Legalisation lobby takes a hit

[Testin da Cable]

hairspray on bad weed. make it look like good weed. all kinds of stuff in hash...you'd be amazed heh.

never had to worry about that though. worse stuff I ever had in my ganj was seeds

 

[granny]

Originally posted by xane
I was under the impression this was reporting the results of just such a study into the connection.

3 such studies actually, links at the top of the BMJ editorial I linked in the original post

Originally posted by xane
Saying that, I actually suspect the recent proposals to reform the licensing laws is the first stage in accepting cannabis and other recreational drug use besides alcohol and tobacco.

I suspected there were moves towards it too but I'm really dubious now that they could get away with anything more than the current situation of unofficial tolerance. This research and those studies published the other week about the increased risk of lung cancer/damage from dope kinda smack any ideas of actual legislation on the head.

 

[Will]

Originally posted by xane
I still suspect there is more of a third factor that links both people liable to develop depression and people liable to succumb to heavy use of any drug.

Yes, that is what I was getting at before. The people I know who are depressed also tend to have addictive personalities. I think its just the way things are, you can't legislate for everyone, you need to strike a common ground between looking after people and letting them do what they want.

 

[mank!]

This thread has proved to be a very interesting read, I must admit.

However, it's got me worrying a bit. A very close friend of mine, whom I love more than life itself, has suffered from depression for a long time now, and has been hospitalised once. She's started smoking weed much more often lately, sometimes just the odd spliff on a quiet evening.

She's also getting worse, and mentions that she "can feel something coming". The both of us realise that she's liable to kill herself any moment, and being without her is something I don't know how I'd cope with. Reading this thread has made me paranoid that the cannabis has worsened her depression, and as a result she'll develop schizophrenia - or in the worse case scenario- die soon.

Not entirely sure why I felt the need to post that...Just getting it off my chest, I suppose :/

Drugs = good & bad mmkay

 

[throdgrain]

I doubt wether smoking dope would be a good thing for someone who got depressed a lot, as it can make you quite introverted and self-analytical.
Not always, like Will says, or translated into throd-speak, its horses for courses chaps, and thats the truth.
I can recall herb making me introverted, and also i can recall it making me cocky. Guess which one came out on top ?
We're all different, but I would think that ythe worst herb can ever do is exaggerate things that are already there, rather than cause problems.

 

[Damini]

You don't develop schitzophrenia out of depression, its not like HIV into AIDS, but depression can be a warning sign that people are having internal difficulties, and the symptoms of shying away from people and consuming sadness might be related to something other than just the catch all depressional tag. Everyone is different. Cooper went barking, totally barking, talk of god and demons and phoning me up to read poetry about a diamond shape outside his window, but he seemed quite jolly with it all. Suwan just kind of retreated from people, broke up with her boyfriend, and got caught up with whatever was in her head. I've known lots of people who have had depression, and they don't go on to become schitzophrenic.

I think it's just like being ill normally mank, if you have a cold it doesn't mean that you will catch another virus, but it can mean that your immune system is repressed and less able to fight these things off. If you are depressed and shut yourself away, you ostracise yourself from the norms of reality and how people should behave.

I don't think pot and extreme depression are an ideal mix, but I don't think any drug and extreme depression is an ideal mix, certainly not alcohol. But then maybe the last thing she needs is to have something she enjoys/relies on taken away. Its difficult mank. Maybe talk to her doctor, if she's in a ward? He/She's far more likely to give good advice than any of us.




And I'll ignore Xane, because I'm a veritable chasm of sanity, and a stabilising force on all I meet. Honest.

And yeah granny, I realise that its a chicken/egg scenario, whether the disposition to mental illness was also what bonded as a group, or created the lure towards drugs, or whether the drugs created the tendency, and hell I'm not in that field of expertise, so I'm not saying any of this is set in stone fact, but it just would make perfect sense that cannabis and schitzophrenia have a relationship. Whatever that relationship might be.



Cooper did far too much acid. He got arrested on acid, thought he was being abducted, and pulled the hand brake thinking it was an ejector seat. The rest didn't do acid though.

