Partially unrelated, but I always post this whenever cannabis is discussed, as a PSA.
Proponents often say that this drug is harmless but in some people it's use can trigger psychiatric illnesses esp. schizophrenia and related disorders. In others it can actually exacerbate anxiety (its somewhat counter intuitive, just like some antidepressants can cause suicidal thoughts). Some people are genetically more predisposed to the effects.
This is a personal topic for me because cannabis (ab)use triggered psychotic episodes in two of my close family members, they had to be hospitalized multiple times (psych ward is no joke) and put on antipsychotics (which are also very hard on you and drain the life out of you). Their actions during the psychotic/manic phase disrupted their family and work lives. Both people were unwilling to cease cannabis use, citing its public acceptability and reasons like "it's legal", "you literally can't overdose on it", "a(n) (internet) doctor prescribed it to me for anxiety so I can use it", "everyone uses it and is fine", "xyz (popular celebrity) uses it". After multiple stints in the psych ward and the threat of government mandated treatments they were finally able to drop cannabis use, it then took them many months to come back to normal functioning.
Thank you. A big factor that excarbates this issue is that the legal cannabis industryha greedily amped up THC potency by an order of magnitude. 5% was typical in the 1990s. Today it's hard to find lower than 20%. And that's just plain flower, whereas many users vape instead which is even more potent and way easier to abuse by using all day at work and school secretly.
Studies and anecdotes agree that higher potency means more symptoms of the sort you discuss and most importantly more addiction and habit forming. So the industry does this on purpose out of greed, and the states have no clue how to stop it.
What do you think would happen if after the 1930s alcohol had been relegalized but suddenly only high proof vodka was available?
Because that is the disaster that has happened with legal weed. We thought we were legalizing the weed we knew and instead they used it as a door to carpet bomb us with ultra high potency products.
This had been going on for decades as a result of the prohibition on the substance and the criminal penalties associated with it.
> 5% was typical in the 1990s
What is your source for this assertion?
> vape instead
Is there a source for this as well?
> which is even more potent
The material used in vaporizers is typically from concentrated extracts. This is another product born out of the long standing legal status of the flower. The real question is, are users consuming _more_ when they vape as opposed to other methods, or is this simply a more efficient delivery mechanism for them?
> So the industry does this on purpose out of greed
You're ignoring edibles entirely. These products really didn't exist before legalization. A large segment of these products are much lower dose than the other specialty products and often have reduced THC in favor of higher CBD, CBG or CBN.
> but suddenly only high proof vodka was available?
Pure grain alcohol from stills has always been available.
> they used it as a door to carpet bomb us with ultra high potency products.
This single minded focus on potency of product and not on the impact of users is unusual. Why have you made this such a focus?
"Many people who have voted for legalization thought they were talking about the marijuana of the 1960s to 1980s when the THC content was less than 2%. ...
Prior to the 1990s it was less than 2%. In the 1990s it grew to 4%, and between 1995 and 2015 there has been a 212% increase in THC content in the marijuana flower. In 2017 the most popular strains found in dispensaries in Colorado had a range of THC content from 17–28% such as found in the popular strain named “Girl Scout Cookie.”2 Sadly these plants producing high levels of THC are incapable of producing much CBD, the protective component of the plant so these strains have minimal CBD. For example the Girl Scout Cookie strain has only 0.09–0.2% CBD."
"... In 1995, the average THC content in cannabis seized by the Drug Enforcement Administration was about 4%. By 2017, it had risen to 17% and continues to increase. Beyond the plant, a staggering array of other cannabis products with an even higher THC content like dabs, oils, and edibles are readily available—some as high as 90%."
None of those links give actual references for the percents (unless I missed it).
As an anecdote, in the late 90s and early 00s, the higher potency stuff was quite prevalent in my circles. The low potency dirt weed was was basically worthless and we would only get it if we were desperate, but it was readily available.
You have to follow the links for a couple of hops.
The key article reference is "Sevigny, E. L. (January 01, 2013). “Is today’s marijuana more potent simply because it’s fresher?”. Drug Testing and Analysis, 5, 1, 62-7."
