Is pot as addicting as other drugs

[newsandi]

My son smokes pot everyday for a very long time. He did quit of course while he was in the hospital. He has his intake Tuesday and will start his outpatient rehab program that is 12 step based with a sponsor and all. I know that my husband smokes pot on a regular basis and he is very seldom ever out but when he is for a few days, he is looking really hard to find some. I just am concerned for my son to overcome this addiction and I am afraid he will not be able to. I know he needs to changed friends but the only friends he hangs with live a few houses down from us and they all do it. I asked him tonite if he told his friends that he would be starting rehab next week and he hasn't mentioned it. I told him that he will have to quit on that day and says he will but a week ago he said he wasnt. I know that if he doesnt, I have to let go and let the courts determine what they want to do with him. Mental illness or not, he knows it is not legal and that will cause him more problems being on probabtion. I just want to hear from you guys that have smoke weed and how are the w/d and is it easier then opiates or some other hard core drug to get off of. I am not totally against smoking weed on occassion but decided after what I have been thru I am not doing it anymore but I am not addicted to it so I know it wont cause me any problems. If anyone is out there that can share, it sure would help and maybe something I can read to him to explain how it can be done or what it has done to you guys. Thanks for whatever info I can get. I just want him to overcome this problem, he has so much on his plate to work on and the pot, I know is holding him back from getting further down the road with other issues. Thanks in advance for whatever you got for me.
Sandi

[Callie]

YOUR AS CANNOT smoke weed on "occasion". He is beyond that his GENETICS are beyond that - his dad taught him that (sorry ) It is YOUR job to teach him right from wrong and by you "condoning that" you're enabling him. LEARN from your mistake and teach your kids right from wrong. It doesn't matter what the drug is - it's wrong!! You know this or you wouldn't be searching for help to validate it. Hang in there, you've come to the right place.

[1963comet]

When I quit smoking weed I never had any withdrawls. I was smoking at least an 1/8 a day.

But I was with two different men that smoked. One would get into a fit of rage if he ran out. And the other just would not eat unless he was high.

This is my experience with it.

[bvaljalo]

Pot ... PHYSICALLY is probably the least addictive drug (that people get high on) that is out there. The PHYSICAL withdrawals ... are very mild to non-existent. When I say this, what I mean is that there are no 'detectable symptoms' from a medical standpoint. Whereas, contrasted with, oh, say, opiates, there are a whole myriad of them, and they are very consistent from person to person. Mild fever. Elevated blood pressure. Diarrhea. Gooseflesh. Loss of appetite. Insomnia. You know the drill, doncha?

Any one who gets on here and tries to say pot has bad physical withdrawals symptoms I would bet money has never kicked a real benzo or crack or opiate or amphetamine or barbiturate or booze or even nicotine habit before, put it to ya that way.

But this being said, some people CAN become VERY psychologically dependent on it. It CAN be hard to get off of, for sure. Especially if one keeps running with a crowd that smokes it all the time.

And as with any drug, it can be SUPER HARD to get off of ... if you don't see any compelling reason to do so.

BTW Hi Sands

[RobbyRobot]

hi,
to answer your question without being too technical, pot is not as physically addicting as opiates/opioids, which have a morphine like action on the body. cannabis has a psychoactive action, meaning it effects perceptions and alters the mind experiences.

having said that, "as addicting as other drugs" is not the best way to ask an addiction question, imo. addiction itself requires two simple things-- a real need for repeated use regardless of the reason for that need -- and a supply that can be used and replenished that satisfies that need -- mix that together and you have an addiction process.

the effects additions have on us can be measured through science, and from user experiences, and from withdrawls. The science is complicated but totally supported, documented and properly proven. user experiences and withdrawls are also complicated, documented but only subjectively proven and therfore not testable by the scientific proofs. That does not mean that user information is worthless, just that subjectivity cannot be tested directly, and so only large population samples can be trusted as reliable data. whew, even not wanting to be technical it gets technical...

anyways, i will offer you some user experiences. grass is an addictive drug and creates a dependance and is not easy to completely stop using it. THC is the psychoactive chemical i was getting from smoking, eating, baking with, and using water-pipes. with enough waterpipes a black tar resin accumulates and the resin itself can be used for a stronger hit.

