she goes to sleep at night. It's been a year.

She says she feels much better on MJ and MJ is her friend. I have been watching her life fall apart: homeless, bankrupt, paranoia, etc. So while the MJ alleviates some of her anxiety and depression, it takes her off into a place where she is not grounded and her overall life has become unmanageable.

She has been unable to see this. She still insists she needs MJ in order to survive.

I am not against MJ. I don't think MJ is good for this particular friend.

Tecomsin, I am glad you have such insight into yourself and are committed to doing whatever you feel is in your best interests, even though it's not easy. I admire you for doing so.

I hope to continue to show you lots of support!

WC

Day 19:

WC, I relate to what you wrote about your friend. I was also using cannabis all day from first thing in the morning to just before falling asleep at night. It was my constant companion and I used it to make up for a big hole in my life. My anxiety has definitely gone down since I quit. The pangs to take a hit are lessening in duration if not intensity. The biggest problem is in the morning since I would use it to set my day.

MJ can be a trap for some people like myself and your friend. My last episode I was doing dangerous things and ended up in a forensic psychiatric ward with criminal charges (which fortunately are being dropped in favour of a diversion program). Needless to say that was a low point of my life. Not as bad as finding out I had lung cancer or finding out they wanted me to do chemo after surgery but it was bad. I don't blame MJ for it but do want to do everything in my power not to have another episode. It seems my brain is destabilized by MJ and then my life become unmanageable, like your friend.

That is the beginning and end of the story. Destabilized in a good way that it can temporarily lift my depression and anxiety too. There's upside and downside to everything.

It is fascinating that it is so controversial. I have a prescription given to me by a doctor. Some doctors support it and some are absolutely horrified. Both sides have earned me that the THC can cause psychosis in people with bipolar. It's a very real risk. I don't sleep well. I never have. So I use it at night to sleep vs sleeping pills. I just feel better. CBD is good for anxiety and doesn't carry the risk of psychosis as you don't get high. It works well for me.

I'm actually not sure where I'm going with this. Lol. Pot is not for everyone, I just believe it should be accessible for those who benefit from it I also personally can't use the THC stuff all day. I basically get hungry and pass out. I'm not functional. I rarely smoke and prefer edibles.

Anyways this was pointless, but I was reading the thread anyways so why not.

Thanks for posting TheSadGirl. I agree with everything you wrote. I've only been psychotic whilst I was regularly consuming THC. I never enjoyed CBD as it just made me tired and what I crave is energy. So I've come to believe i"m in that minority of people who are prone to psychosis on THC. As long as I stay abstinent maybe one day I won't need to be on a daily AP. I'm thinking after a year or so of stability I might try to go off the AP with the supervision of my pdoc. Well, in the meantime it is one day at a time for me. It is just that my last psychosis was so bad that I never want to live through that again.

Makes me tremendously anxious and paranoid. I do love the smell of it and I used to use it for listening to music. Nothing like Dark Side of the Moon and some cannabis.

Cool09, yes I remember when I was younger listening to Pink Floyd whilst stoned...that was a long, long time ago (I'm 54).

So far, so good. I'm sticking with the program of no cannabis anymore to rewire my brain because it often goes haywire that way. I still get some urges in the mornings but I think it is boredom more than anything else.

I'm 54, too. A few years ago I would go to NYC to get MJ. You can get MJ from Craigslist delivered to your door in NYC. Some of what I had in high school turned me into a zombie.

Hey there Tecomsin,

Congratulations on sticking with your goals!


WC

Boy, there must be something to smoking marijuana. This thread has sixty six replies.
Well, sixty seven now.

Tecomsin
It is impressive that you have accomplished this.
I follow this thread regularly for inspiration.
Good luck.

It's getting easier every day WC. I appreciate all your support. Even though we have never met or spoken there's an affinity...

Well, yes, pirilin. It can be a godsend for some people and a nightmare for others or some combination, as it was for me. Thanks for stopping by. I really appreciate everyone's input.

Thanks FDT. It isn't an easy addiction to give up but it is also not as hard as giving up cigarettes, which I did in 2015. I learned some lessons from that helped this time with cannabis. The main thing was just to decide I was finally done with it. Once that decision is firm then the rest is much easier. I'm glad you get some inspiration here. That means a lot to me.

I'm having a really tough day. 2 of 3 of my son's bags arrived from where he was a student. Unfortunately his citizenship document is not in the bag with the other papers and he needs that to get provincial insurance as his insurance under my coverage expired when he was not a student out of province anymore and he didn't apply in the province he was in.

So the other bag is supposed to arrive tomorrow. He had told me before he put all his papers in one bag so I am skeptical it is in the last one. If the document isn't in there then there's a big application to fill out to get a new proof of citizenship and all that has to happen before he can get provincial health insurance in canada. I have a phobia of paperwork but know if I don't do it then he won't deal with it either. He also needs that paper to be able to work in Canada.

I am so frustrated and angry about this. i had asked him many times to please take care of that document as it is important but it just goes in one ear and out the other.

I have a phobia of paperwork so I'll have to hire an immigration consultant to do the paperwork and tell me everything to do. It is hours of more work and aggravation for me and he just doesn't give a damn. He is sleeping until afternoon and playing video games all day. Hardly working on applying for jobs. I feel like we are sinking into a morass. I just want to get stoned and forget about all this but know it won't help.

Sorry for the rant. i just need to get it out of my system.

Can I ask how old your son is?

my son is 24 with ADHD and a college degree but not working.

I feel trapped by my son. He's 24 and ought to deal with these things himself but the fact is that he doesn't. I just don't know what to do. He is sleeping in his room until the afternoon everyday. Then he plays video games all day. Maybe he works on applications and leetcode practise coding site for an hour or two. He doesn't clean up after himself and won't turn off the lights when he leaves a room. I gave him an electric heater because his computer room is cold and half the time he leaves it running all night until I wake up in the morning. He doesn't lock the door when he comes and goes. i am so frustrated. It was a bad idea to let him come home and now it is going to be a big fight to get him to leave.

(((((( tecomsin ))))))

Thinking of you.

WC