I don’t think I will ever partake…But I do wish they’d legalize it so stoners would shut the hell up
[quote]carbiduis wrote:
Several members have chimed in about how they used MJ for a long period of time, and didn’t have their life spiral into a ‘Reefer Madness’ Style burnout, or anything close to it. I am only here to argue that we as individuals are where the blame and credit should go. Sure, drugs (and some, of course, more than others) can sway us and “deflect” our paths, they are in no way the captain of the ship, we as individuals are.
Troubled people give MJ a bad image, but it won’t turn your life upside down. The people/scenes/paths that come with it may, but not the drug itself.
[/quote]
Most people can handle alcohol, but it absolutely devastates some people’s lives. MJ is the same, whether stoners want to admit it or not.
[quote]doogie wrote:
[quote]carbiduis wrote:
Several members have chimed in about how they used MJ for a long period of time, and didn’t have their life spiral into a ‘Reefer Madness’ Style burnout, or anything close to it. I am only here to argue that we as individuals are where the blame and credit should go. Sure, drugs (and some, of course, more than others) can sway us and “deflect” our paths, they are in no way the captain of the ship, we as individuals are.
Troubled people give MJ a bad image, but it won’t turn your life upside down. The people/scenes/paths that come with it may, but not the drug itself.
[/quote]
Most people can handle alcohol, but it absolutely devastates some people’s lives. MJ is the same, whether stoners want to admit it or not.[/quote]
Yea those people have some wires crossed from the beginning if it wasn’t MJ it wouldve been any other drug. Just like how big macs and cheesy poofs ruin some peoples lives who have food addiction.
Some ethnic groups (Native Americans, Inuit, Indeginous Australians) are notorious for not being able to handle their liquor. One of my Laos brahs told me something crazy like 20% of Asians lack the enzyme to properly digest alcohol.
Is it possible that THC is super strong and more harmful to some people because of some genetic factor? Besides addictive tendencies or whatever.
[quote]carbiduis wrote:
Yea those people have some wires crossed from the beginning if it wasn’t MJ it wouldve been any other drug.[/quote]
Addiction is a real shitty diseases to inherit.
[quote]Powerpuff wrote:
We’ve got a problem when we have so many “disabled” people seeking special treatment in graduate schools of all places.
[/quote]
cupcake generation and everyone gets a trophy.
FWIW my household cut its alcohol consumption and increased its weed consumption when it was legalized in Colorado. We’ve lost a total of 130 lbs and are both still gainfully employed. Yes, many other factors led to the weight loss, but if you don’t get bad munchies it’s a viable diet crutch.
[quote]carbiduis wrote:
[quote]clinton131 wrote:
[quote]MudFlap wrote:
Thanks much, I appreciate the thought.
The only reason we made it thru was… because we had to.
There were times when I would go to the gym to train (it helped with the stress, a lot) and I would need to just find a corner of the gym and compose myself for a couple of minutes before doing much of anything.
Yeah… to say it sucked would be an understatement.
** End of Hijack ** — apologies
mf[/quote]
I can certainly empathize to what you went through. Going through the same living hell with my 17 year old son. Started out with MJ and slowly moved onto whatever drug he could get his hands on but MJ remained his drug of choice. It totally changed his personality. Went from being a straight A student to failing classes. High school sports were huge to to him at one point and then he slowly walked away from them. He has stolen from family to support what he said was something he was only doing for fun and that he could walk away from at any time. The level of selfishness on his part was inconceivable. Definitely not the person my wife and I raised. In fact we would have laughed in your face if you said we would be going through this with our child two years ago. Shows how naive we were. Even though I recognized some signals in his personality, and traits that I have observed in other addicts (been a LEO for over 22 years), I was still in denial as to the magnitude of his addiction.
We have spent thousands on out patient counseling. He refused to cooperate with any form of inpatient treatment. He threatened to physically fight any attempts at placing him in inpatient treatment. Long story short and without too much detail he eventually ended up getting arrested. The only good that has come from that is that I was able to use the legal system to force him into an inpatient treatment center. He has been there for over 30 days and he starting to sound like the son we had. He is now acknowledging that he is an addict and was in desperate need of help. I am not sure how long he will be in.