it has pleasant effects and it is hard not to like it. it cannot be overdosed because it does not effect the lower brain and only mildly gets the heart beating. cannabis is prolly the most widely used drug on the planet and everybody knows someone who has done it, same as with alcohol.

i found it hard to quit grass simply because it was not dangerous enough to me, at that time, to be concerned about it as a drug. i did quit it though because it kept alive the hunger of my addiction and that always tripped me into harder drugs and alcohol use. no way to really avoid that for me as an addict, but to be honest, that is the sole single reason i quit grass and hash. yep, once an addict always an addict, as my thinkin shows. anyways...

the withdrawls from daily use are real but minor imo. feeling some body (stomach) aches, nervous anxiety, mood changes, last like a couple of weeks or so, and then nothing really after that. however, grass is an emotional head drug, and to me it had a great attraction as a relaxer and just a fun drug, and that was the difficult withdrawl -- not the physical at all -- but the mental addiction -- that was the thing to kick. harder to kick then alot of people actually admit too, from what i hear anyways, and usually those same people have not quit it completely, but just moderate its use. and this is important: the THC in the pot was satisfying my needs and that means i had to change both my needs and the way i satisfied them to actually quit. anything else i did failed until i changed what i fed my addiction monster. starvation will not kill it. it must be fed recovery to put that killer down.

so i guess that is about it. not a drug to just play with because it keeps the addicts addiction alive, but no way as hard to physically quit as opiates.

now as for your son, from what i gather from your post, well, he is going to have a bad time trying to completely stop pot. He is going to need tons of support and his father is not going to be able to really do that, so another problem there. i am thinking the bottom line here is your son would have to declare himself a hardcore addict -- meaning a hardcore addiction to substance abuse -- and plan a recovery from that point. you say he has been doing it for years... always has a supply.... so stopping is not going to be pretty, and i just want you to know that each person has a different take on what is hardcore and what is easy. when your son attempts to actually *stop using* y'all gonna find out the difference. i advise you to be prepared for relapsing.

i hope this post helped you get some ideas on what you were asking. best of luck helping a drug addict recover. not an easy thing. i am sorry that addict is your son.

[grateful2b]

i want to add to what Robby said and say that I am concerned that because he is Bipolar it is much more complicated for him...his brain chemistry is already challenged and throwing weed into the mix changes the ball game completely...
during the sixties I did my share of drugs and smoked a lot of pot..never had any problem taking it or leaving it. several years ago, I became addicted using pot medicinally..I did not know at the time that my brain chemistry in the ensuing years had changed considerably and unbeknowst to me I had developed BP2..my experience with pot this time was completely different....I became addicted , could not just leave it, never did I struggle with weed before...I was smoking a considerable amount everyday.....if it was in the house I had to smoke it all.the changes I went through personality-wise were considerable.... .It was extremely difficult to walk away from weed because of the BP2, and how my bp2 brain interacted with the weed....I crave weed sometimes still but 'cannot ever smoke it again...so it concerns me that he is smoking weed, but more so that he is smoking weed and he is bipolar, because the weed will exacerbate his illness..as it did mine.and of course if he is smoking hydro he is not only doing THC , but a lot of other crap which is a nightmare for his BP.....Sandi, Prayers as always for you and Scooter, Hugs, Grateful

[newsandi]

Thanks to all that responded. I know my main concern with him getting off of the pot is the friends he hangs with. I do want to say that my son has no clue when I have smoked pot and that my husband is not his dad. But genetics are there because I am a addict and so is his real father. Starting Tuesday when he goes into rehab, the whole situation with him and my reactions will be different. I will be strong and I wont enable or allow what I might have in the past. For those who know me, know that my world revolves around helping my son with all of his problems. I have lost who I am because I have focus everything on him. Now, when he gets into rehab and starts to learn from it, I will hand him over to God to help him thru it. On the homefront, he will know I mean business. When I need to be strong on different points this is one battle I will fight to help him overcome. Thx again for all of your comments, they do help me and will help him also.