Well good for you, but some people couldn't get the fancy stuff and didn't mind and actually liked the "dirt weed" and are sad it can no longer be gotten for love or money. You can't even grow your own either because in many of the legal states, it's still illegal to grow but legal to buy from a large cannabis corporation. What a boring dystopia and not at all what the punky hippy "LEGALIZE IT" types of yore can possibly have had in mind!
Yeah, as a Canadian who grew up in this time, it's comical to hear people talk about 5% THC levels in weed. The only time I've experienced something like that was down in Arcata when someone gave me some Mexican brick weed.
> Sadly these plants producing high levels of THC are incapable of producing much CBD, the protective component of the plant so these strains have minimal CBD
What does that mean “the protective component of the plant”?
"Human studies have shown that long-term (>10 years) and heavy (>5 joints per day) cannabis use compared with age matched non-using controls resulted in bilaterally reduced hippocampal and amygdala volumes (p=.001) and significantly worse performance on measures of verbal learning (p<.001).14 There is evidence that recovery is possible in humans as well. ... They found that cannabis users had smaller hippocampal volumes compared to controls but the users not exposed to CBD had an even greater (11%) reduced volumes (CBD appears to be somewhat protective). In the former users the hippocampal integrity was comparable to controls. ..."
summary: THC-only users had smaller hippocampal and amygdala volumes (HAV) than THC+CBD users, while former users had HAV similar to control subjects.
Lol. Do you really doubt this? Have you been out in the world recently? It's become a major problem in the schools. It can be done discretely, much like nicotine vapes, in a way that is impossible for smoked cannabis or smoked tobacco.
> A big factor that excarbates this issue is that the legal cannabis industryha greedily amped up THC potency by an order of magnitude. 5% was typical in the 1990s. Today it's hard to find lower than 20%.
Only tangentially related, but I’ve realised I should really think thrice before advocating for something because the way things become is pretty much never the way advocates had in their mind while advocating.
I see this in many contexts but I won’t make other examples because it would get controversial…
No, because the high potency stuff merely increases THC but does not increase and in fact often decreases other psychoactive compounds like CBD. It will not be the same.
I had nothing scientific to go one, but have long felt that mixing 50/50 with CBD specific flower may be putting it a lot closer to the old school stuff.
Looking at a couple of the studies linked to from the comments, seems like that broadly about right.
(Hypothetically, if I was a Marijuana user) I (would) exclusively use edibles for this exact reason. Dosage is labeled on individually wrapped pieces with the exact amount of thc/cbd/cbg/cbgb on the packaging
We live in the time when there is sharp decline in trust of public institutions and academia.
What is considered 'safe' to use, or 'unsafe' -- is debated at the level of a layman (a person without specialized knowledge in chemistry, biology, immunology, etc).
We cannot all be specialists in human biology, finance, internet security / etc.
And that's being exploited by powerful organizations.
When the above happens, and we feel taken-advantage-of we tend to 'default' to our 'localized' experiences and instincts.
For me, and I am sure many others I do 2 things
a) I trust the NIH positions and articles before 1994 or so, much more than the most recent ones (on the topics that rely on observational statics)
b) I tend to do research on these topic across countries (especially if I can translate, of non-English speaking countries).
Forums like this one, may amplify just one side of the view (recently publish observational stats, English-speaking ).
My suggestion, if I may offer one -- continue to be cautious and use information sources that are 'balanced'.
Weed is not harmless. The question I always ponder is if it's more harmful than X. Alcohol, methamphetamines, etc.
Rescheduling is a start for more research into whether weed is causing these episodes or highlighting other underlying causes.
It seems like your friends arguement that it's legal for continued use is asinine. Plenty of prescription drugs are legal per se but would have adverse effects for some.
Good call, here cannabis damaging effects are usually minimised and hidden under the rug.
And you will always, always find someone telling you “what about alcohol”
Eh, "I don't believe your claimed reasons because your actions don't seem consistent with them" can be a valid things to bring up. Of course it becomes less so if you then refuse to hear any explanations that aren't the one you came up with.