I was not a fan of drugs before, but this experience that we have had to endure as a family has significantly reinforced my hatred for these substances. Like I said…it’s been a living hell watching your child slowly turn into an addict. I am still uncertain as to what to expect when he finally comes home. I know this will be a life long battle for him and for us for that matter. [/quote]
I’m sorry to hear this. I am not a parent yet (plan to be) and I will never understand the challenges that it brings until I have kids of my own in the future. Hearing stories like this really puzzles me and doesn’t make sense (like you’re saying).
But I would like to ask you, do you really think this is 100% to blame on MJ? I really think you’re giving MJ way to much credit, it just isn’t that powerful. Do you think if MJ didn’t exist, your son would still have a lot of the same problems that he has?
Several members have chimed in about how they used MJ for a long period of time, and didn’t have their life spiral into a ‘Reefer Madness’ Style burnout, or anything close to it. I am only here to argue that we as individuals are where the blame and credit should go. Sure, drugs (and some, of course, more than others) can sway us and “deflect” our paths, they are in no way the captain of the ship, we as individuals are.
Troubled people give MJ a bad image, but it won’t turn your life upside down. The people/scenes/paths that come with it may, but not the drug itself.
As I like to say, “Don’t let IT change your opinion of ME, let ME change your opinion of IT”[/quote]
THIS.
[quote]carbiduis wrote:
[quote]clinton131 wrote:
[quote]MudFlap wrote:
Thanks much, I appreciate the thought.
The only reason we made it thru was… because we had to.
There were times when I would go to the gym to train (it helped with the stress, a lot) and I would need to just find a corner of the gym and compose myself for a couple of minutes before doing much of anything.
Yeah… to say it sucked would be an understatement.
** End of Hijack ** — apologies
mf[/quote]
I can certainly empathize to what you went through. Going through the same living hell with my 17 year old son. Started out with MJ and slowly moved onto whatever drug he could get his hands on but MJ remained his drug of choice. It totally changed his personality. Went from being a straight A student to failing classes. High school sports were huge to to him at one point and then he slowly walked away from them. He has stolen from family to support what he said was something he was only doing for fun and that he could walk away from at any time. The level of selfishness on his part was inconceivable. Definitely not the person my wife and I raised. In fact we would have laughed in your face if you said we would be going through this with our child two years ago. Shows how naive we were. Even though I recognized some signals in his personality, and traits that I have observed in other addicts (been a LEO for over 22 years), I was still in denial as to the magnitude of his addiction.
We have spent thousands on out patient counseling. He refused to cooperate with any form of inpatient treatment. He threatened to physically fight any attempts at placing him in inpatient treatment. Long story short and without too much detail he eventually ended up getting arrested. The only good that has come from that is that I was able to use the legal system to force him into an inpatient treatment center. He has been there for over 30 days and he starting to sound like the son we had. He is now acknowledging that he is an addict and was in desperate need of help. I am not sure how long he will be in.
I was not a fan of drugs before, but this experience that we have had to endure as a family has significantly reinforced my hatred for these substances. Like I said…it’s been a living hell watching your child slowly turn into an addict. I am still uncertain as to what to expect when he finally comes home. I know this will be a life long battle for him and for us for that matter. [/quote]
I’m sorry to hear this. I am not a parent yet (plan to be) and I will never understand the challenges that it brings until I have kids of my own in the future. Hearing stories like this really puzzles me and doesn’t make sense (like you’re saying).
But I would like to ask you, do you really think this is 100% to blame on MJ? I really think you’re giving MJ way to much credit, it just isn’t that powerful. Do you think if MJ didn’t exist, your son would still have a lot of the same problems that he has?
Several members have chimed in about how they used MJ for a long period of time, and didn’t have their life spiral into a ‘Reefer Madness’ Style burnout, or anything close to it. I am only here to argue that we as individuals are where the blame and credit should go. Sure, drugs (and some, of course, more than others) can sway us and “deflect” our paths, they are in no way the captain of the ship, we as individuals are.
Troubled people give MJ a bad image, but it won’t turn your life upside down. The people/scenes/paths that come with it may, but not the drug itself.
