Did you smoke pot? (Read 1459 times)

Willie Nelson is pretty cool, that is a good point.

 

 and funions man....funions

 

No way, man.....never.

 

 

THis made me laugh sooo hard.

as soon as I reached legal drinking age (18 back then), I drank way too much.  I've told my kids a few stories about that (not being able to find my car or my contact lenses the next morning!).

Dude, where's my car!

We just saw Inception.  As we walked out I was telling DH that I think parts of that might have been easier to wrap my brain around had I been mildly intoxicated.

I am a drug counselor.  This is what I have to say about this whole thing.  Most of my coworkers who do the same work as me are for decriminalization and some are for legalizing.  I personally am for decriminalizing it (having a small amount gets you a ticket like speeding, but obviously if you have 4 kilo...well ya know...)

As far as some actual facts.

Moderate marijuana use (1 joint (not a blunt) per 2 weeks) your body can recover.  As far as teens, it hurts the brain a bit but nothing they can't recover from if they are using the above or less. Weed is a hallucinogen like shrooms, acid, and PCP.  See the post about paranoid in Amsterdam to see an example.  It is not a depressant as commonly assumed.  It is just more mild that other common hallucinogens.  

However, as far as harm.  All my clients are on parole for things other than pot (it is decriminalized in NJ).  This is what I see.  The guys who would smoke 6-7 blunts daily can hardly walk for more than a few blocks while job searching (also part of our facility) without hacking up a lung like hardcore cigarette smokers, granted the air quality in Camden, NJ is crap anyway.  Also I can't tell you how many of these guys had their kids taken away because they and their girlfriends where smoking so much that the kids has smokers cough and had their teeth rotting out because they aren't getting their kids to brush their teeth.  (for the record I'm eliminating any clients who where using drugs outside of weed).  To say that smoking weed doesn't have big negatives is BS.  Smoking weed hardcore has the same effects as alcohol hardcore or heroin or any other drug in the areas of family, employment, marital relationships, etc.  Not to say there can't be functional users just like functional alcoholics, but statistically it will get you in the end like any addiction.  To be clear...I'm talking people to the level of addiction and daily multiple joint/blunt smoking. 

As for physical effects.  Smoking 1 blunt (3 joints) is about the same as smoking a pack of cigarettes due to the nature of holding it in your lungs for a sustained time.  Also it does just as much damage to the lungs it just as less cancer causing agents...but many studies are now coming out linking sustained weed use with lung cancer.  It raises blood pressure and can lead to irregular heart beats.  It can also be extremely problematic for people with various mental health conditions. 

I've never smoked anything personally do to running and having a family of addicts (alc and heroin mostly.)  Most of my coworkers have used weed.  I drink about once a month.  So there you are.  Well that's my two cents.  My wife asked me to add her two cents too.  So there's four for you. 

Hells yes!!! There is nothing wrong with smoking pot.  Cigarettes and beer are way more harmful than marijuana.  If you use a vaporizer to smoke weed, you are actually just smoking the crystals from the leaves and not inhaling the smoke.  Vaporizer is not the ones you get a the drug store for cold, like VapoRub.  It's this machine that turns it to steam (most drug dealer have it).  So marijuana is ten times safer while cigarettes give you lung cancer and beer can both mess up your brains cells and destroy your liver, which can lead to liver cancer.  Done in moderation, weed is a whole better.   I probably sound like a pot head but I smoke probably once a month or every two months.

 I hope that you didn't conclude this from my post anyway.  Like I said it still is linked with cancer, brain damage, and can affect the heart (high blood pressure and such).  As far as the cancer, like cigarettes it takes years to develop.  Done in moderation, none of them will hurt you all that much.  And the problem with weed is that it comes in so many levels of THC, can be laced with other drugs (in Camden particularly PCP), and can have all sorts of pesticides used to grow it that are not for human consumption, I would not use the phrase safe by any means.  Again with moderate use and from a good source you can be fine, but it can also go really bad.  See the post about paranoid in Amsterdam and imagine if that was laced with PCP and they make a run for it out of the hotel through the front window.  I have a client who got some laced weed by accident and went through a friends front glass window and got pulled over for driving erratically down the road.  Just like alcohol the biggest problem with weed is the driving while smoking.  The reaction time slows and again hallucinogens while driving a couple thousand pound vehicle....mmmmmmmmm not good at all. 

Let me just end by saying, be smart about it and do it with moderation.  If you can't do both, then you should be doing it all.

+1 to that