Anxiety due to cannabis use

Suchthefool

Bluelighter
Joined
Jan 4, 2010
Messages
81
I have posted this in cannabis discussion but feel it is also appropriate to post here. If it's against BL rules to post twice in two forums or it should be somewhere else please mods do what you need. Also to all those reading it I apologise if this doesn't all make sense. This is the first time this has ever happened to me and I don't know fully how to project it into words.

Where to start really.... I was a regular smoker at night with the occasional time of smoking all day. I've been smoking regularly for around 2 years and it finally happened, the bad outweighed the good.

On Tuesday night I was having a spliff with the missus and it all felt fine till 15 minutes in I felt I was about to have a heart attack. I basically went mental and had an anxiety attack (though I found out this out much later). I didn't want to alarm my sleeping parents so we ordered a taxi to the local A&E and checked myself in saying I can't breathe properly and thought i'm about to have a heart attack. When they saw me, I mentioned I had spliff and this happened. They checked my vitals and told me I was fine but didn't tell me much else. They put me back in the waiting room for a good while and eventually it went away to an extent but I felt tired and wanted to go home. We asked the nurses if I was ok to go and they said i'll be fine but not to smoke again or I might die (Responsible eh?). At this point I still had no idea what had happened. I felt like no one really wanted to help me and I was just shunned as a no good druggie.

The next day I woke up and felt fine but not myself. I had to get the train back to my uni town and felt awful the entire way up but didn't have too much of a problem with it. I still didn't feel myself. When I got home I just curled up into bed and then rolled a cigarette and suddenly it all started happening again; couldn't breathe, the feeling of the need to escape and not knowing where and just feeling like i'm about to die. I felt I had to see a doctor and book an emergency appointment. When I got seen she checked my vitals and said i'm medically fine but what i'm experiencing is a psychosomatic response to my cannabis use. Although she told me to stop using it she didn't say much else except if it happens again call NHS direct (too all non brits it's a health line run by the national health service). At this point I thought fuck this and quit cigarettes too.

The next day they came back even harder and I was getting really scared and worried that i'm never going to get better. So I thought can't hurt to call the NHS. I spoke to the nurse on the phone who was asking what my symptoms were and what could be causing it. I explained and she told me that I am suffering a series of anxiety attacks caused by my cannabis use but by experiencing the withdrawal from cigarettes (which i've smoked for nearly 8 years and never experienced withdrawal either) told me right now it's not a good idea to quit. Cut down but by going cold turkey, it's only gonnah make it worse. But she also told me what I can do to curb my attacks and they will go away slowly. I have decided to stay on my smoking habit for the moment as it helps me calm down, and as I can't smoke in my girlfriends house it gets me outside and helps me take my mind of things.

So after three medical professionals only the last had made me calm down after a couple of days of sheer terror. They have calmed down now today but still occur at times but never get on top of me. Obviously my days of cannabis use are long gone. But, as fun as the times I had on it were, I don't miss it. Which is what I was afraid of if i ever did quit. It was always there for me after a tough day and I feel this experience will only make me stronger but right now i'm still in a pretty dark place from time to time.

I'm essentially just asking you guys for a bit of advice and support and wondering if anyone has had to deal with this? For the ones who have had to deal with it, how have you dealt with it and how long till it went away?

Also while I will not be indulging in any kind of a drug for a while, would it be a bad idea to use any other drugs in future (including caffeine and alcohol)?

With love,

Your friendly ex - stoner

Suchthefool
 
cannabinoids can cause anxiety. it's a well known fact.
it happened to me a few times where. especially the first few times i smoked cannabis. i freaked out on a few occasions. i smoked daily from summer 2004 to january 2009. i haven't smoked since, but just recently stumbled upon JWH-018 and have been smoking it. a blend of random herbs sprayed down with JWH-018. i know a guy who is making it. and it has made me have a few paranoia and anxiety episodes.

cannabinoids cause anxiety. nothing to it. you can't change it. if it's too bad use a benzo before smoking or smoke less.
 