As I like to say, “Don’t let IT change your opinion of ME, let ME change your opinion of IT”[/quote]
I am not blaming it all on Marijuana. With the legality issues aside, I view Marijuana much like I do alcohol. Some people can control their use of alcohol and some are controlled by the alcohol. The same with Marijuana, or any other controlled substance for that matter. My son can’t handle any sort of controlled substance without losing control. He is completely controlled by them and it is slowly destroying his life.
In my line of work I don’t see a lot of positive coming out of people’s illicit use of drugs and alcohol. It never seems to end well for them. Couple that with my own personal experience with my son and you can see why I am not a huge fan of either.
[quote]clinton131 wrote:
[quote]carbiduis wrote:
[quote]clinton131 wrote:
[quote]MudFlap wrote:
Thanks much, I appreciate the thought.
The only reason we made it thru was… because we had to.
There were times when I would go to the gym to train (it helped with the stress, a lot) and I would need to just find a corner of the gym and compose myself for a couple of minutes before doing much of anything.
Yeah… to say it sucked would be an understatement.
** End of Hijack ** — apologies
mf[/quote]
I can certainly empathize to what you went through. Going through the same living hell with my 17 year old son. Started out with MJ and slowly moved onto whatever drug he could get his hands on but MJ remained his drug of choice. It totally changed his personality. Went from being a straight A student to failing classes. High school sports were huge to to him at one point and then he slowly walked away from them. He has stolen from family to support what he said was something he was only doing for fun and that he could walk away from at any time. The level of selfishness on his part was inconceivable. Definitely not the person my wife and I raised. In fact we would have laughed in your face if you said we would be going through this with our child two years ago. Shows how naive we were. Even though I recognized some signals in his personality, and traits that I have observed in other addicts (been a LEO for over 22 years), I was still in denial as to the magnitude of his addiction.
We have spent thousands on out patient counseling. He refused to cooperate with any form of inpatient treatment. He threatened to physically fight any attempts at placing him in inpatient treatment. Long story short and without too much detail he eventually ended up getting arrested. The only good that has come from that is that I was able to use the legal system to force him into an inpatient treatment center. He has been there for over 30 days and he starting to sound like the son we had. He is now acknowledging that he is an addict and was in desperate need of help. I am not sure how long he will be in.
I was not a fan of drugs before, but this experience that we have had to endure as a family has significantly reinforced my hatred for these substances. Like I said…it’s been a living hell watching your child slowly turn into an addict. I am still uncertain as to what to expect when he finally comes home. I know this will be a life long battle for him and for us for that matter. [/quote]
I’m sorry to hear this. I am not a parent yet (plan to be) and I will never understand the challenges that it brings until I have kids of my own in the future. Hearing stories like this really puzzles me and doesn’t make sense (like you’re saying).
But I would like to ask you, do you really think this is 100% to blame on MJ? I really think you’re giving MJ way to much credit, it just isn’t that powerful. Do you think if MJ didn’t exist, your son would still have a lot of the same problems that he has?
Several members have chimed in about how they used MJ for a long period of time, and didn’t have their life spiral into a ‘Reefer Madness’ Style burnout, or anything close to it. I am only here to argue that we as individuals are where the blame and credit should go. Sure, drugs (and some, of course, more than others) can sway us and “deflect” our paths, they are in no way the captain of the ship, we as individuals are.
Troubled people give MJ a bad image, but it won’t turn your life upside down. The people/scenes/paths that come with it may, but not the drug itself.
As I like to say, “Don’t let IT change your opinion of ME, let ME change your opinion of IT”[/quote]
I am not blaming it all on Marijuana. With the legality issues aside, I view Marijuana much like I do alcohol. Some people can control their use of alcohol and some are controlled by the alcohol. The same with Marijuana, or any other controlled substance for that matter. My son can’t handle any sort of controlled substance without losing control. He is completely controlled by them and it is slowly destroying his life.
In my line of work I don’t see a lot of positive coming out of people’s illicit use of drugs and alcohol. It never seems to end well for them. Couple that with my own personal experience with my son and you can see why I am not a huge fan of either. [/quote]
Agreed I worked ER for 14 years and saw the end results myself.
