lacey k said:
Even my own doctor supports the shit, and shes a 50-somethin year old straight-lace old lady who prolly crochets in her free time. I hate to be one of the people like "but a doctor said so!" cuz that is exactly what we are talkin about here, and the way that it can give ppl a false sense of security.
So ima take it to the flipside.
personally i think "dont trust what a doctor tells you just because they are a doctor, cuz their drugs can be just as bad or worse than yours."
BUT, since yall seem to take the word of a doctor pretty high, with the whole "tested and known safe medications" and shit like that - if a doctor supports it and you listen to your doctor, you still gonna question that shit?
Honestly its crackin me up, cuz everytime you bust someones point, they come up with a different one. "Smoking weed during pregnancy will make ur baby die omg!" "No, it wont, and there is reasearch to support that." "OK, fine then, but the actual SMOKE from the weed will make ur baby sick!" "No, well if you vaporize it, almost all carcinogens and the huge majority of the negative substances get totally removed and that wont be a problem." "OK fine, but your babys gettin HIGH! You cant get a baby high! You baby hating selfish junkie whore! Why dony you go inject your baby with some heroin, you piece of human filth!"
Its one or two tokes of god damn weed. This whole stupid ass thread is totally theoretical, cuz im willing to bet that a large percentage of everyone in here splittin hairs over bullshit drives a car, breathes the air around them, eats food that been treated with millions of pesticides and chemicals, washes with shampoos and soaps full of unknown and posibly carcinogenic ingredients, uses cell phones, and lives in this place that we call Earth which by itself is a whole lot more toxic than taking ONE OR TWO GODDAMN HITS OF VAPOIRZED THC could EVER be. unless you live in a bubble there aint no way to avoid exposing yourself or a fetus to all types of shitty things. even babies born in jungles thousands of miles from civilization still get affected by it. So when people are willing to worry about, and condemn others who choose to use herbal medicine instead of conventional when they are pregnant, they better also devote just as much attention to every little thing i just mentioned before.
My point is, THERE IS A LOT BIGGER AND MORE DANGEROUS THINGS TO WORRY ABOUT. take it or leave it, idealistic as you wanna be, weed is really on the far far end of the spectrum of damage and no matter what you do, your kid will most likely be exposed to a bunch of crappy shit anyways so you might as well make it be something that serves a purpose and helps you out.
Alright, I'm bored so I'm picking a fight, Lacey K, I challenge you to a duel, a figurative one ofcourse, I don't like to strike those disabled when it comes to realizing the point that basically ends your argument.
Alright, where do I start to rip your post apart...
You mention your own personal physician in an unproven and well, not surprising manner. You need to understand a basic sense of reality for the true idealism called "common sense" that I embrace to fully extend its meaning to your consciousness. For right now your sense of a realistic opinion is a blank shot in the dark closet of hopeless argumentative bullshit, where it deserves to remain so no one can be bewildered by a stretched opinion that goes beyond even semi-truthful opinion, hell, I don't think truth is present unles your doctor's age is really around 50. Eitherway, not the point, I gotta start getting to the facts.
To work my way top to bottom in your post I'll talk about medical opinion. In general as you stated the social norm is to trust the medical communities opinion. However, the social norm does not account for the debated ethical and actual health basis that exists within the question of pregnancies relationship to marijuana, muchless any substance whether its psychoactive or not. The problem with for the specific instance you proposed, a middle-aged doctor, is the fact that as they may have gained new experiences, even attended some seminars to keep up with new techniques for treating patients but not necessarily new medical findings that are of more obscure natures. Today's new residents at many hospitals are practicing a more modern form of medicine that is based on teachings that have been improved upon what the class of '76 was getting when your doctor was probably getting out of medical school. Not to mention the fact she might have been stoned through most of the 70's if she was what I presume, a stoner, not necessarily smoking every second but well into it. The problem with that is that while she may seem straight laced its because shes operating in her own practice, and might possibly still enjoy the mary jane, though shes most likely grown out of that phase of her life and moved on to more serious tasking.