[newsandi]

What ever happened with Pete the Addict? I think he changed his user name but I know that he struggled big time with pot. I would like to know how he is doing with all of that. Anyone hear from him anymore??????

[hopefully tryin]

Hey newsandi~ I smoked pot many years ago and smoked daily for several years. One day I just decided to stop, mainly because it lost it's effect for me and I wasn't getting that high anymore and also anytime I smoked I had to smoke soooo much to feel anything or atleast feel what I wanted out of it. Of course this was before I had been addicted to opiates or anything or than nicotine for that matter. I haven't really felt the need, urge or desire to touch it since with the exception of the many times I attempted a cold turkey detox from opiates and even then it just didn't do it for me. My husband on the other hand smoked it morning, noon and night and didn't quit until he went overseas and that was because he didn't have a choice. The only w/d I noticed in him when he didn't have it for a couple days was that he was a cranky little b*tch. Although he could go without it and not really have what I would consider w/d. I think many people are different physically and mentally though with different chemicals/substances and I do agree with Bvaljalo that the w/d are almost "non-existent" compared to the other stuff like opiates,benzos,meth,crack,etc
Good Luck to you and your family! I wish you only the best

[Tryin2Recover]

Pot can be addictive both physically and psychologically. The first time I quit pot last summer (and eventually traded it for my out of control spiral towards rock bottom with opiates) I had mild-decent PHYSICAL withdrawl symptoms. I couldnt sleep, I was restless, highly irritable, drained of energy. It wasnt nearly as horrible as getting off the opiates but nevertheless still did exist for me.

While it was heroin and other lesser opiates that drove me to my rock bottom, I still consider pot my drug of choice. I did it everyday no matter what for the entirety of my young adult life up until i sought recovery not too long ago. For me, personally, it is much much MUCH harder to stay off the weed than it is off heroin. For a majority of my life I classified weed on its own pedestal, there were drugs and then there was weed. Even nowadays when I have using dreams, its about smoking weed not dope or pills. And my relapse 3 months ago? I kicked that off using weed. But now i know i cant do that, i ended back at heroin in under a week. That is all just how it affects me, your son might be different. But there is no denying that to me weed is VERY addictive.

[pakuni boy]

psycologocally can be te hardest , cause as said above it doesn´t harm us visibly (at least 4 a couple of years), yes it might not have such an unpleasant cold turkey a opiate addict or alcoholic might experience, sure, but that junkie cold turkey lastas 4 a week or so, whereas the thc marihuana stored in thr fat in non soluble, so in chronic addicts could last up to 6 months, a long slow prolonged stoner "cold turkey" so pot sure is a benign drug if abused, compared to any other "hard drug", but quitting pot in hardcore decade-long addicts is another story, i have a very close friend who was a heroin addict, he has been successfull in the heroin but not with pot, and I have not been able to kick my addiction truly yet also, so draw your conclusions.
Another issue i see is that pot smoking anciently was a serious matter, more spiritual, and now has become superficial in it´s consume, like blowing your mind with 10 hits of hydro just to play x-box 360 and munch pizza and twinkies. and then go to sleep.
Pot itself is harmless, responsible consumption is ok, but the addicts of marihuana, real addicts, we have a serious addiction problem, deceiveng, because the nature of it (pot), as medicinal and "benign".
Talk honest, open your eyes and your son´s too. weed is deceiving, pot is delicious that´s why i became addicted to it, and yes it´s an emotional addiction, weed replaced a hole of loneliness and insecurities in my being and dug me into myself, not a sane thing to do.

[grateful2b]

Originally Posted by pakuni boy

Another issue i see is that pot smoking anciently was a serious matter, more spiritual, and now has become superficial in it´s consume, like blowing your mind with 10 hits of hydro just to play x-box 360 and munch pizza and twinkies. and then go to sleep.
Talk honest, open your eyes and your son´s too. weed is deceiving, pot is delicious that´s why i became addicted to it, and yes it´s an emotional addiction, weed replaced a hole of loneliness and insecurities in my being and dug me into myself, not a sane thing to do.

could not agree more...I was so complacent about weed...pot as most of us know is not the pot of long ago.....oh the days when a splif would give you a nice buzz....the thc is now much higher and unless you know the source, god knows what(from the hardware store shelves), it is laced with....street weed is another conversation all together....

so when we talk about being addicted to weed...these days... its not just about THC anymore...I think the crap in it messes with your brain chemistry even more...... and your physiology.. JMHO

[stone]

I don't know about the USA but it wasn't laced here when I smoked it, it just got stronger...on average with the whole skunk/hydro thing.

