DOSE:

1 bowl

smoked

Cannabis

(daily)

BODY WEIGHT:

150 lb

Quitting Cannabis

I would tend to think there are no side effects to smoking weed. But quitting is hard to do.

I am not the addictive type. Never drank too much, smoke too much, or too much of anything really. I am too ADHD for that. I get bored with whatever and move on. I do like a beer every night, but never more than one. Tried to smoke cigarettes to be cool, but hated it the whole time, and only social smoked. But I have to say, something about being stoned REALLY appeals to me.

I started out when I was 21, smoked a few times a year with friends. But as time went on, I found more and more friends to smoke with and finally by the time I was 24, I was a habitual smoker. I would usually smoke every night to go to sleep. I would use it for sleep for a period of several weeks to several months, then quite for a while, then start up slowly again, usually just on weekends and parties at first, but inevitably end up smoking every night to sleep.

Never got into smoking it during the day everyday. Sometimes when I'm not working, I'll try smoking it during the day. But mostly prefer nights.

I am 32 now, wife, baby, mortgage, full time job, stress. As the winter came on, I started smoking every night. I told myself it was okay, cause it was winter and the whole planet is winding down and I should too. I work a full day. I make the dough. I take care of the kid. I deserve a little R&R before bed. And it was all fine at first. But then, October, November, December, January, Feb, March, April and I'm thinking to myself... 'hmm... Haven't quit yet and spring has already sprung.'

I try and quite several times during the spring. Usually lasting a day or two of sobriety. But always going back. By this time, I'm lethargic almost all the time, I'm so low energy at night that I'm really impatient with my wife, which doesn't help at all. We get into silly fights about nothing, because I blow up at whatever she says. I'm not usually stoned when I lose my temper. But it's usually close to the time I should be taking a toke, 8pm or so.

Finally, May rolls around, and I've had it. My mental state is in such turmoil, I'm depressed even very mildly suicidal. My mind is constantly shouting at me about all the things I have to do, but my body just can't respond. I'm tired and lethargic and impatient and jonsing for the next puff. So I email my General Practitioner, buy some Valerian root to help with sleep and tell my loved ones about my fear of failing at life once I stop smoking. But then... I stop.

I stop on a Friday night. The last puff was Thursday night. I pop 125 mg of Valerian root and drink a cup of Kava tea. I should also mention that my nightly routine is to sit in front of the computer, mindlessly stumbling through the web and when I feel horny, watch some porn and jerk off while high. So part of quitting, is quitting the mindless internet and the habitual masturbation. I stay up till about 11:30pm that friday night and head off to bed. I sleep restlessly, tossing and turning, but pop out of bed early in the morning with way more energy than I'm used to.

I take my daughter to the playground after breakfast the next day and I'm just bouncing around, running on the grass with her and actually swinging on the monkey bars doing pull ups.

It is now the following Monday, and I've had the most productive and present-minded weekend. It lasted much longer than I'm use to. I am also just bouncing off the walls with energy. I'm twitchy and shaky. I stayed up till 1:30 Sunday night and woke at 6:30am Monday morning. I'm writing this after a hard days work, followed by playing, feeding, bathing and getting the baby to bed. I then work on my second business for a few hours and it's now 10:30pm and I'm typing furiously and my knee won't stop shaking.

To be fair, I'm usually like this without pot. It's just that it's such a contrast and smoking for so long and stopping abruptly makes the difference so much more apparent.

I do hope to not smoke for a while and see how this goes. There has been no physical withdrawal symptoms. Just a huge jump in energy level. But I think that can be attributed, partly, to the winter/spring transition. (Actually smoking did leave some physical effects. My nose got so dry that it was cracked and raw on the inside. And My throat would often hurt in the morning from having dry mouth all night.) It took nearly a month of self-talk to finally quitting. I was a nervous wreck. I just didn't know if the pot was helping me cope with stress, or making it worst. I was afraid that if I stopped I would have some kind of psychotic break from the stress. But in hindsight, I think it served it's purpose for the winter and I had to start being a responsible father/husband again. Be fully there for my daughter and wife.

Exp Year: 2000-2011	ExpID: 90980
Gender: Male
Age at time of experience: 32
Published: Jun 14, 2018	Views: 1,449
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