• CD Moderators: nepalnt21
  • Cannabis Discussion Welcome Guest
    Posting Rules Bluelight Rules

After Years of Being a Stoner, Now Paranoid of Even Smelling Weed?

U

ucscslug

Greenlighter
Joined
Jun 21, 2008
Messages
4
Location
San Francisco, CA
Hello to everyone! Before submitting my question/concern I would like to thank everyone who contributes to this site. Your insights and opinions have been truly valuable to my ever-expanding knowledge of the psychedelic world/my own mind.

With that said, I have a question/concern that I would like to hear peoples' opinions on. After being a "stoner" for 2-3 years (or weed connoisseur %)), I eventually developed panic disorder that transcended into my every day life after a series of bad experiences while smoking that seemingly came out of no where. After speaking with a psychiatrist and expressing my fear that I thought marijuana (or perhaps MDMA, LSD, or Mushrooms) had developed in me schizophrenia, the psychiatrist quickly reassured me that I did not have schizophrenia but rather, panic disorder. According to him (and my own research that I've conducted online), I exhibited all the common signs of panic disorder, including a racing heart, shaking, cold sweats, chest pains, and, worst of all, derealization/depersonalization during an attack (especially when smoking pot). Why this happened after 3 years of smoking pot and being fairly comfortable with it (enjoying it thoroughly as well), I will never know, but that is not my main concern here and there is a pretty lengthy thread on the subject here on bluelight.

My concern is with the following: after having so many bad experiences smoking pot and freaking out like crazy (severe panic attacks) after smoking it, I now have developed a ridiculous fear of even SMELLING pot. To the point where I will avoid even being around people who smoke, or places where there may be marijuana smoke (a considerable task as I live in San Francisco, where seemingly everyone smokes marijuana).

It gets so bad that often, if I even smell pot, I automatically assume that it is affecting me (since, after all, I can smell it) and that I am stoned/getting stoned, and automatically work myself into a panic frenzy that often (though not always) blows out into a full blown panic attack. The rational part of my brain seems to think that it is impossible to get stoned, or even feel the effects of pot, simply by smelling it, yet still I would like to hear peoples' opinions on the subject. Do you think it's actually possible to get "stoned" or even mildly affected without consciously or directly inhaling pot smoke, a.k.a. ripping a bong or hitting a joint, etc.?

I honestly can't believe that I've gotten to the point where even smelling weed makes me freak out, especially after enjoying it so much for so long. From what I hear though, it's not all that uncommon to have a "falling out" with MJ, so that is somewhat comforting, though I would really like to get to the point where I could at least enjoy being in places (a.k.a. concerts, festivals, etc.) where people are smoking weed and not freak out and lose my shit.

Thank you in advance to everyone for your responses, it is much appreciated!

Best regards to all of you.
 
ucscslug said:
Do you think it's actually possible to get "stoned" or even mildly affected without consciously or directly inhaling pot smoke, a.k.a. ripping a bong or hitting a joint, etc.?
Click to expand...

Hey fellow slug, it seems like you have conditioned yourself to associate marijuana with panic/anxiety. This specific phobia then becomes generalized to include the smell of marijuana, and anything associated with it - like you are saying places where people smoke. ok enough psych 101.

Your best bet is to recondition your behavior and to read up on some behavioural (CBT) treatments of panic attacks. Are you on any Rx medications for your psych issues? Anyone who knows me knows that I hate HATE benzodiazepines, (after being on them for 10 years) but if you feel like you wont abuse them, lorazepam - about 1mg taken sublingually at the onset of a panic attack is like a silver bullet and a complete lifesaver. SSRIs are helpful in preventing panic attacks, but have awful hideous side effects (from my own experience), have a look into some seratonin precursors such as 5-HTP. The more you understand about the biochemistry and the mechanism of action which occurs during a panic attack, the more you can tell your brain "the reason why my i am getting pins and needles is not because i am dying but because blood is rushing away from my capillaries and into my central nervous system because i am hyperventilating". Trust me, it helps. Also, developing a ritual to cope with the panic attacks help.

Did you have a bad/traumatic/too intense experience on a psychedelic (you were saying MDA/LSD)? My guess would be that the high from marijuana produces a similar feeling as the onset of some psychedelics, and you might associate that with an out of control feeling you experienced on something stronger.

And no way do I think it is possible to get stoned or to experience psychedelic effects of marijuana from unconsciously inhaling pot smoke. OK maybe if you are in a closet or a car with the outside air circulation off and people intentionally hotboxing it, you might get a bit stoned. But from what you are saying, especially being outdoors and just smelling some ganj? No I really don't think it is possible.

Best of luck mate. PM me if you want to talk at all ay, Ive unfortunately got a lot of experience in this department.
 
Dear FiatFlux,

Thank you so much for your thoughtful (and very insightful response). Your belief that I've "conditioned myself to associate marijuana with panic/anxiety" rings very true to me and seems very plausible. I mean, even the thought of marijuana gives me a little anxiety so I can definitely see that being true now.