 

[Testin da Cable]

well, I don't know about smoking weed. for me it tended to dull [ yet magnify] whatever I was feeling at the moment if you catch my drift. I wouldn't advise using any kind of substance [especially the heavier hallucinogens] if one wasn't feeling mentally on par. or even unhappy heh.

 

[Will]

Dope can lift your mood, especially when smoked in company, with good tunes on. But it can also turn you inwards, make you analyse yourself, for better or for worse.

As Damini said, any drug will do this. And as TdC said, some are far more pronunced than others.

 

[mank!]

Originally posted by Damini
You don't develop schitzophrenia out of depression, its not like HIV into AIDS... I've known lots of people who have had depression, and they don't go on to become schitzophrenic.

As far as I see it, depression is a precursor to a worsening mental state. Leading towards suicide, bipolar depression, schizophrenia or plain insanity. I'm worried that weed will quicken or hinder her 'getting back to normal'. Not everybody who is depressed becomes schizophrenic, you're right there. Some do, and I'm paranoid.

I don't think pot and extreme depression are an ideal mix, but I don't think any drug and extreme depression is an ideal mix, certainly not alcohol. But then maybe the last thing she needs is to have something she enjoys/relies on taken away. Its difficult mank. Maybe talk to her doctor, if she's in a ward?He/She's far more likely to give good advice than any of us.

The weed actually keeps her going to a certain degree. If she's feeling really down, a spliff will sort her out. She's sworn that she won't move onto harder stuff (and I'm sure she won't) because she couldn't not live relying on something illegal/difficult to access. Which is why I know she needs weed, but it's for her good more than anyone elses... I've also found getting drunk out of your skull is good, especially when you're depressed. Even if prozac + alcohol = vomit

The other thing Dam, is that she's having about 4 different types of therapy. Two of which I've had myself, and are absolute wastes of time as far as I'm concerned. I don't think there is a miracle cure for depression, and meds do fuck all (I've been on them 9 months and I've just got worse)... It's a catch 22, things won't get better until you move on in life. Unfortunately, to move on in life you've also got to live your life which is exactly what you're not wanting to do.

Thanks for the advice, anyway

 

[mank!]

Originally posted by Will.
Dope can lift your mood, especially when smoked in company, with good tunes on. But it can also turn you inwards, make you analyse yourself, for better or for worse.

As Damini said, any drug will do this. And as TdC said, some are far more pronunced than others.

Like someone said earlier, it all depends on the type of person and how they view life.

 

[xane]

In my early 20s I visited hospital with a suspected stomach ulcer, due to excessive binge drinking, the kind where you forgoe food for booze. The experience shocked me into going on the wagon for a couple of years, as dope was not as common back then this was the start of a long and boring "dry" period for me.

The experience actually showed I could still have a good time socialising on the "party atmosphere" alone, often just as much as the "pissheads" around me, in fact in my case I was often prone to passing out with drink rather than sicking it up and restarting, so I'd actually enjoy myself for longer !

What it went to prove was that people don't actually consider the environment they are in when taking drugs, happy environments give you more euphoric drug experiences, sad ones only drive you even further down. The belief that drugs are some sort of gateway _out_ of sadness is unfortunately very misleading.

(Yeah, this is just repeating what others have said).

 

[bodhi]

Another week, another study by the Anti-Cannabis lobby published. What they don't tell you is that most of the people studied were nutballs before they even smoked the stuff.

Remember, there has never been a death in the history of its use, directly attributed to smoking pot.

 

[theriven]

Originally posted by granny
Some pretty good evidence of strong causal links between heavy cannabis use and depression & schizophrenia here (editorial at the BMJ here with links to the original papers). Not gonna do the legalisation movement any good at all eh.

bahh thats old news!

i went to my doc cos i was getting parro attacks after i stoped but i was smoking just over an oz a week and he said my brain was fucked but gave me pills and the pills made me worse so i stoped em but then was always parro so turned to drink but i said i only had 1 or 2 a day not the 7 or 8 and i didnt need the pills and he belived me but im better now and hardly ever get scared and hide and only drink

 

[xane]

Re: Re: Legalisation lobby takes a hit

Originally posted by theriven
i went to my doc cos i was getting parro attacks after i stoped but i was smoking just over an oz a week and he said my brain was fucked but gave me pills and the pills made me worse so i stoped em but then was always parro so turned to drink but i said i only had 1 or 2 a day not the 7 or 8 and i didnt need the pills and he belived me but im better now and hardly ever get scared and hide and only drink

Cut back to 1/day and your punctuation skills may improve too.

