Joined: Jun 29, 2005 Posts: 35 Location: United Kingdom
Posted: Sat Jul 26, 2008 12:30 pm Post subject:
I can see how pot can help stress and tension. But helping anxiety? Doesn't it create anxiety? Don't get me wrong here.. I am admittedly a pothead. But just because I enjoy it, I'm not going to deny that it can add to anxiety rather than help it. ????
You've got the wrong picture here Shattered. This thread is entitled Medical Marijuana Treats Anxiety, not Being a Pothead Treats Anxiety. There is quite difference between the two. Having a toke after an anxiety-inducing event allows us to get our minds focused elsewhere to forget about the anxiety and not go over all those little things over and over in our heads afterwards, especially if these racing thoughts continue while you try to sleep. Marijuana is honestly the only thing that can make me sleep. I don't know what I would do without it. For some people it causes panic attacks, but it usually only occurs in naive users according to most studies. Use it as your own risks, but I find it much more helpful than any of the plethora of prescriptions I've been given over the past few years trying to get past this living hell.
Twenty years ago, on Sept. 6, 1988, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration's chief administrative law judge issued a landmark ruling, but don't expect any celebrations or commemorations in Washington, D.C. Our government has ignored this historic decision since the day it was issued, inflicting needless misery on millions.
Indeed, most Americans don't know it ever happened.
In response to a petition asking that marijuana be moved from Schedule I of the federal Controlled Substances Act, which bars medical use, to a lower schedule that would permit physician prescriptions, Judge Francis Young held extensive hearings that began in the summer of 1986. He heard from an impressive array of expert witnesses, resulting in thousands of pages of documentation.
Young laid out his findings in a detailed, 69-page ruling, walking readers through the scientific evidence. He concluded that the law didn't just permit moving marijuana to Schedule II, but required it.
"Marijuana, in its natural form, is one of the safest therapeutically active substances known to man," he wrote. "By any measure of rational analysis marijuana can be safely used within a supervised routine of medical care. ... The evidence in this record clearly shows that marijuana has been accepted as capable of relieving the distress of great numbers of very ill people, and doing so with safety under medical supervision. It would be unreasonable, arbitrary and capricious for DEA to continue to stand between those sufferers and the benefits of this substance in light of the evidence in this record."
Remember, this was no pot-addled "legalizer" writing. It was the chief administrative law judge within the top federal agency responsible for enforcing our drug laws. Unfortunately, the ruling had no legal force. In legal terms, it was a recommendation, not an order that had to be followed.
And the DEA chose not to follow it. Six years after top DEA officials rejected Young's recommendation, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. circuit ruled that the agency did have the right to ignore its own administrative law judge.
Because the federal government chose to disregard the results of its own investigation, the medical marijuana controversy continues to rage today. Losing patience with the feds, 12 states have acted to permit medical use of marijuana under their state laws. If Michigan passes the medical marijuana initiative on its November ballot, that number will increase to 13, comprising roughly 1 in 4 Americans.
But while those state laws provide considerable protection for medical marijuana patients, states cannot provide an exemption from federal law. Even in the 12 states that have medical marijuana laws, patients and caregivers have been arrested, terrorized and even had their children taken away.
Meanwhile, the medical evidence continues to mount. Another federally commissioned study, this time by the Institute of Medicine, confirmed in 1999 that marijuana has legitimate medical uses.
More recently, newly published clinical trials have found that marijuana effectively relieves certain types of hard-to-treat pain, including the nerve pain that often accompanies multiple sclerosis, HIV/AIDS and other diseases. Other research suggests that by relieving the nausea and vomiting often caused by the harsh drugs used to treat hepatitis C and HIV, medical marijuana can help patients stick to these challenging drug regimens -- and live.
Because our government has ignored science, needless suffering has been inflicted on millions of Americans who have benefited or could benefit from medical marijuana. In 2009, we will have a new president and a new Congress, and they should move quickly to end this sorry record of federal stonewalling.
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This is something I very much agree with.
It helped a lot in overcoming depression and has been helping with my anxiety.
I figured, since they won't help me with my anxiety (not just drugwise, but the suggestions given have never helped me.) ) I'd take it into my own hands.