I do currently have some lorazepam that was prescribed to me, though I'm very wary of using it because I've heard from so many people that they had issues with addiction/getting off of them. Are there any recommendations you can provide on avoiding addiction/tolerance/how to use it responsibly?

It's funny that you ask whether I had a "bad/traumatic/too intense experience on a psychedelic" because I actually did. One time while on LSD (I only did about 4-5 times), I decided that the high wasn't "strong enough" about 2 hours into it, and decided to smoke marijuana. What followed was a completely traumatic experience, about 2.5 hours of pure hell, pretty much a complete mental meltdown (though it may not have appeared quite as intense to people watching me; thankfully I was with my boyfriend who was very supportive, and that helped." Prior to this, my first true "anxiety attack," (though I did not recognize it as such) was after eating one too many pot edibles and completely zapping myself into wonderland. The experience was very frightening and for the first time brought on feelings of depersonalization. Ever since that experience I occasionally experienced mild anxiety when smoking cannabis, but nothing too intolerable (the high still outweighed the low). My worst panic attack (and the one that finally made me quit smoking) occurred about 6 months after, and felt almost exactly the same (derealization/depersonalization followed by the classic physical symptoms of a panic attack).

I've been trying my best to simply "tough it out" whenever I find myself around pot smoke (which happens to be every day living in SF -- LOL), and every time I end up thinking "oh man, here we go, within a few minutes I'm going to get stoned off this pot in the air, and then completely lose my shit and end up in the hospital with a mental breakdown again."

I will definitely look into the CBT treatment you mention. I noticed you said you have experienced a lot of this yourself. Can you please speak about some methods that have helped you, or your own personal experience? If it is all too personal, I will definitely PM you. At first I thought about PMing you instead of responding publicly, but I suspect there a lot of people on this web site that will read this thread and totally relate to my concern, and I would hate to take away from them any potential help that your insight (or that of others) may offer. I know how helpful for me this web site has been.

Thank you in advance for your response.

P.S. are you a psych major? Are there any books you would recommend that would help?

Thanks again.
 
This happened to me years ago. I took ten years off, tried it again when I stopped getting panic attacks. I am fine, but I take benzos daily too.
 
Watch your breathing. Perhaps when you smell cannabis your breathing becomes shallow as you try to avoid inhaling the smoke. You may want to remove yourself from the smoke until your breathing is normal. Focus on breathing with your belly so that you inhale deeply and properly fill your lungs. When I had panic attacks before I would quietly hum a tune (Beethoven's 6th) and this helped my breathing and also took my mind off my symptoms. Fighting a panic attack only makes it worse. You have to go with flow, just ride it out and let it finish. Good luck.
 
you are over analyzing your situation, to the point where you lose control.
stop thinking so much is my advice. and that is honest advice, not troll advice.
 
this happened to me also after years of daily cannabis abuse ending in horrible panic attacks where i thought i was dying more than 70% of the times i smoked. after that, i quit, i also would freak out just smelling cannabis. i remember my friends smoked some when i was over at their place and i had to make an excuse to leave. how ridiculous! i had been by far the biggest pothead/pot advocate of my friends and suddenly i couldn't even be in an apartment where it had been smoked (in the other room no less). anyway, a few years past and i gradually got over the fear. i still haven't tried to actually smoke pot again and i might not ever but it's no problem being around it. you won't get stoned.
 
in the same boat

I totaly feel the same way. I have recently quit smoking pot for anxiety reasons and just because I don't enjoy the high. I live in northern california and it's hard to not get a wiff every now and then, and I hate it! I feel like when I smell it it brings me back to this place I don't want to be and I feel dull. Sometimes when I smell it I hold my breath until it goes away. It's part anxiety, part imagination, part just being a bit too sensitive.
 
I cannot understand why people with preexisting anxiety issues decide to smoke marijuana despite consistent negative feedback. The whole purpose of smoking marijuana is to shift your mindset where you're no longer preoccupied with past happenstances and future possibilities, goals, planning etc. -- in other words, the purpose of smoking is to induce time distortion where you can more fully appreciate immediate experience. The smoker wants to transition from a state of conscious awareness which involves social conditioning in order to just experience things as they are. If you're going to fight this and view it as a threat of "losing control", you shouldn't be smoking marijuana to begin with and you can't get anything out of it.
 
FiatFlux is right. Its all about association of anxiety to the marijuana. There were times when I thought I would never smoke again due to anxiety and such but days later I would choose to say fuck it, I won't let cannabinoids cause me dismay. I just continued to smoke, though obviously less and came back around. This has happened atleast 2 times over the years. I've gone from smoking 40 mgs of 018 in a session to have panicked thoughts about hitting mids from a bong. Doesn't equate and it shouldn't unless you let it!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top