[quote]Be_Sound wrote:
FWIW my household cut its alcohol consumption and increased its weed consumption when it was legalized in Colorado. We’ve lost a total of 130 lbs and are both still gainfully employed. Yes, many other factors led to the weight loss, but if you don’t get bad munchies it’s a viable diet crutch. [/quote]
Whoa! That’s a LOT of weight loss!
How has it impacted your lifting?
[quote]clinton131 wrote:
[quote]MudFlap wrote:
Thanks much, I appreciate the thought.
The only reason we made it thru was… because we had to.
There were times when I would go to the gym to train (it helped with the stress, a lot) and I would need to just find a corner of the gym and compose myself for a couple of minutes before doing much of anything.
Yeah… to say it sucked would be an understatement.
** End of Hijack ** — apologies
mf[/quote]
I can certainly empathize to what you went through. Going through the same living hell with my 17 year old son. Started out with MJ and slowly moved onto whatever drug he could get his hands on but MJ remained his drug of choice. It totally changed his personality. Went from being a straight A student to failing classes. High school sports were huge to to him at one point and then he slowly walked away from them. He has stolen from family to support what he said was something he was only doing for fun and that he could walk away from at any time. The level of selfishness on his part was inconceivable. Definitely not the person my wife and I raised. In fact we would have laughed in your face if you said we would be going through this with our child two years ago. Shows how naive we were. Even though I recognized some signals in his personality, and traits that I have observed in other addicts (been a LEO for over 22 years), I was still in denial as to the magnitude of his addiction.
We have spent thousands on out patient counseling. He refused to cooperate with any form of inpatient treatment. He threatened to physically fight any attempts at placing him in inpatient treatment. Long story short and without too much detail he eventually ended up getting arrested. The only good that has come from that is that I was able to use the legal system to force him into an inpatient treatment center. He has been there for over 30 days and he starting to sound like the son we had. He is now acknowledging that he is an addict and was in desperate need of help. I am not sure how long he will be in.
I was not a fan of drugs before, but this experience that we have had to endure as a family has significantly reinforced my hatred for these substances. Like I said…it’s been a living hell watching your child slowly turn into an addict. I am still uncertain as to what to expect when he finally comes home. I know this will be a life long battle for him and for us for that matter. [/quote]
Wow.
The bright side to this (if there is one) is that it sounds like he’s turning a corner.
Thoughts and Prayers; hang in there and remember to take good care of yourself.
mf
[quote]FlatsFarmer wrote:
Some ethnic groups (Native Americans, Inuit, Indeginous Australians) are notorious for not being able to handle their liquor. One of my Laos brahs told me something crazy like 20% of Asians lack the enzyme to properly digest alcohol.
Is it possible that THC is super strong and more harmful to some people because of some genetic factor? Besides addictive tendencies or whatever.[/quote]
This is true. About 1/5 of Asians have a mutated acetaldehyde dehydrogenase enzyme that is a fraction as effective as a non-mutated one.
Ethanol (via alcohol dehydrogenase) is broken down into acetaldehyde. Acetaldehyde is broken down into acetic acid (via acetaldehyde dehydrogenase).
Interestingly enough, the mutated gene actually causes a decrease in incident of alcoholism because build of acetaldehyde leads to brutal hangovers and discourages drinking as a result.
There is a drug called Disulfiram that inhibits acetaldehyde dehydrogenase. They give it to alcoholics whom consequently have the worst hangovers ever and don’t feel like drinking.
[quote]schanz_05 wrote:
[quote]FlatsFarmer wrote:
Some ethnic groups (Native Americans, Inuit, Indeginous Australians) are notorious for not being able to handle their liquor. One of my Laos brahs told me something crazy like 20% of Asians lack the enzyme to properly digest alcohol.
Is it possible that THC is super strong and more harmful to some people because of some genetic factor? Besides addictive tendencies or whatever.[/quote]
This is true. About 1/5 of Asians have a mutated acetaldehyde dehydrogenase enzyme that is a fraction as effective as a non-mutated one.
Ethanol (via alcohol dehydrogenase) is broken down into acetaldehyde. Acetaldehyde is broken down into acetic acid (via acetaldehyde dehydrogenase).