I'm very happy that I did.
Quality of life has improved a lot. (I'm not saying that it was all based on taking up smoking again, but it did help a lot.)
Worked better&faster than the other medications.
Plus, nobody has ever given me a legit reason for its illegal status. :\
Ganj is most certainly NOT cure for anxiety.. It CAN be a quick fix in some cases.. Like if you have never smoked before, and you get high for the first couple times it's a blast and you giggle and talk a lot. But after smoking a lot it begins to take a toll on you.. I have been smoking every day for about 4 years. [I'm 17 now] and 4 years ago is when I started having these problems. I only have social anxiety now, but I've gone through severe depression and agoraphobia that is just now beginning to subside because I recently cut down on the smoking.. That is how I know the smoking played a big part in why I am the way I am. My friends I had before I got into smoking even told me that I changed when I started smoking.. and look where I am now. I have NO friends..none. If you are a naturally nervous person with an addictive personality, then weed is a very bad solution. In the long run, it will just worsen your problems. Trust me..
I mean don't get me wrong, weed is harmless for the most part.. But if you treat it as a 'cure' then you're in for digging yourself deeper in the pile of shit you're already in. In the case of just relaxing with a joint at home like I do.. It's better to smoke it than not I guess if you are really feeling that hopeless.. But I don't want people to think it's going to cure their problems when it comes to interacting with the outside world and such. All it will do is help get you by, and that isn't exactly a great thing if you need something to just get you by. But I still see it as way better than popping some pills the shrink prescribes, or getting drunk every night. I just want to point out that weed makes things worse for anxious people more often than not. The only panic attacks I've ever had was when I was stoned... and I can only smoke alone because I am even more awkward and quiet around people when I'm high than I am when I am straight. I do understand that not everyone is going to abuse the herb like I did.. But it's not like I ever intended for it to turn out like this. At first it was just for fun.. But I have an addictive personality so it just made things worse. But honestly I really just want to quit smoking all together because I find that I have an easier time coping with a clear head. I haven't smoked in a few days now and I can't remember the last time I felt this confident. I finally got my permit, and I didn't waste 50 dollars this week.
Cannabis less harmful than drinking, smoking: report
2 days ago
LONDON (AFP) — Cannabis is less harmful than alcohol or tobacco, according to a report by a research charity Thursday, which called for a "serious rethink" of drug policy.
The Beckley Foundation, a charity which numbers senior experts and other academics among its advisors, said banning cannabis has no impact on supply and turns users into criminals.
"Although cannabis can have a negative impact on health, including mental health, in terms of relative harms it is considerably less harmful than alcohol or tobacco," says the report by the Foundation's Global Cannabis Commission.
The government is pressing for cannabis to be re-classified in law as a Class B drug compared with its current, less serious, Class C classification.
Authorities are concerned notably by the growing prevalence of the potent "skunk" form of the drug. Around 80 percent of cannabis seizures are of this strain, said to be linked to mental health problems, official figures show.
The Beckley Foundation, a charitable trust, claimed only two deaths worldwide have been attributed to cannabis, while alcohol and tobacco use together kill an estimated 150,000 people in Britain alone.
"Many of the harms associated with cannabis use are the result of prohibition itself, particularly the social harms arising from arrest and imprisonment," it said.
"It is only through a regulated market that we can better protect young people from the ever more potent forms of dope," it added.
The decision to reclassify cannabis upwards into the more punitive Class B category -- which includes amphetamines -- is a U-turn for the Labour government.
Cannabis was downgraded from Class B when Tony Blair was prime minister, but Gordon Brown announced a review of its status soon after taking over in June last year.
An earlier review of the cannabis classification, at the time of the last 2005 general election, resulted in it remaining Class C.
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The Big Question: Is it time the world forgot about cannabis in its war against drugs?
By Michael McCarthy
Friday, 3 October 2008
Why are we asking this now?
Because yesterday a British think-tank published a report for next year's United Nations Strategic Drug Policy Review, suggesting that a decriminalised, regulated market in cannabis would cause less harm than the prohibition of the drug currently in force across most of the world.
What is the UN review?