> cannabis (ab)use triggered psychotic episodes in two of my close family members, they had to be hospitalized multiple times (psych ward is no joke)
There are additional risks for those experiencing psychotic episodes over and above the obvious as they can fall afoul of other social problems like police brutality.[1] So, if you have a family history of mental illness, but especially a history of psychotic episodes related to cannabis use (!!!), it’s very foolish to use cannabis.
And why does anyone need to fuck with their brain like this without a doctor’s supervision? I get some people have glaucoma or cancer. But that doesn’t require normalizing yet another psychoactive substance. As if we don’t have enough problems with alcohol, tobacco, caffeine, not to mention all the other toxins we’re pumping into our bodies (BPAs, PFAs, microplastics, etc).
Yeah. I know someone who uses cannabis without much issue (for pain management, every day, partaking for years with no significant issues), but I also know someone who had been smoking cannabis for a few months and had one instance trigger a psychotic/schizotypal episode which still hasn't subsided a decade later. They had a family history of schizotypal disorders on both sides. My strong recommendation to anyone with a family or personal history of any sort of schizotypal or psychotic illness is to avoid cannabis as a treatment, because the risk of an extremely debilitating outcome is not worth it. There is the possibility that it's just triggering earlier an illness which would have struck you in your thirties anyway, but A) it can still make it worse and B) triggering an illness that would have happened at 35 when you're 15 or 20 is still losing 15-20 years of health and inflicting a lot of suffering. It's not worth it. Talk to a doctor about other treatment options.
For anxiety something like diazepam might be less risky (more risky for average people, less for those with a history of schizotypal), or a beta-blocker. For pain there aren't many great options. There's opioids, which some people are going to need but which have significant issues with addiction and bowel health. Managed/staged consumption of ibuprofen and paracetamol can help deal with mild to moderate pain if your liver is functioning well and being monitored, but there are some risks with NSAIDs (like ibuprofen) and bowel health that you should be aware of. Non-pharmaceutical interventions like the use of hot packs, massage (be mindful of massage with MAST cell disorders), hot showers etc can all be useful in managing pain.
I presume the uptick I've noticed of "weed is really bad, actually" articles filling my news feed and social media is a response to the imminent classification changes in the US in an attempt to sway public opinion. I can only assume this is being driven by parties with ill intent, who prefer the status quo of using the phrase "I smell weed" to end-run constitutional protections against search and seizure, allowing unequal enforcement of the law, and selling less effective but more expensive treatments for ailments cannabis is known to be effective for.
This is an active topic of conversation in the law enforcement community. The changes and adaptations of not being able to catch criminals using the illegality of weed as probable cause.
This was over a decade ago, but I idiotically drove from my "weed legal" home state into a much-less-friendly state... ultimately arrested for flakes found beneath passenger seat (was absolutely sober), in a state where 0.009oz == same "up to 2oz" misdemeanor charges. The police in this tiny Texas town acted like they had caught Pablo Escobar, and not an impoverished college dropout...
For my defense attorney, I chose a well-recommended private attorney (futureMe: I would use the public defender because it would have been the same outcome). His services cost me around a pound of "top shelf" kush. I was broke.
Ultimately I "served my time" [2mo. probation + community service]. Just a few years ago this attorney said to me, in private: "but if we didn't have this legislation [prohibiting marijuana] then I would be out of the job!"
I guess I was supposed to feel bad for his archaic legal practice/funding?
Not necessarily a counterpoint but as an HN lurker in Canada I have also been seeing these articles popping up, but, in Canada Cannabis is already essentially completely legal.
You could also interpret this by saying that the legalization of cannabis is allowing researchers to actually study its effects more widely in clinical environments.
If they are indeed finding extra symptom not previously known I think it's something the public should know about.
As far as I can tell, there’s very little one can do for any extended time without creating epigenetic changes. Epigenetic changes are durable changes in gene expression within the cell - we already know that fasting or food deprivation create epigenetic changes, and the mechanism of cell differentiation generally (muscle vs liver cells, say) is epigenetic.
I’m not going to defend long-term high-level cannabis usage - I’ve got eyes - but I’d suspect we’re going to find more things in the “causes epigenetic effects” bucket than not.