Basically, the point is, you got a doctor that is a private practicioner, shes got a basic need to keep up with the common illnesses but medical research into marijuana isn't necessarily top priority, not to mention most doctors will have opposing opinions of one another. Reasoning behind these opposing opinions is like I stated, you have ethnic and possible health risks to consider. You can't rule out carcinogens, muchless co-carcinogens because during the process of biotransformation, which makes the carcinogen more water soluble to be extreted from the body, the result can sometimes turn carcinogens with limited toxicity into far more poisonious formulations. And if you've failed to realize, carcinogens are defined as substances, radionuclide or radiation, directly involved in the growth or facilitation of cancer. Radionuclide I explained in another thread is when you have an atom with an unstable nucleus which sometimes will release energy that is attached to radioactive particles in the nucleus. The process can also occur with electrons orbitting around the nucleus which is internal conversion. The process results in the formation of radiation and subsequent release. This radiation is in the form of gamma rays or other sub-atomic particles. For carcinogens in general their activity is related to the radiation commonly gamma rays or alpha particles. Ofcourse the carcinogen levels with marijuana, even tar levels, is much lower. Still, Vitamin A, and Vitamin C deficiencies which have been linked to many carcinogens can pose risks to the development of the unborn fetus. For marijuana, and cigarettes, the real formation of carcinogens comes via the method of administration, or rather how its smoked. Incomplete combustion of hydrocarbons inside our oxygen and nitrogen rich atmosphere causes a multitude of co-carcinogens (not directly influential in cancerous facilitation and growth but under certain circumstances is influential) along with carcinogens to be formed based on both composition of the actual marijuana based on variables ranging from strain, growth method, distribution chain, lacing or perservative additions, lighter type (temperature / gas used), pollution in area, duration of smoking, amount smoked, nutritional factors that could influence vitamin and mineral levels in the body (long term mainly), hormones, etc. There's many. For instance, some carcinogens and co-carcinogens form at different temperatures, and the varying temperatures and the varying atmosphere which bonds with products of incomplete combustion to form carcinogens and co-carcinogens can mean more than your willing to look into.
Because many factors contribute to the gases formed when smoking marijuana you don't necessarily have a basis that is undoubtable sound and applicable to every situation. People embalming fluid for instance has been found some places, not saying its common, its the fact that there are the different things that may not necessarily influence a person as dramatically as others, and this is simply regarding the non-cannabinoids inhaled when smoking. I've not gotten to the fun part yet, the medical studies.
To briefly run the list, the birth defects that are possible aren't the most serious in the world, but they are there as possibilities and should be weighed by each individual the same. Remember, each defect has a higher likelyhood of occuring in a direct dependancy ratio to the amount smoked, among the other factors I listed before. To run down the basics, studies have shown that marijuana can affect a baby's growth and development of its central nervous system. The effects seen are commonly problems focusing their attention and general problem solving. With higher use, short-term memory, concentration, and judgement (reasoning) are affected. The defects are somewhat similiar to the attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, however, theres no link just shared symptoms. Another study mentioned the increased risk for the child to develop leukemia. Among these defects (incomplete list), the general low birth-weight, premature birth, etc, are all present. So do you want to get high throughout your pregnancy and increase the risks, go ahead. Ofcourse most risks are still minimal if you smoke frequently or even sporadically it can influence the fetus' development psychologically and physically as any affect upon the central nervous system will have an almost definite effect upon the mental aspect of the child's development, ie: understimulation or overstimulation that increase the risk for developing various psychiatric disorders later in life.
Moving past the general ideas you talked about relating to cellphones, possible pollution, because that argument would simply extend this post far beyond any human's attention normal attention span, muchless its a waste of my damn time. However, I will mention that yes there are other risks out there, however, they are uncontrollable and in most cases unwillingly experienced events that are minimal because of our body's biological processes. However, under-developed fetus' will often lack the natural processes or efficiency to meet an increase well beyond the normal requirements. Overload of cellural functioning can be possible, enzymes work but its all a system of processing that takes time and can put stresses on developing large cell structures (organs, etc).