I'm not really thinking i'll use cannabis again, my question was more directed at other drugs, mainly party drugs such as cocaine and mdma. I've also wanted to get stuck into other psychadelics but for obvious reasons I will be steering clear for a good long time. Thank you for the advice though, its always good to know.
 
cannabinoids can cause anxiety. it's a well known fact.
it happened to me a few times where. especially the first few times i smoked cannabis. i freaked out on a few occasions. i smoked daily from summer 2004 to january 2009. i haven't smoked since, but just recently stumbled upon JWH-018 and have been smoking it. a blend of random herbs sprayed down with JWH-018. i know a guy who is making it. and it has made me have a few paranoia and anxiety episodes.

cannabinoids cause anxiety. nothing to it. you can't change it. if it's too bad use a benzo before smoking or smoke less.

however the cannabinoid in reggie is being made into an anti psychotic for its non anxious high

i stopped doing coke cause of my anxiety and if you feel comfortable enough dealing with coming down by benzos, then it's whatever. but i never used shit to come down from coke so i'd be dealing with a panic attack first hand. mdma worsened my anxiety, and is probably behind the majority of the shittiness now. i could deal with being impatient in line and swaying back and forth doing my make up, but the random panic attacks and 169/39 blood pressue @ the doctors is not cool. stay away from shit that damages your brain man

i was eating up to and over a gram at a time though of mdma for over three months every week. even though you wouldn't be eating as much or probably doing drugs that much in general, it WILL worsen your anxiety. it's just not worth it imo. it's made my everyday life harder
 
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^ Taken on board molly but i'd still like to hear other peoples experiences on getting back into drugs like those after having something like this. FYI I have never taken drugs that much, i've done coke less times than fingers on my hand and mdma I did once a month if that for a couple of years and did it for the first time in a couple of years over the summer.

As much as I respsect my health and myself it would be lovely to know that I have options in the future. At my own risk of course. But this will become a decision if I ever feel that I'm ready to do it again and ready to risk the consequences.
 
My oldest son, now 31, tried some weed with one of his sisters and myself and he went into straight up cardio arrest. I gave him a xanax and he settled, but he would never try it again and he would never try any other drug as a result of that experience. He was about 23 at the time. He started having regular panic attacks after that, brought on by nothing at all. Once we were at the movies and we had to leave just as the movie started because he went into a panic attack. His attacks were very severe and eventually he got regular benzos from our doc to control them, and he seems to have grown past them now. But weed brought it on, and even though he didn't do any more weed, or try anything else, the damage was done and the panic attacks worsened. He even ended up in the hospital a few times. It took several years for him to conquer those things, and I still feel horrible for how he suffered. If he was going to try a substance I wanted him to do it at home, so when he asked me to smoke him out, I did. My God the results were SO damaging. I've never seen anything like it before or since.
 
I love pot like theres no tommorow. And I also love to grow it too hydroponically.

Pot absolutely CAN make me anxious, but thats ONLY if I ever leave my house lol. Its like a very sacred nightime ritual for me. After everyone goes to sleep, I pack my little bowl, go outside in the dark with the lights off, and take a few tokes.

Then I'll sit outside and smoke a cigarette and just think about where I want my life to go. Its a very personal/ritualisitic type process and has never really been for getting as blitzd as I possibly can. It turns me into a hippy and makes me accept life for those last couple hours before bed.

One time however my brother came bursting into my room with an atrial fibrilation (heart issue that athletes tend to get) and I was high. He was telling me he needed a ride to the hospital and I kept thinking "this is it, I'm definitely getting a panic attack tonight around all these doctors". But I wound up popping an inderal before I went and it chilled me out enough.

But in terms of anxiety, it never happens when I'm alone... ever.
 
^ Still be careful though dude. I said the same thing, and when I had my first full blown panic attack not even my girlfriend could calm me down.

I'm never one to say stop doing it because I don't believe in that at all. Just never say never ;)
 
Yeh tbo honest with you I use to have an ugly case of panic disorder for 5 years after speed and found a med that quells them rather fast.
The panic attacks induced by speed I couldn't imagine being anything like the panic attacks induced from pot. I know all panic attacks feel like hell, but I'm somewhat accustomed to how to stop them when they start. Which usually involves swallowing a bunch of inderal. It shuts down my adrenaline in like 30 minutes and never fails.

And even if it happened a couple times its still no reason for me to personally stop. For some people they happen everytime they smoke and then yeh in that situation I'd prob drop the habit.

And thanks for the concerns.
 
^ Mate you can't imagine the sheer terror of having one when your on weed. Not only do you have the paranoia coming on from the attack, the paranoia from the weed only made it worse. But i'm not gonnah touch it again or at least not for a good long time and see where it takes me.

In the past couple of days I've learnt how to notice one when they come and in a way meditate it off. They seem to be decreasing in severity and i'm sure ill be back to normal in a few weeks without meds. Though if I'm still struggling I am going to seek medical help and maybe find a support group.

They do suck though. Just the weirdest thing when your convinced you're about to die or something equally as terrible and finding out there's nothing wrong is almost destroying in itself.
 
Bro have you tried a betablocker yet for the panic attacks?

Panic attacks are 100% caused by an offset adrenal system. Your receptors overrespond to the amount of adrenaline you secrete (usually by a biological trigger or 1 simple nervous thought) and it causes you to keep secreting more adrenaline.