My biggest concern with weed is that it stays in your system for a long time, much longer than the actual high. THC is fat soluble, getting stored in the body's fatty tissue, and can slowly enter the blood days after using. This means it can affect you for days. I usually feel off for 24 hours after vaping cannabis.
My other concern for legal states: I think a lot of people using weed are doing it every single day. This is because it gives a relaxing 'weight off your shoulders' feeling at lower doses. At higher doses you get 'faded' and it can be scary. Using daily means the high becomes your new normal, affecting memory and reasoning.
It definitely helps with exercise (much less boring) and sleep for me, but at what cost?
Every story in here, for or against cannabis, basically has no evidence. A lot of stories about people who went nuts when they took weed, but no studies of if the weed caused it or just revealed it. A lot of stereotypes for people who took weed. A lot of people saying weed is scary or perfectly normal.
A lot of stories with no studies or experiments. I hope the rescheduling helps this in the USA.
I will admit that I have a borderline-irrational hatred for weed culture, so consider this a disclosure of biases [1].
Despite the lecture I've gotten from every stoner on this, I've never been convinced by people claiming that weed doesn't have side effects. It always seemed like it would make my friends' personalities frustrating, even when they weren't stoned. A lot of this could just be attributed to the fact that "teenage boys are just kind of insufferable anyway", but it always seemed like weed exacerbated things. [2]
Obviously this isn't a study, just vibes on my end, so it can reasonably be dismissed immediately, but it does seem like my feelings on this stuff is being a little validated.
[1] I still think it should be legal since I think enforcing it is worse than doing it, but I think it'll always make me uncomfortable
[2] I was always terrified of doing any illegal drugs because I was always afraid that drug dealers would cut it with something horrible, so I to this day have never done any drugs that weren't federally legal.
Even if it doesn't have physical side effects, it certainly must have psychological ones.
My pet theory is that people relying on substances to emotionally regulate can neglect to develop the regular skills that everybody who doesn't rely on substances use for emotional regulation. And that's why some 40 year old stoner's will seem to have the emotional maturity levels of teenagers.
Don't take this as a disagreement but I wonder from reading your comment: Is there a right way to live life?
Your statement appears to be passing judgement to an adult using marijuana as a coping mechanism. Do you also have the same feeling for someone who takes a prescribed medicine for similar emotional regulation? I get there is a line here with certain mental disorders but if someone finds themselves better off (in their own opinion) by using marijuana who are you, or I to judge?
Similarly, I don't judge the person who picks up their monthly Rx at the pharmacy, if it makes them feel good. At the end of the day people are just trying to live their life and be comfortable.
> Do you also have the same feeling for someone who takes a prescribed medicine for similar emotional regulation?
We don't need to go even that far. Upwards of 50% of people in the US, and some 20-30% people on the planet[0] are emotionally self-regulating with coffee. 13% of the world[1] regulates themselves emotionally on tobacco. And let's not even look at alcohol consumption rates. Or sugar.
This is not to demonize any of it - just to point out that approximately every adult[2] uses some mind-altering substances in a ritual of emotional self-regulation. The drugs I mentioned above are some of the more potent ones, but they're so deeply embedded in our cultures, that we don't even notice it.
--
[0] - If we go with random stat I found here: https://coffee-rank.com/world-coffee-consumption-statistics/. I'm taking it at face value, since it feels close enough, and the exact number doesn't change my argument, unless it's a fraction of a percent.
[2] - The numbers I gave above may not feel impressive, but note that the averages in the west are much higher, and then all those numbers are dragged down by including people aged 0-18 in the denominator.
I definitely feel like caffeine can absolutely be used as a coping mechanism; if nothing else it can help you ignore the "why am I not getting enough sleep?" question, for decades if you let it.
I've never really drunk coffee because it always tasted like an ashtray to me, but I've had other things that gave me an unhealthy dependence on it. I don't drink caffeine anymore and it did force me to acknowledge a lot of bad sleep habits (both physiological and self-imposed) that I was able to (mostly) solve them as a result.
If you're taking something like an antidepressant or something, it's because a mental health professional has indicated that they think you'll be better-able to deal with your issues with this thoroughly-tested, regulated item. At least in theory, the professional will be much better-suited to find the exact medication that will help you emotionally regulate.