To quickly bring a relation between pollution and smoking, to without really going deep into it, you need to understand this variable. This variable of "air quality" is both dynamic and continually changing. Sure, smog is a factor in some cases, but minimal in relation to the fact unless your living in downtown Los Angelos or San Francisco you won't have an exposure to smog or pollution in general that is as great as you believe it may be. Remember, smog's affect on our health and functioning is related to long term exposure because of the limited, and very small amount that is absorbed. In relation to smoking marijuana, muchless anything that results in incomplete combustion the risks are exponentially increased in terms of its relation to "air pollution". You need to consider the variables of both a much larger, delayed exposure (holding smoke in), etc. Go figure which would be worse. Exposure to smog which sees its negative effects after years of exposure, compared to the times during preganancy regardless of frequency that the fetus is exposed to the smoke containing both psychoactive substances that can deter proper nerve development during fetal growth and development (overstimulation, etc), a mix of co-carcinogens and carcinogens that are based upon countless variables impossible to control.
So, we got some bad things to inhale and some incomplete scientific opinions that have moreso personal opinions rather than the scientific side of things being their basis. Remember, its continually and forever be both a ethical and health related issue in the arguments that take place, however, if your the kid of mother that breaks the rules during pregnancy when a period of abstinence is highly recommended, then go for it. Furthermore, the full extent of possibilities is not known for the other relationships with pregnancy that exist with marijuana smoke with varying controlled tests that show the impact of different atmospheric gases on the combustion of marijuana and possible laced chemicals when using different methods of igniting the marijuana. Remember, the flame you use generates a combustion that you actually inhale, and often forms new molecules during this period that is worsened when using a bowl that is being run down and majority of inhalation comprising of butane or other igniters used for getting things lit.
Now, I guess the final bit would be the question moreso theoretical of "one or two hits". Thats moreso a question of whether it remains at just those one or two hits, muchless the frequency, the composition of the marijuana smoked, etc. So, quit your bitching downplaying whats smoked, how much is smoked, the 'ethics' of such smoking, etc. It all comes down to whether the person that is pregnant makes a conscious decision to smoke or not to, and whether or not they know the risks and accept the possibility of such risks even if they aren't fully aware of them.
So, ends this argument which clearly demonstrates that as you may debate countless times the ethnical side, the opposing medical community's views, and possible birth defect risks or later life development hinderances that can be related to the use of marijuana. However, one time smoking won't cause a risk unless there are other chemicals used to lace the marijuana, however, frequency of use if increased beyond that one time during the final months of pregnancy can significantly increase birth defect risks dependent on the use and frequency of such use. So, again I state, the question really is not our own and whether its a definite yes or no answer thats out there, its rather one that breaks down to taking the consequences of such behavior and living with them regardless of the risks presented for moderate to heavy use especially during the times of early nervous system development in the fetus.
So, Lacey K, I stand here with your post corrected to the knowledge that is available and with proper information. I mean, some things related to risks are disproportionate but the fact that a pregnant women is smoking during a time when its highly encouraged to abstain from all substances psychoactive or not unless necessary so that the fetus is at no time at risk from outside influences, but merely solely influenced by the proper lifestyle choices of the mother during the pregnancy and the genetics that will ultimately decide much of the possible defects that could arise.
Now, I'm gonna get back to doing something else, I'm done typing this long ass post, had enough fun in the beginning rashing but proving the points was tedious and boring at parts though worth the disproving of such a subject only to be overlooked by the ethnical rather than scientific side of this debate. Stop saying its alright if the consensus isn't definitively for or against a single viewpoint based on varying research.
, so a hit or 2 a day for a bit is not anything to wet your panties about. hell, it's not even every day that you feel sick.
