tracer

I am in recovery for a long time (30 years) but had a slip 20 years ago on weed. I've always been tempted by the "marijuana maintenance plan" and now with the legalization in my state it seems like everyone is doing it ! Its really making me crazy, on my way to work today I drove past a guy smoking a joint while driving with his window open like it was a cigarette. Is this where we are headed with the legalization ? Its starting to look like an option to be stoned all the time, sobriety is hard.

kevlarsjal2

I am not addicted to weed myself, just alcohol. But both of it is consumed very openly on the streets where I live and alcohol is pretty much always surrounding me.
I am in no way nearly as long in recovery as you are but for me it made the difference when I started to work on no longer wanting to escape or numb myself. When I don't feel the need for it, when there are other tools for me available, I can be around any drug or alcohol without feeling tempted to consume it.

So I would maybe ask myself, why do I still want to be stoned?

tracer

haha have you seen my other threads ? (just got finished dating a daily pot user, if i smoked we would probably still be dating.....
plus for me life has been real hard lately, unhappy at my job, lonely, getting older, just feel like I need a break and the weed is looking good to me. Been going to lots of meetings which helps but constantly smelling it and seeing people use it has been difficult

kevlarsjal2

I haven't read your other threads, no. But if this is a tough phase in your life and that makes smoking look more like an option to you again, you know it will sure pass once things have settled a bit more again. I'm sure it will be less problematic for you to see it everywhere around you then.

tracer

thanks yes i hope so

Pacoloco

Hang in there! Smoking is not an option. It solves nothing, and it makes things worse.

I personally hate weed and I don't see myself smoking that crap again. Same with drinking. Enough of messing with my head and health, the most precious assets I got in life!

tracer

thanks for this. with all the weed love out there now its sometimes hard for me to see the negatives. I find myself questioning my own experience and thinking "if you cant beat em join em"

biminiblue

To be fair, I think this is possibly more about your failed dating experience than it is you wanting to get stoned again.

You've written this script in your head that says, "If you just chilled and accepted being a dopehead you could have this woman and get high, too. It's even legal, how bad could it be? At least I'd have a warm body next to me."

[regardless that she isn't even "present" in any sense of the word]

This is why I don't get involved with active addicts. If I feel something for them I start to make bad choices.

Play the tape forward, tracer.

You get back with this woman (which isn't even a sure thing, she stopped seeing you, right?)...then you start smoking again...how long do you suppose it would be before the two of you started arguing over money or over time spent obsessing or just being weird because your brains are so altered? Or having intimacy problems? Then comes the paranoia, the weight gain, the lethargy, the depression, the soul-sucking regret. Then continually trying to get back to sober (because obviously in your 30 years you must have realized it's better) and trying to get her to sober.

No way, no how am I getting back into that. Not my circus, not my monkey.

tracer

sucks being a love addict AND a drug addict. in this case they are so tied together !

biminiblue

or you could look at it as a recovered addict.

Like, now you make choices that are rational, sane, and in your best interest.

I don't see how labelling yourself as an addict is helpful here. You aren't using. You are still using your brain and staying away from this woman.

That's recovery right there.

tracer

I make them but I dont always trust them ! this whole thing has been incredibly difficult for me. I am doing all the right things but not seeing the positive results of my decisions. I know this takes time and at some point I will be grateful for putting myself and my recovery first, but right now its just hard and makes me sad and left out feeling...

biminiblue

Did you post that you are ACOA?

That will mess with the trusting yourself thing.

I figure if I've made XXX decisions in the past and they have led to pain and misery, then it makes sense to try the other way for a while.

Do you do any reading? Like self-help books or the Bible? Some good stuff, and it helps in the overcoming.

Staying away from pot-smoking women when you're in recovery? I'll go ahead and say, good call.

zerothehero

There are over 20 cannabis dispensaries within a mile of my house. Pretty much everyone I know smokes weed, and they're boring and mostly f#$%&ing up. And so many claim it helps with anxiety but also "need" their benzo prescriptions. Whatever. When I need a break from reality I take a nap. That's what sleep is for. Weed always made me feel like I had a helium balloon instead of a brain in my skull. I'm the "radical" in town who doesn't smoke or drink (and go figure, people tell me I look ten years younger than I did ten years ago). Surf the urge. Take a nap on the beach.

Dee74

Hi and welcome to the forum tracer - I think Bim's hit on something very important and I tend to think its really the 'failed' relationship messing with you and causing those 'If only I was...' thoughts.

I was like that for most of my life until I found the right woman - and then it was easy. I don't have to be anyone else but who I am.

As far as legal pot goes , I was an alcoholic and that's legal too. I don't like who I became on either drug and nothing will ever drag me back there.

Like Zero says, stoners are boring, every bit as boring as drinkers - or maybe even a little more so cos they have this little supercillious smirk about how much better pot is than other drugs...



Freedom is great

D

zerothehero

Lol, and the fact that a lot of folks have difficulty stringing a sentence together when they're high, which kind of interferes with would-be engaging social banter.

tracer

thanks for all the replies. an interesting side note: this past december I actually got myself a MM card. I wanted the option to try MM in sobriety to see if it would work for me. I never filled the script and the card expired but this whole thing was in my mind before I met the pothead woman to date. so its a bit complicated with my obsession. Its almost like my disease took human form when I met this woman to date she herself admitted to substituting pot for alcohol and claims it is working for her. I'm sure my own addiction disease latched right onto that. I think this is one of the reasons it is so hard for me to let go of this, its triggered so many things for me on so many different levels (love addiction, acoa abandonment, substance addiction). Its a doozy !! i'm doing all the right things by using no contact, going to therapy, working steps, hitting lots of meetings, and all my positive action is helping but my disease is still on and its a fight to believe what I am doing is the the right decision for me. I was hoping to have a fun summer of dating and enjoying life but its turned into what appears to be a bottom of sorts that is lasting way too long !

wastedpotential

"What'd you say mannn?"

Repeating myself "Hows that house coming you moving soon?"

"I'm sooo stoned you got any ho-hos?"

Dee74

Sorry I didn't mean to start a thread tangent of scorn against stoners - I was one of them for a very long time after all

It took me a long time to dismiss those rosy smoke dreams of getting high Tracer. Much longer than it took me to 'get over' alcohol.

Eventually tho I saw my experience with pot for what it was - a totally uneven toxic relationship where weed had all the power and I had none. Weed called the shots - exactly like my relationship with alcohol became later.

I've refereed to both as 'the same leaky boat on the same sea of crap' and thats still pretty much it.

I was the problem - trying to fill that void within me with stuff...and meber filling it.

Healing it got me way better results - and the first step towards that for me was staying clean and sober

D

zerothehero

Fair enough, Dee. I was kind of half referring to myself. I was boring when I was stoned. I couldn't string a sentence together. But go ahead, folks, and make fun of me. I'm over it.

tracer

Thanks for the replies. I need to remember that as a recovering addict it is not safe for me to date a pothead whether the pothead is addicted or not. She claimed to have addiction problems but it really doesn't matter does it. I still wish she would call me but she hasnt. I haven't called or texted either but I am tempted to every day. I really liked her I wish things were different