I've never done weed, but I have gotten drunk plenty of times when I was young (though not in quite awhile), especially when I got dumped by a girl that I really liked. Alcohol can be great in a very temporary sense to make you feel better and ignore your problems, but it's terrible at actually addressing the core issues, and it has a ton of other awful side-effects that might even make the underlying problems worse.
I already said that I have a hatred of weed culture, and I stand by that, but as someone who does take mental health meds for depression, I do understand how appealing coping mechanisms can be, and I absolutely sympathize, but I think there are enough differences between prescribed meds and recreational drugs to where I don't think it's fair to claim that the former is a coping mechanism.
I think it is equivalent. It's not by default, a bad thing to take drugs in order to help control your mood. I am certainly an enjoyer of alchohol on rare occasions.
It just becomes a problem when your dependence on it causes you to become anti-social and/or generally a burden upon the people around you. For example you end up in the psychiatric hospital, costing the tax-payer 100's of thousands of dollars to baby-sit you whilst you recover from your latest meth bender.
> Your statement appears to be passing judgement to an adult using marijuana as a coping mechanism. Do you also have the same feeling for someone who takes a prescribed medicine for similar emotional regulation? I get there is a line here with certain mental disorders but if someone finds themselves better off (in their own opinion) by using marijuana who are you, or I to judge?
I think there's a point where it becomes clear use of the drug is leading to sufficiently negative life outcomes that the drug's doing more harm than good. Alcohol's an easy case here (and a trigger word, so: I'm not comparing alcohol to weed from a health perspective) - many of us will have a pint or a glass of wine now and again to relax, but when you start drinking enough that it's regularly preventing you from meeting your obligations (or desires), you should re-evaluate. It can happen with prescription drugs, as well - a friend of mine was prescribed something for anxiety that wound up effectively rendering them homebound. At that point, it's not really serving its purpose as a coping mechanism.
>Don't take this as a disagreement but I wonder from reading your comment: Is there a right way to live life?
This question has had a clear answer for millennia, although one too uncomfortable for modern feelgood relativists: confronting your problems with strength and willpower.
As Tom Cruise[1] is wont to say, it masks rather than solves. I suppose it’s up to the user to decide the acceptance of not addressing the root cause, but hiding it with chemicals.
[1]Sure, he’s out there with religion and stuff but he’s pretty clear-headed there.
So long as they are choosing to live in such a way that improves the lives of the people around them to some degree of their abilities rather than burdening the rest of us then it's fine. Do all the drugs you want.
> My pet theory is that people relying on substances to emotionally regulate can neglect to develop the regular skills that everybody who doesn't rely on substances use for emotional regulation.
As I understand it, this is basically taken as a given in substance use therapy - there's some reason you're using this (to the degree it's having a negative impact), and it's probably to deal with some kind of emotional or psychological issue, and part of reducing substance use is working through those issues and building up strategies for dealing with them that don't include the drug.
“Well, Stan, the truth is marijuana probably isn't gonna make you kill people, and it most likely isn't gonna fund terrorism, but, well son, pot makes you feel fine with being bored, and it's when you're bored that you should be learning some new skill or discovering some new science or being creative. If you smoke pot you may grow up to find out that you aren't good at anything.”
― South Park, Season 6 episode called "My Future Self n' Me"
I agree with everything you're saying; I think pretty much all non-prescribed drugs make it really easy to ignore underlying problems; it's why I don't drink caffeine anymore, since I feel like it allowed me to mask my symptoms of sleep apnea for around fifteen years.
I still think there's a physiological element to the weed stuff as well, and I do think that the research seems to indicate that, but I don't know anything about medicine so I don't really know what I'm reading with the research.
Dont kid yourself, prescribed drugs are even worse in many cases. I was given adderall as a teen and it absolutely wrecked my ability to develop normal routines for hygene, diet, excercise, and socialization.
I got off it fairly recently and am slowly rebulding giod habits. But yeah fuck amphetamines.
Similar deal with xanax, opiates. They often mask underlying problems.