It is an examination of progress made since the international community, at a special session of the UN General Assembly in New York in June 1998, agreed a 10-year programme of activity for the control of illegal drug use and markets – the "war on drugs". It is thought unlikely that enormous progress will be reported in 2009, as many drugs are purer, cheaper, and more widely available than ever before. Experts on drug policy are therefore looking again at the alternative to prohibition which is always in the background, but which no office-holding politician hoping for re-election appears able to contemplate - legalisation.
What exactly isthe think-tank report?
It is the Global Cannabis Commission report, launched at a conference in the House of Lords yesterday and prepared for the Beckley Foundation, a charitable trust "set up to promote the investigation of consciousness and its altered states from the perspectives of science, health, politics and history." The report, put together by a specially-commissioned international group of academics and experts in drug policy analysis, attempts to put the issue of cannabis in a global perspective with a comprehensive view of the evidence, so that governments can move beyond what is termed "the present stalemate in cannabis policy."
Which stalemate is this?
Cannabis is used worldwide by "a conservatively estimated 160m people", according to the report, so it can hardly be said that prohibiting it is successful – and increasingly, nations cannot agree on the way forward. Some countries take a hard line – in the US, about three-quarters of a million citizens are arrested every year for cannabis possession – while other countries have considerably relaxed their penalties or their enforcement policies (Until recently Britain could have been put into this category. Four years ago we downgraded dope from a class B to a class C drug – until in May, the Home Office, clearly at Gordon Brown's behest and in the face of official advice to the contrary, retightened the policy and made it class B once again, after fears in some quarters that stronger versions of the drug were leading to more harmful effects.) But internationally, cannabis is considered an outlawed substance, so changing the official regime is everywhere difficult.
Why does the report suggest cannabis should be legalised?
It argues that although cannabis can have a damaging effect in health and on mental health, it is actually far less damaging than alcohol and tobacco. "Historically, there have only been two deaths worldwide attributed to cannabis, whereas alcohol and tobacco together are responsible for an estimated 150,000 deaths per annum in the UK alone," the report alleges.
Much of the harm associated with cannabis use is "the result of prohibition itself, particularly the social harms arising from arrest and imprisonment," the report says, claiming that policies which control cannabis, whether draconian or liberal, appear to have little impact on the prevalence of consumption. It offers the alternative of a legal but properly regulated market.
"In an alternative system of regulated availability, market controls such as taxation, minimum age requirements, labelling and potency limits are available to minimise the harms associated with cannabis use," it says, claiming that through a regulated market young people could be protected from the increasingly potent forms of the drug, such as skunk.
Wouldn't the legalisation of cannabis pave the way to the legalisation of all drugs?
It might well do, which is why, no matter what the relative harm of dope may be compared to cigarettes or whisky, a move to end prohibition would be stoutly resisted by opponents of liberalising the drug laws, and welcomed by those who would like to see liberalisation brought in. For it is the issue of prohibition itself, rather than the issue of cannabis, which is really at the heart of the argument. The drugs-liberalisation pressure group Transform yesterday welcomed the Global Cannabis Commission's call for legalisation, but said it would also welcome its now being applied to heroin and cocaine.
Why is prohibition at the heart of the argument?
Simple economics, say its opponents. It is simply a matter of supply and demand. If you squeeze the supply of a much-desired commodity – especially an addictive one – its price will rise sharply, and in an unregulated market, it can go sky-high. It then becomes too expensive for addicts for buy, and so they turn to crime or social deviancy on a large scale to feed their habits – burglary, shoplifting, prostitution. At the international scale, the profits are such that the trade is taken over by organised crime and whole countries are destabilised.
So just how big are the profits?
Transform's Danny Kushlick says: "In the cocaine and heroin trade, the profit margin is anything between 2,000 and 3,000 per cent, which enables organised criminals to turn what are effectively vegetables into commodities worth literally more than their weight in gold." A large number of prominent and entirely respectable economists have bought this argument, and insist that drugs prohibition is entirely counter-productive, just as alcohol prohibition was in the US in the 1920s - until it was eventually repealed.