Its a fucking nightmare I know. Sometimes I get pulled so far into my own head I actually can not walk anymore. It happened one time walking up a flight of stairs to class where I fell down about 3 stairs onto the floor and started having one. My heart races, I sweat, my vision gets blurry and racey, I feel like someones pointing a gun at my face basically when theres nobody really there. It always feels like your 2 seconds from dieing, thats the point of adrenaline its really the "survival" hormone. But it can wreak just as much havoc at the same time.

Have you tried a strong beta blocker? Its biologically impossible to have a legit panic attack if you shut your adrenal glands down with one.
 
^ Nope, never really suffered from them until recently. I will do some research into them now but could you tell me about your experience with beta blockers (never even heard of them until you mentioned them)?

Cheers for all the information too dude. I really appreciate it. It's so nice to know i'm not alone with all this. I know that I was never alone but it's in a way reassuring to see that others have the same problems and are able to get over them too.
 
Yeh absolutely.
I'll reiterate a bit of what I said before just so it reads clearer.

People with panic disorder, or anyone who has panic attacks usually suffer from either:

a) secreting too much adrenaline or
b) having too many adrenal receptors to respond to the adrenaline (which both can be altered by substance abuse)

When a panic attack starts, the first thing many people feel is a burning sensation in their lower chest or upper stomach (focus next time you have one) this is literally the receptors right around the adrenal gland becoming "overactivated".

Imagine you're standing in the street, a stranger runs up to you and pulls a gun out in your face, your body SHOULD absolutely respond with the same type of warmth in the chest. That initially triggers the whole panic mode.
Its NOT just a tiny fraction of adrenaline to cause you anxiety, its a FLOOD of adrenaline that your body can't shut off immediately. And the emotional response causes you to keep triggering more adrenaline (either till the trigger is removed or your glands exhaust themselves).

By taking a beta-blocker, you won't stop secreting adrenaline, but it will fill up your adrenal receptors (this is a laymans way of describing it) and essentially "deactivate" them. So if you are standing on train tracks, and a train is coming at you, your heart WILL NOT increase a beat, your skin won't get flush, your brain won't become overwhelmed with panic.. and the train winds up slamming into you lol.

But that explains the surival aspect of it.
We are OUTDATED biological machines. Very important to keep in mind. 10 thousand years ago there was a survival stimuli around every corner. Whether we were being hunted by man or animal, our adrenal glands were ALWAYS being activated.

Overtime, as we became "civilized" those glands stopped being used as much. But there still lies the genetic adaptations that our body made, which is what precisely effects so many people today. Same way a moth will change color to match its background over time to avoid a specific predator. Than its predator dies off, and it takes about another 10 thousand years for it to revert/change color. Evolution is a bitch. Panic attacks are very much a natural part of evolution imo.

Beta blockers will shit down your adrenaline, and you simply can't have them anymore. But remember, some beta blockers are less effective than others. Toprol is not strong enough for most people, inderal is a lot more effective. I've been on inderal before and heard a tire explode 20 ft away w/out even blinking. Its a crazy fucking drug. And its very safe and effective as well.

I hope this helps!
 
Taking a benzo 30+ minutes is great for reducing chances of panic during use of any cannabinoid. but Most people don't get too much anxiety on pot for it to be a big problem.
 
Yes benzo's will definitely curb the anxiety during your weed high but lets face it you gotta conquer it without the benzo's or you will always want to go to that combo. The combo is real nice but i think as tolerance grows and you get more panic attacks it gets easier as much as that sucks. I have gone through many many panic attacks on weed and i still do once in a while. They are more of just anxiety now since i have conquered it mostly ,but i still have the occasional panic attack from smoking too much. It will never happen when im alone but sometimes while im out side or something ill get kind of anxious. I think it was brought on by my mdma use as i never had anxiety or panic attacks from weed before dropping E. My friend and I also blacked out completely once at subway due to grit weed and the ambulance was called and such. I think when im really stoned i will sometimes psyche my self out and think im going to pass out because of that vivid memory i had. You just have to know its all in your head and once you go through some anxiety and panic attacks with weed you will know that the symptoms are just that... symptoms. They are HARMLESS, it may take a few more anxiety attacks for you to notice that nothing will happen to you but so be it. It's either you conquer your anxiety while your stoned or you quit all together. I am just letting you know you can definitely stomp most of your anxiety when high and bring it back to how it use to be.
 
I smoked pot almost everyday for the better part of fifteen years and I quit because I experienced almost all of the symptoms that you described in your post, I never went to the ER for weed because somewhere in the back of my mind I knew it was connected to weed but I came close. I definitely felt like I was going to die from some of the panic attacks that I've had that were triggered by weed. It took me a long time to actually quit though, the bad weed trips at first happened very rarely but eventually happened every time and that was when I quit.