Interestingly enough, the mutated gene actually causes a decrease in incident of alcoholism because build of acetaldehyde leads to brutal hangovers and discourages drinking as a result.
There is a drug called Disulfiram that inhibits acetaldehyde dehydrogenase. They give it to alcoholics whom consequently have the worst hangovers ever and don’t feel like drinking. [/quote]
maybe I have that! Any amount of alcohol rips my stomach up and leaves me feeling like hell for days.
I wish I could say it discouraged me.
[quote]MudFlap wrote:
[quote]clinton131 wrote:
[quote]MudFlap wrote:
Thanks much, I appreciate the thought.
The only reason we made it thru was… because we had to.
There were times when I would go to the gym to train (it helped with the stress, a lot) and I would need to just find a corner of the gym and compose myself for a couple of minutes before doing much of anything.
Yeah… to say it sucked would be an understatement.
** End of Hijack ** — apologies
mf[/quote]
I can certainly empathize to what you went through. Going through the same living hell with my 17 year old son. Started out with MJ and slowly moved onto whatever drug he could get his hands on but MJ remained his drug of choice. It totally changed his personality. Went from being a straight A student to failing classes. High school sports were huge to to him at one point and then he slowly walked away from them. He has stolen from family to support what he said was something he was only doing for fun and that he could walk away from at any time. The level of selfishness on his part was inconceivable. Definitely not the person my wife and I raised. In fact we would have laughed in your face if you said we would be going through this with our child two years ago. Shows how naive we were. Even though I recognized some signals in his personality, and traits that I have observed in other addicts (been a LEO for over 22 years), I was still in denial as to the magnitude of his addiction.
We have spent thousands on out patient counseling. He refused to cooperate with any form of inpatient treatment. He threatened to physically fight any attempts at placing him in inpatient treatment. Long story short and without too much detail he eventually ended up getting arrested. The only good that has come from that is that I was able to use the legal system to force him into an inpatient treatment center. He has been there for over 30 days and he starting to sound like the son we had. He is now acknowledging that he is an addict and was in desperate need of help. I am not sure how long he will be in.
I was not a fan of drugs before, but this experience that we have had to endure as a family has significantly reinforced my hatred for these substances. Like I said…it’s been a living hell watching your child slowly turn into an addict. I am still uncertain as to what to expect when he finally comes home. I know this will be a life long battle for him and for us for that matter. [/quote]
Wow.
The bright side to this (if there is one) is that it sounds like he’s turning a corner.
Thoughts and Prayers; hang in there and remember to take good care of yourself.
mf
[/quote]
Thanks…same to you.
[quote]Derek542 wrote:
[quote]clinton131 wrote:
[quote]carbiduis wrote:
[quote]clinton131 wrote:
[quote]MudFlap wrote:
Thanks much, I appreciate the thought.
The only reason we made it thru was… because we had to.
There were times when I would go to the gym to train (it helped with the stress, a lot) and I would need to just find a corner of the gym and compose myself for a couple of minutes before doing much of anything.
Yeah… to say it sucked would be an understatement.
** End of Hijack ** — apologies
mf[/quote]
I can certainly empathize to what you went through. Going through the same living hell with my 17 year old son. Started out with MJ and slowly moved onto whatever drug he could get his hands on but MJ remained his drug of choice. It totally changed his personality. Went from being a straight A student to failing classes. High school sports were huge to to him at one point and then he slowly walked away from them. He has stolen from family to support what he said was something he was only doing for fun and that he could walk away from at any time. The level of selfishness on his part was inconceivable. Definitely not the person my wife and I raised. In fact we would have laughed in your face if you said we would be going through this with our child two years ago. Shows how naive we were. Even though I recognized some signals in his personality, and traits that I have observed in other addicts (been a LEO for over 22 years), I was still in denial as to the magnitude of his addiction.
We have spent thousands on out patient counseling. He refused to cooperate with any form of inpatient treatment. He threatened to physically fight any attempts at placing him in inpatient treatment. Long story short and without too much detail he eventually ended up getting arrested. The only good that has come from that is that I was able to use the legal system to force him into an inpatient treatment center. He has been there for over 30 days and he starting to sound like the son we had. He is now acknowledging that he is an addict and was in desperate need of help. I am not sure how long he will be in.
