https://apnews.com/article/marijuana-cannabis-alcohol-drinking-daily-use-b91c2c5957fdb2d48e6616c3baa14c13
Millions of people in the U.S. report using marijuana daily or nearly every day, and those people now outnumber those who say they are daily or nearly-daily drinkers of alcohol.
Drugs took the Quellcrist Falconer approach to war.
She named herself after a seaweed dries up in absence of water and seems like it's dead, but, as soon as it gets even a drop of water again, it grows ten fold. That seems like a good analogy to how drugs prevailed.
Daily alcohol: blunts my emotional pain, causes awful feelings in my stomach, does damage to multiple organ systems, is physically addictive, and gives you a hangover the next day.
Daily THC and other cannabinoids consumed via edibles: blunts my emotional pain, blunts my physical pain, has a minor effect on working memory when used over years that does not further inhibit cognitive ability or motivation, is not physically addictive, and has no impact on the next day.
Used to self medicate in vaguely controlled doses, it is a no-brainer. MJ is not perfect by any means, but it is world better than booze for frequent users.
After getting the shakes, sweating profusely and not being able to sleep for a few days when quitting, I really wouldn't say it's not physically addictive.
Wait, this is after giving up cannabis? That is not normal at all. There might be something else going on. I've gone from heavy smoker for years to completely sober over night and then maintained my sobriety for months without any adverse effects. I've probably done this 5 times in my life. I've literally never heard of anything similar to your withdrawal situation happening to anyone with cannabis.
The sweating and shaking is the parts I haven't heard before, but as someone who has smoked a lot of weed and quit a few times, the problems with sleeping were definitely a thing for me. I've also worked in the industry for a while and have heard restlessness affecting other people who quit.
That's fair. I have heard of the difficulty sleeping as well. The sweating and shaking threw me so much that I didn't make an exception for the sleeping issues that that some people have when stopping use.
Seems like an easy choice. You'll feel the effects of daily drinking with in a week or two, but pot smoking? Doesn't seem to affect the day to day
I'd agree weed is the healthier choice but I don't think it's fair to say it doesn't affect the day to day. I used to smoke everyday and it really messed with my short term memory and sleep.
Both. For a couple years it was definitely all day but through college it was just in the evenings. The mental effects were a lot worse when it was all day but I noticed it still when it was just evenings.
I’ve smoked a lot of weed, and known a lot of people who have smoked a lot of weed, and this is my theory:
Marijuana makes it easy to get into a headspace where you simply aren’t recording memories. It is sort of like daydreaming and then snapping out of it and not knowing what the lecturer has been talking about.
People such as myself who have used weed to avoid feelings of depression tend to seek out that state, and once you get in the habit of doing that, it is hard not to fall into it again while high. You can counter it with practice, but like any mental discipline, it is a tricky thing to accomplish.
Some people seem to have a personality that keeps them more actively focused on external things rather than their internal thoughts while high, and those people don’t seem to have the same memory problems. Same goes for people who smoke for only part of the day—their brain has more time to be focused on outside stimuli and not get in the habit of being internally focused all the time.
Needless to say, my memory is shit when I’m not intentionally trying to remember something. It is sort of a blessing for me though because it makes me less anxious about things when I can move on from them without a strong memory.
Some people seem to have a personality that keeps them more actively focused on external things rather than their internal thoughts while high, and those people don’t seem to have the same memory problems
Could also be ADHDers. I smoke ALL day either because it's a passable replacement for my actual meds (helps focus) or because if I don't then the Adderall turns off my hunger sensation completely. Despite this my memory is on point specifically when I'm high, I'm a little slower when sober funny enough.
My Dr directly attributes that to my ADHD. He could be talking out of his ass but he's also got it and has been doing work in this field for like 40 years so I trust him.
That may also be due to the strength. Not to mention, it's hard to measure thc amounts when inhaled. Other methods can be dosed out consistently, and even at low doses, although not always with the same effect as smoking. There may be better ways is all I'm saying.
Also, only one of the two is physically addictive. You can get psychologically addicted to cannabis, but you can get psychologically addicted to eating carrots.