After I quit I still had problems with anxiety and had to go to the doctor, and eventually a psychiatrist and now I'm on Klonopin for anxiety, it works but it sucks to be dependent on. It's been a long road and I still get anxiety attacks and depression too. This has affected my drug use because I almost always use drugs as a way of medicating my anxiety and depression issues.

As far as just recreational drug use goes, after I quit weed I sought out drugs that didn't cause me anxiety, things like benzos, alcohol, opiates, and ironically ADD medication actually calms me down a bit in the right doses. I actually just got prescribed Ritalin to go along with my Klonopin, my psych and I are trying to taper down the Klonopin. I'm making progress but it's been quite a journey to say the least. I also use suboxone even though I'm not prescribed it.

The reason I clicked on this post was because the other day I smoked weed for the first time in a while, I was in the passenger seat on my way up to a gig, I took one huge hit of some very good weed and it was like three hours of hell, I knew that the anxiety it was causing was from the weed so I didn't freak out but it just made me feel like shit and dwell on all the negative shit in my life, it was torturing to me to be that stoned, I felt so stuck inside myself. It reminded me of why I don't smoke pot anymore and all the shit I've been through to try and rid myself of my anxiety. Like I've said before I've made progress but weed is not good for me anymore, it just made me crave opiates.

That being said you may find that you can still enjoy weed in time, personally I'm tired of it. I'll have the occasional hit of it where it'll hit me good but that is so rare that I don't even bother with it most of the time.

I'm kinda tired so sorry if this post is kinda scattered.

Cheers.
 
Weed definitely makes me feel anxious, so I usually avoid it. Coke and MDMA can also increase anxiety levels especially if used frequently. I think you will have to figure out for yourself if there is any level of use that you can handle without throwing you into another panic attack. But weed and stimulants can both easily contribute to anxiety. I would suggest laying off substances for as long as possible and see how you feel later on
 
WOW8o!! I had no idea that people can be affected so negatively from weed. I've been tokin since 1969...smoked all the great imports of the 1970s & 80s...the super-potent homegrown of present [currently tokin something called 'Morning Moon'], that is 2-3 bonghits & that's all that's needed. In fact, the older I've gotten, the less amount of weed is needed for maximum blast-off. Not sure if after 41 yrs of tokin, all I have to do nowadays is 'top-off' my cranium. I can't toke all day & night like I did 30-40 yrs ago.
I must admit, I have NEVER gotten that debilitating anxiety that's been mentioned. Now, back when I was 16 to 20 yrs old, there were times when our 'Gang of 5' would toke a bit too much Michoacan or Acapulco-Gold & we'd be in some restaurant ordering everything on the menu...twice...& all of a sudden, the entire place would go quiet & we'd be looking at 1 another, thinking -- "Oh fuck!! Everybody in here knows we're stoned-out & they're all staring at us!! Why the fuck won't these dipshits stop looking over here? I'll bet the cops are gonna show-up &...&...WTF are we talking about again?"8)=D
Nope!! I've never experienced anxiety to that extent...but wishing you all the best in coping with that scenario. I hope 1 day you conquer that nervousness, as weed, imho, is the best recreational substance that's been around. I used to drink, but after age 45, the hangovers were lasting longer than the booze-buzz & have been sober for 9 yrs. Then quit the cigs 3 yrs ago. Weed & my prescriptions [Klonopin & Methadone] are all I need anymore.
Good luck, my friend....................:\
 
Thank you to all the reply's. They have helped greatly. The anxiety seems to be going and found taking my girlfriend out tonight for dinner tonight wasn't so hard in a busy restaurant. Had a moment near the end where I felt one coming but was easy to make it go away.

I also found something which helps with my anxiety. May seem like a bad idea but funnily enough I had an urge to play poker tonight at one of the local casino's. I found the atmosphere to be relaxed even when it got exciting and the casino pumps oxygen in to keep people calm (which really helped actually). I was playing small stakes (50p / £1 Blinds) cash game (first time I've ever played in a casino too) and when I started I was worried about having an attack but if anything as I'm an eager player the concentration helped me ignore it and let me enjoy a buzz without the anxious consequences. Managed to show up a poker shark and doubled my money by the end. May seem silly but i've always been a responsible gambler and for me it's a bit of fun and I never bet more money than I can afford to lose (which isn't much :p ). I'm planning on going back for a smallish tournament (less stress than a cash game for me) and I think this will help teach me how to control my anxiety in the most anxious of situations. Things are really looking up :)
 
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