Then again, when I smoked it, I smoked cannabis resin which was stronger than old fashioned grass anyway.

I always say the same thing about pot, which is that it is the least dangerous illegal drug but if you do it daily from an early age it can be really hard to stop, it does seem to change your brain chemistry, maybe some self medicating of mental problems comes into it too.
So even though it is the least 'serious illegal' drug it can be very insidiously addictive and serious.

[Peter]

My own experience with hardcore/longterm weed smokers (20-30yrs) has convimced me that weed is very addictive and difficult to quit.

[tommyk]

"Is pot as addicting as other drugs"

To some people it is, to others it isn't.

(I don't want to know the answer in my case... )

[exjunky]

"Is pot as addicting as other drugs?"

Which other drugs?

Anybody who says that pot is as addictive as heroin or cocaine must either have an agenda or be outright daffy.

Likewise, anybody who tells you it's not addictive at all is either ignorant or has a very specialized definition of what "addiction" is.

One thing I'm sure we can all agree on: it is a drug.

[stone]

Or perhaps they are asking a question?

[WA_NA_Survivor]

Hi NewSandi, having experience form both ends of the spectrum I would have to say that pot is more psychologically addicting where as opiates are highly addictive both physically and psychologically, but that's not to be under-estimated as daily long term pot use leads to significant storage of THC through-out the body and it affects your thinking and moods for a very long time after quitting. I got very irritable and paranoic and those tendencies can persist for a long time - for me that was years ago when I was more of a binger. You mentioned mental illness - tread carefully if your son has any schizophrenic tendencies, there was one such person, my friends and I knew and the most diabolical changes came over him under its influence - toxic pychosis can occur and schizophrenic people are much more susceptible, doesn't do them any good at all!

Opiates have severe physical withdrawal symptoms and they have their psychological withdrawals as well such as depression, which can last for months. Strong cravings remain for a very long time, in fact for most the mental impression of the opiate high cannot be forgotten.

Best to realize that NA is a program of complete abstinence from all drugs including alcohol because addiction - as a disease of the spirit, can only ever be arrested through total abstinence from all mind altering substances.

Hope this helps, take care!

[Tryin2Recover]

Originally Posted by exjunky

"Is pot as addicting as other drugs?"

Which other drugs?

Anybody who says that pot is as addictive as heroin or cocaine must either have an agenda or be outright daffy.

How do you figure? Addiction is not always measured by the severity of withdrawls. People can become addicted to other people, material things, food, etc...None of which cause physical withdrawls. The definition of addiction is "a recurring compulsion by an individual to engage in some specific activity, despite harmful consequences to the individual's health, mental state or social life." In my book all drugs have equally 'addictive' potentials it all just really depends on the person.

[grateful2b]

Originally Posted by Tryin2Recover

In my book all drugs have equally 'addictive' potentials it all just really depends on the person.

....and their unique brain chemistry

[pakuni boy]

like i said, my friend did quit the heroin, not been able with cannabis, so....each one is different, i have used coke extensively in the past in large amounts and never got addicted to it, some say cocaine has a real physical addiction, or nicotine, and in myself, i have always been able to control them both and never felt a phisical addiction to them, not with marihuana, maybe it´s phycological but the lack of thc on my system ends up being physical, i cannot sleep, acute loss of appetite, sweats, fear, depression, and what´s worse it that lasts for months, so we´re all different, but in my personal experience i could debate about the phisical adictiveness of cocaine and nicotine vs the supposed non phisical addictiveness of marihuana, at least on myself particulary.

[pakuni boy]

i was wondering if any of you know someone who has successfully quit marihuana after long term use? cause i haven´t, any tips?