So if you feel like you're using too much cannabis, it's a hell of a lot easier to stop.
I would suck dick for weed. But I like sucking dick so it's more like a benefit.
Coke also isn't physically addictive surprisingly.
Be careful with your concept of physically versus psychologically addicted, it's not really a 100% seperatable dichotomy like that. Your brain is your brain after all, whether you decide to call something physical or psychological it's all happening inside the brain. I think because cannabis doesn't tend to have severe withdrawal effects (like alcohol withdrawal, which can kill you) people assume that means they're not dependent or that it doesn't have direct effects on the reward processing centers in the brain to reinforce its use again in the future. That's what distinguishes addictive drugs from things that are just generally pleasant so we want to do them again, they have a direct chemical interaction with the neural circuits that are supposed to be helping decide if a behavior should be done again or not. Kind of tipping the scales in their favor, making you want to do something again more so than just the pleasentness of the past experience alone would otherwise do. You're going to have an easier time quitting carrots than you will cannabis, even if you find them both equally pleasant in the moment.
Don't get me wrong though, cannabis is waaaay less addictive than things like nicotine or alcohol, and has far less harmful effects than those. I think there is a tendency (especially with things like DARE lying about drug dangers when people were younger) to over correct and say things like it's a miracle drug that's non addicting and can never harm you and can fix everything wrong in your life! I'm for recreational cannabis legalization, but people should understand it's actual risks, even though they are much less than other recreational drugs.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3069146/
The cumulative probability estimate of transition to dependence was 67.5% for nicotine users, 22.7% for alcohol users, 20.9% for cocaine users, and 8.9% for cannabis users. Half of the cases of dependence on nicotine, alcohol, cannabis and cocaine were observed approximately 27, 13, 5 and 4 years after use onset, respectively.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7605022/#ref4
Cannabis-derived psychoactive compounds such as Δ9-tetrahydrocannabinol and synthetic cannabinoids directly interact with the reward system and thereby have addictive properties. Cannabinoids induce their reinforcing properties by an increase in tonic dopamine levels through a cannabinoid type 1 (CB1) receptor–dependent mechanism within the ventral tegmental area. Cues that are conditioned to cannabis smoking can induce drug-seeking responses (ie, craving) by eliciting phasic dopamine events.
You’re going to have an easier time quitting carrots than you will cannabis, even if you find them both equally pleasant in the moment.
I would suggest that isn't true for the woman in the link I posted, which was sort of my point about the addictive nature of cannabis. And I would say that physical addiction is not only in the brain because it isn't your brain that kills you when you go through alcohol or opioid withdrawal.
But sure, you can become heavily dependent on cannabis. I'm just arguing that it's a totally different sort of dependency and should be classified as such.
Yes but saying it's psychological dependence only is is kind of misleading here. To most reading that would imply that's just addicting because they like doing it. A carrot does not contain a chemical that directly interacts with the learning and reinforcing centers of the brain, while cannabis does. Cannabis is directly addicting, carrots are not. I don't think it's a fair comparison.
Also it is your brain that kills you when you have alcohol withdrawal, it's why alcohol withdrawal is treated with central nervous system depressants. Opiod withdrawal generally won't be able to kill you but you certainly will feel like you want to die.
I climb the walls when I can't have my daily dose of thc. I once broke my vape pen and the time it would take to get a new one was too long for me, so I sliced off the power cable to an old lamp and tried to electrocute the cartridge so I could smoke.
It does have day to day effects, but it’s definitely less dangerous than alcohol. It’s still overloading your dopamine levels when you use it, and effecting your dopamine production. I used daily for over a decade, and I still use once every couple months, but my emotional regulation has been so much easier since I quit daily smoking. Less frustration, less depression, just a better baseline emotional state. Several long term studies show this also. This podcast has a lot of great info from a neuroscientist with a history of addiction.
I don’t know what it was, but after a while of using regularly, it got to a point where every time I smoked, I would get panicky and my stomach would be on the verge of throwing up.
It was overall a very unpleasant experience. I’ve since cut way back and only smoke on weekends and just a couple small joints at that.