They range from Milton Friedman, the US guru of the free market, to Adair Turner, former director-general of the Confederation of British Industry, current chairman of the Government's Climate Change Committee and forthcoming chairman of the Financial Services Authority. A lot of senior scientists are also strongly in favour of drugs legalisation.
Wouldn't the legalisation of cannabis or indeed any drug just lead people down the path to addiction?
That is certainly the position of its opponents; it is more or less the position of the Government and of the Tory opposition. Economists might be in favour; politicians are very wary of legalising drugs. There seems to be no widespread popular call for it. Its proponents say that although more people might become drug users, the harm done would be far less than the benefit gained by taking the world's Mafias and local criminals out of the equation.
So what are the chances that cannabis will cease to be internationally outlawed?
With the US running the show? Don't hold your breath.
Should cannabis be legalised on a world scale?
Yes...
* It would immediately take the supply of the drug out of the hands of violent criminal syndicates.
* Compared to alcohol and tobacco, which are freely available, Cannabis is not very harmful anyway.
* Any increased use of the drug would be greatly outweighed by the benefits gained.
No...
* It would be a first step to more widespread, and potentially disastrous, liberalisation of other drugs.
* It would lead to a great increase in use, which might put people on a "slippery slope" to harder drugs.
* Some forms of cannabis are very harmful and have been implicated as a cause of mental health problems.
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Joined: Sep 26, 2008 Posts: 171 Location: United Kingdom
Posted: Sat Oct 04, 2008 1:27 pm Post subject:
I was a heavy Marijuana user for about twelve years. I can say, hand on heart, that it only offers a temporary illusion of well being. Long term, it actually makes your anxiety ten times worse.
The argument about it being less harmful than cigarettes is ridiculous. Although it can be eaten, most people roll the drug in tobacco to smoke it, and they do so unfiltered, and thus it is more harmful.
From a physical perspective, inhaling any particle laden smoke into the lungs is dangerous and, cancer aside, can certainly lead to emphysema and bronchitis. Fact.
As a side effect of its use, most Marijuana smokers become addicted to tobacco. The side effects of tobacco withdrawal is lethargy, bad temper and lack of concentration when not actually inhaling smoke. The withdrawal effects of tobacco begin very soon after extinguishing a cigarette or joint, within minutes. This is why people smoke seemingly habitually, they're just trying to stay in that place where they feel focused and comfortable.
Smoking is a stimulant and yet people talk of its relaxing properties. A stimulant can only relax you when you are addicted to it. The feeling of being unrelaxed comes from nicotine leaving your system. The relaxation and sense of relief comes from the need for the drug being met. It's quite simple.
Over time, Marijuana smokers, like I used to be, become insular, paranoid, introspective and lazy. Qualities that no self respecting person would ever want or desire in a partner.
My anxiety was heightened and worsened by long term Marijuana use. Before I smoked it I was fine.
Frankly, anyone who says that Marijuana should be considered a 'cure' for anxiety clearly does not know the facts and should not be advocating its use.
For what it's worth, stay away from it and seek help in other ways. Healthier ways. That will ensure your long term development and worth as a human being.
_________________ "Sunday is gloomy, my hours are slumberless, dearest the shadows I live with are numberless..."
Joined: Jun 04, 2008 Posts: 300 Location: The good red road
Posted: Sat Oct 04, 2008 3:54 pm Post subject:
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_________________ I want ecstasy. I am a neurotic — in the sense that I live in my world. I will not adjust myself to the world. I am adjusted to myself.
Last edited by sleepysparrow on Thu Nov 06, 2008 6:20 am; edited 1 time in total
Sabbath, you posted some great articles on marijuana. Very nice additions to this thread!
As for GloomySunday, nobody here ever claimed marijuana cures anxiety. All we're saying is it helps relieve stress. And your claim that most people who smoke weed end up addicted to cigs is ridiculous. People don't smoke tobacco because they smoke pot. It makes no sense whatsoever. I, for one, have smoked weed for years and have never had the urge to take up smoking cigs. Cigarettes are a choice completely separate from marijuana, and I have no idea how you came to this conclusion. It seems as if you're just grabbing at straws to come up with ridiculous reasons to demonize ganja. I don't even know why I'm dignifying you're post with so much of a response right now, so I'll stop ranting now...
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