 

[theriven]

 

[mank!]

Re: Re: Legalisation lobby takes a hit

Originally posted by theriven


bahh thats old news!

i went to my doc cos i was getting parro attacks after i stoped but i was smoking just over an oz a week and he said my brain was fucked but gave me pills and the pills made me worse so i stoped em but then was always parro so turned to drink but i said i only had 1 or 2 a day not the 7 or 8 and i didnt need the pills and he belived me but im better now and hardly ever get scared and hide and only drink

What the fuck?

 

[old.Kez]

As of right now, I can't actually read the papers, because they're down for fixing.
But reading the story, I felt the omission of what variant(s) of cannabis used to be rather striking. Its well known that there are two types of associated mental change when smoking, the happy 'high' - generally within Sativa strains, and the mellow 'sloth' effect - attributed to largely indica strains. I'd be utterly unsurprised if the latter gave way to depression, and the former to schizophrenia (possibly, its a more teneous link), but I think its important to differentiate, for rather obvious reasons.

I could well have the strains the wrong way round, but you'll forgive me - I've been smoking pot!

 

[~YuckFou~]

I smoke regularly. It helps me relax after a usually busy/stressful day. I don't drink much, probably 3/4 pints a week.
I am not depressed, have a good job that I do well, have a nice house and a babe wife.

My theory is that if you are a fuck up you can blame the weed.

I'm also sick to death of people associating hard drug use with cannabis. I've smoked for 20 years, had easy access on many occasions to coke, speed, E's etc. Not once have I been even slightly tempted, I like to remain in control of my faculties.

 

[theriven]

I too smoke regularly, during the 80's/90's i took acid, ecstasy, smoked a bit o coke, done the odd bone, and had speed a plenty.
But as i have grown up, got married and had a family now, the occasions that i CAN get completely fucking outa my tiny little mind have kinda dried up a little.
As for weed leading to other drugs, then yes it does, but only if your that kinda person in the first place *your gonna try it anyhoo and if ya can get greens ya can prolly get somink else as well*.
As for the legalisation, when was the last time anyone here was nicked for having a few spliffs in there pockets? In my experiance it was allways "confiscated" unless ya had class A on ya then they would nick ya

YuckFou's theory that "if you are a fuck up you can blame the weed." is kinda close to mine, but i kinda think if you are a fuckup then its probly down to being a fuckup in the first place.

tbh i do drink them 6/7 a night but every1 needs a vice

 

[Chalky's_Wife]

Read all above with great interest.
1. wouldn't it be interesting if the same study was carried out on alcohol. Immediate call for prohibition. I lived with an alcoholic for many years before coming to my senses. I'd rather stay stoned.
2. have smoked hash for twenty years in it's various forms, dabbled in a couple of other things enjoyed them but not had anything recently. Due to a whiplash injury my Dr put me on various strong painkillers. Boy was I out of it for 6 months. Couldn't work, had difficulty coping with three small daughters, and when I decided to come of prescribed medicine ended up seriously depressed and on Prozac. Thought fuck this- smoked hash for the pain- not a lot just weak ones to numb the neck- got a job in the roughest pub in town- fun- and lived it up. six years later still smokin', really cool administrative job as well as consultancy from home paying good dosh.
Live couldn't be sweeter thanks to the weed.

 

[Embattle]

Seems some of the weed users give moronic replies, either way we don't need another harmful drug legalised.

 

[Will]

There are morons who don't smoke dope, that doesn't prove anything.

 

[Nos-]

Weed doesn't affect me much, I'd rather just get pissed!

 

[mank!]

I've never done weed, but tbh I love the feeling of being drunk. I wish I wasn't so fucking ill whenever I got hammered though, it simply isn't worth it everytime :|