I guess I just think that self-diagnosis is usually a very bad idea, that's what I was trying to get at. At least if a doctor gives you the drug, there's at least some trained professional that believes you'd be better off with the drug than without. Obviously there's a ton of abuse that happens with the medical system and it leads to people getting addicted ending up really fucked up, so I'm not claiming it's perfect, I just think it's better than people randomly grabbing their own drug to get some temporary relief.
I didn't try adderral until I was 31 (prescribed), and it really messed with my sleep, which is bad enough as it is; even taking a relatively small dose at 8am, I wouldn't be able to get to sleep until 3:30am. Not entirely sure why I had such a horrible reaction and I decided it was definitely not worth it for me, but I could also see why people get hooked on it. In a way, I'm kind of glad I didn't like it.
You didnt have a horrible reaction thats just how the drug works. You get used to it eventually and ur body adjusts but your sleep remains low quality.
And yeah I agree self diagnoses and self medication is pretty bad
As a long-time on-and-off habitual user, yeah, weed has side effects and stoner culture is stupid. At best, the heaviest users experience weed like coffee: without it, they're useless; with it, they're back to baseline.
Yeah, that's kind of been my outside observation. I don't drink coffee, but I have had a pretty unhealthy relationship with caffeine throughout most of my life. Obsessive Diet Coke drinker (now an obsessive Diet Coke Caffeine Free drinker), drinking upwards of a gallon a day, usually with a few energy drinks thrown in for good measure, and possibly even a NoDoz depending on the day.
That much caffeine was definitely very bad for me, hence why I eventually quit cold turkey (that was one hell of a headache!), but for years it was something I very much depended on, in no small part because of my at the time undiagnosed sleep apnea, which the caffeine helped me ignore for many years, which is bad for obvious reasons.
I sympathize with habitual weed users, basically any addictive drug is something we should be understanding of. Weed culture really bothers me because people let "stoner" become their entire identity.
Or perhaps, they have a sense of humour. Sorry, not sure how to teach you to have one though. I think humour is a type of intelligence that requires recognizing the hidden meaning...like 'lols' implies for textual representation of laughter...since it doesn't translate.
Isn't that selection bias? Maybe a lot more people have used from an early age and you don't notice them because you are only noticing the ones that look different.
I can generally spot a regular heavy user. The proverbial "burn out". I'm not sure I could say I know how to spot someone who started early, or is an occasional user. What is it that tips you off?
Ah, so actually a morphological difference? That's really interesting. I generally pin the cliche burn out more by the tired eyes, pallor of skin, and such, but again that's heavy users and transient. I didn't realize you meant something as permanent.
I'd be curious to see an example if you happen to know one you could link.
It's a cannabinoid from cannabis that has a double bond in a slightly different position from normal d9 THC but otherwise the same chemical formula that happens to be federally legal in the US from a loophole involving hemp (which is the same plant).
Yep. But in truth the alternative cannaboids are interesting on their own. That having been said I don’t live in a legal state but… it really doesn’t much matter anymore.
That’s literally the only substantive information in the article. Aside from that sentence the article can be summarized as “we saw some changes and it is outside the scope of this study to figure out what, if any, impact they have”
Proponents often say that this drug is harmless but in some people it's use can trigger psychiatric illnesses esp. schizophrenia and related disorders. In others it can actually exacerbate anxiety (its somewhat counter intuitive, just like some antidepressants can cause suicidal thoughts). Some people are genetically more predisposed to the effects.
This is a personal topic for me because cannabis (ab)use triggered psychotic episodes in two of my close family members, they had to be hospitalized multiple times (psych ward is no joke) and put on antipsychotics (which are also very hard on you and drain the life out of you). Their actions during the psychotic/manic phase disrupted their family and work lives. Both people were unwilling to cease cannabis use, citing its public acceptability and reasons like "it's legal", "you literally can't overdose on it", "a(n) (internet) doctor prescribed it to me for anxiety so I can use it", "everyone uses it and is fine", "xyz (popular celebrity) uses it". After multiple stints in the psych ward and the threat of government mandated treatments they were finally able to drop cannabis use, it then took them many months to come back to normal functioning.