I was not a fan of drugs before, but this experience that we have had to endure as a family has significantly reinforced my hatred for these substances. Like I said…it’s been a living hell watching your child slowly turn into an addict. I am still uncertain as to what to expect when he finally comes home. I know this will be a life long battle for him and for us for that matter. [/quote]
I’m sorry to hear this. I am not a parent yet (plan to be) and I will never understand the challenges that it brings until I have kids of my own in the future. Hearing stories like this really puzzles me and doesn’t make sense (like you’re saying).
But I would like to ask you, do you really think this is 100% to blame on MJ? I really think you’re giving MJ way to much credit, it just isn’t that powerful. Do you think if MJ didn’t exist, your son would still have a lot of the same problems that he has?
Several members have chimed in about how they used MJ for a long period of time, and didn’t have their life spiral into a ‘Reefer Madness’ Style burnout, or anything close to it. I am only here to argue that we as individuals are where the blame and credit should go. Sure, drugs (and some, of course, more than others) can sway us and “deflect” our paths, they are in no way the captain of the ship, we as individuals are.
Troubled people give MJ a bad image, but it won’t turn your life upside down. The people/scenes/paths that come with it may, but not the drug itself.
As I like to say, “Don’t let IT change your opinion of ME, let ME change your opinion of IT”[/quote]
I am not blaming it all on Marijuana. With the legality issues aside, I view Marijuana much like I do alcohol. Some people can control their use of alcohol and some are controlled by the alcohol. The same with Marijuana, or any other controlled substance for that matter. My son can’t handle any sort of controlled substance without losing control. He is completely controlled by them and it is slowly destroying his life.
In my line of work I don’t see a lot of positive coming out of people’s illicit use of drugs and alcohol. It never seems to end well for them. Couple that with my own personal experience with my son and you can see why I am not a huge fan of either. [/quote]
Agreed I worked ER for 14 years and saw the end results myself. [/quote]
Clinton, MF and DJ; sorry for your troubles. As the parent of a young child I can only imagine. My best to you and yours.
Clinton, your above comment is spot on. Some people can get away with it, others cannot. Family history of addiction can be an indicator, but it’s no guarantee, one way or the other.
The idea that if it wasn’t MJ it would be something else is not really sound either, IMO. The compulsive risk taking, sensation seeking personality that is susceptible to addiction does not necessarily need to find fulfillment through drugs. However, getting high is much easier than doing most of the other things that can fill that hole.
Yes, it will always be something, but it could be rock climbing, motor racing, big mountain sports, training, school, high risk work etc. You can harm yourself by overdoing any of these things as surely as you can by overdoing drugs, but I tell you what, when I was climbing with every spare minute, I felt a lot different than when I was smoking weed.
My dad replaced alcohol with passionate, one might say obsessive involvement in local politics and news blogging. Once and addict always an addict, right? Which addiction do you think had a bigger negative impact on him and those around him?
Intoxicants change your thought patterns and personality. It’s why we use them. Use them heavily enough for long enough and the changes can begin to become permanent. To imagine otherwise is just wishful thinking.
edited
I think there are many things I’d rather spend my money and time on. Also having kids changes things a lot as they emulate us in every way. I try very hard to be a good example and not do things that I wouldn’t like my kids to be doing as they get older. That way they can’t call me a hypocrite. Used to smoke in high school but you gotta grow up sooner or later. Smoking pot is for high school once you are a man it’s time to drink beer and/or whiskey. Just kidding sort of.
[quote]StevenF wrote:
Smoking pot is for high school once you are a man it’s time to drink beer and/or whiskey. Just kidding sort of. [/quote]
this type of ignorant perception is the problem.
Consuming some thc is no different than someone having a beer, or glass of wine at the end of the day. Aside from the addiction, empty calories, and possible hangover. There is a reason beer bellies are named as such.
^ true that…face it…most people enjoy it, its less harmful then booze, and its on its way to being legal everywhere… We could argue it all day & night but thats a fact… light up bitches
Big news from the FDA! Oxycontin is OK for kids!