I found when I had a vape pen or flower, I would take in huge amounts and it would send me to the stratosphere every time. Now I can actually stay coherent enough to remember and enjoy the experience.
I know I’ve heard about this happening to other people as well where it’s fine for a while, but then it’s like your body starts to reject or something along those lines.
All that being said, the few times I’ve gotten really drunk, the experience wasn’t enjoyable at all and the headache the next day was monumental.
I know several people who used cannabis to help them quit drinking and turned their lives around.
That's me, sorta. For the first time since I turned 21 (so almost 15 years), I can have just one drink and not want another. I didn't even really try to cut back, it just happened naturally after I took up cannabis.
Looking back, it's kind of incredible how much alcohol was bringing me down.
I've lost 50 lbs in the past year. It is almost entirely due to the fact that I replaced alcohol with weed after it became legal here. I sleep better, eat better, I'm less anxious, and I actually look forward to working out now.
It's very hard to see any downsides.
If you ever go to the doctor and have nausea they will immediately try to diagnose you with CHS, even if none of your symptoms match CHS other than vomiting. I swear there is some competition to be the first one to diagnose a case after it became legal.
Thanks for the heads up. Pretty fucked we have to live in a world where we can't be completely open with our health care professionals.
i honestly don't think this is good for your mental health, but i'm glad your body feels better (i hope you're not smoking it)
Technically, I am a daily consumer of cannabis, but in reality I microdose (one to two hits off a vape pen) before bed to combat chronic insomnia. I know many people have a glass of wine with dinner or a "night cap" before bed. I guess I am wondering what they mean by daily use.
Daily use would include what you do while also including people that consume it all day long.
Newly legalized drug being used at a faster rate than when it was illegal.
Amazing. What a scoop.
I think you misread. The headline itself says that weed is being used more than alchohol, not more than it was when it was illegal.
For the first time, the number of Americans who use marijuana just about every day has surpassed the number who drink that often, a shift some 40 years in the making as recreational pot use became more mainstream and legal in nearly half of U.S. states.
Since the legality is the thing that has changed, that’s not that surprising.
Obviously legality of weed is related, but I'm arguing that there is a "scoop" here, that weed has passed a milestone; it's more commonly used daily than alchohol.
Fair enough I guess, I just think that would be kind of expected. Alcohol is extremely expensive.
How cheap is weed where you are? Or how expensive is alcohol? Cause that doesn't sound like my experience
Recently quit drinking. Went to hit my disposable (only because I only got high once every few months or I'd have bought a refillable vape) and it was dead. Went to a shop yesterday to replace it. Found the gummies that we'd bought last year while doing spring cleaning.
We have a lot planned for today (Saturday) including going into farmland where you can pay to pick fresh fruit plus running some errands. But I'm getting high tonight.
I don’t trust a news source still calling it marijuana. Marijuana is a Mexican weed that was used as racist propaganda against cannabis in the early 20th century.
I’m happy to see the wide-spread adoption of cannabis. It’s non-addictive (it can be habit forming), you can’t overdose on it, and withdrawal is non-existent. Alcohol is addictive, you can def die from consuming too much in a single sitting, and withdrawal can literally kill you.
I agree with you about it being a propaganda word, but you really should trust the Associated Press as a source.
Yeah, AP is good. But this does show a lack of understanding on the part of the author. I expect better of them.
It does show a lack of understanding, but I don't expect better of them because that's something that, in general, has been lost to history. It's just not widely known. Plenty of regular cannabis users still call it marijuana.
My mother caught me high as fuck when I was ~16yo and asked me, "Have you been smoking the pot?"
The pot.
I laughed so hard it was impossible to lie that I wasn't high.
I have a vague memory of a comedian (Kevin Meaney maybe) talking about his dad asking him if he was "smoking the pot" whenever he said something his dad didn't understand.
The nomenclature doesn’t really matter. In Oklahoma its called a “Medical Marijuana Card” you have to get to consume
This is exactly why marijuana will remain illegal in France. The wine industry will not allow such verdant competition.
It's only marijuana if it's from the Marijuana region of France. Otherwise, it's sparkling cannabis.
Cannabis does not have to be inhaled to be used. Or are you saying you can get COPD from gummies?