misuse help - big problem

[sasquatch]

This is not a support for prohibition, this is seeking strategies to help get a younger brother who is not a 'good' smoker get off the weed. Some people don't handle alcohol well, others dont handle weed well.

 

He is a long time intermittent smoker who is having clear difficulties but will not accept it.

To give you an example, he is like Barney off the simpsons.

When he stays clean he gets active, participates, smiles, looks great and healthy, shares a joke, holds down a job, and is generally a great guy.

When he has a smoke he flips, jeckyll and hyde, into a seedy looking waster who doesnt give a shit about anything or anyone, acts selfish, acts like an arsehole, gets all defensive at EVERYTHING, hides underneath the house and covers of the bed and takes weeks of hard effort and moroseness to get back to being relatively user friendly again.

He has big trouble holding down a job and it is very clear that the pot is the central figure to these difficulties.

Without the pot he handles it like a breeze.

He has deep set patterns and insecuriteis contributing to these problems.

How do you access someone who doesnt handle their pot and help them off it. His mates are stoners and provide NO positive support, kind of like they go whatever man, do what you want man, its your life, here have a bong, when its clear that he's an arsehole on the weed and thrives when off it.

That kind of passive chill-man philosophy is a load of shit and doesnt wash.

It is pivotal in keeping a good man down.

 

You are all clear advocates of the weed and have strong opinions on the subject.

We also know that misuse IS a problem and does lead to social and personal difficulties.

Does anyone have any ideas or techniques that can help penetrate the fog of a stoner who does not handle his weed and has problems breaking from the patterns of repeated misuse and fear of facing a clear head for any length of time?

[Tom]

Any drug is open to misuse, your brother’s problem is in controlling his usage and until he can he should leave it alone. Last year I managed to get a job for a while (until my back and a couple of other body parts forced my to quit), I went from every day usage to weekends only with no problems, if your brother has a real problem with mj why not seek medical help like you would for any other drug?

 

[Guest Eikel]

I haven't had a smoke in 4 weeks, went cold-turkey, I'm fine apart from being oversensitive and cranky

 

Your brother can give up anytime he wants, he has to WANT to though.

[dsyfer]

How old is he?

[naturalmystic]

The thing with pot is that it thrust you into the deepest parts of your mind leaving yourself exposed to yourself , confronting your deamons in all there forms . Some people have more deamons than others , there own that theyve created through there own socail formulas . Its all transitional the fact that hes doing these things is typical of this . Young males always hit the bongs harder and like to push things to the limit , thats probably why hes walking around like Barney . GUys and girls that are younger are still finding out who they are and would without pot probably remain more composed and hide these problems better or handle there own identity crisis better, pubity, interaction with other beings , theres alot of pressure on the young the worlds a high pressure environment and some beings handle it better than others with or without pot , the pot just makes all this more obvious and people become more animated and can retreat more and play out there thoughts and investigate themselves in a more reclusive state .

The fact that he has this flipside probably suggest that hes normally a fairly insecure person for what ever reason and pot is away of coming out of his shell and act out his insecurities , no one has a book of guidelines to follow on how to act maybe you can try talking to him more about it ? Pot can take away motivation i have struggled with this from time to time , im not exactly sure why it does this , wether its because you feel so fucked out or because its just so enjoyable and you just want to remain in that state , different pot has different affects , i find some poeple are affected by hydro similar to your brother , maybe you should get him some different pot , but with some its like ive gota have the chronic man yah . While hes on the pot your probably not going to be able to get through to him , mayb when hes not stoned . You can try taking him places get him out of hes environment , the outdoors can be very liberating even for the most chronic stoners , what about women ? Help him get more interested in women it might make him snap out of it ., take him out on the piss now and then to see some live music , more interaction with others might improve his ignorant behaviour and change his ways of thinking .

[WantDaChronic]

if he wants to quit he will, i highly doubt you'll be able to force him to quit as his friends are stoners and they'll want to keep him smoking buds, especially when he gets cranky as all hell from withdrawal symptoms :thumbdown

 

your best bet is finding him a chick who is totally straight and doesnt approve of his chronic usage...my father dubbed a womans ability to get men to do what they want "power of the pussy" and he'll be put in a situation where he has to choose between getting stoned with his friends or getting laid. now he could be a dick about things and get her to toke (highly doubtful) or her might dump her for trying to change him, but the majority of guys (especially guys who spend all day getting stoned with their friends) have a hard time getting laid and will try almost anything to not lose their new found pleasure and will quit as a result believe me, it works really well too, even more so when the girl is drop dead gorgeous, my ex is living proof

[sasquatch]

Thanks guys

 

he is 26.

 

You are very accurate with your insights.

 

A girlfriend is the key i and my family feel.

I know these things work themselves through to some end in the end, but it is just so frustrating to be involved with.

He is open and understands when not stoned, and completely bulletproof when wasted.

Ignorance and arrogance combined within a caccoon of stoned is nasty.

 

It's probably more about supporting him not to slide back into smoking which seems to happen with the slightest social, personal and work pressures. And to build the positive things and as you say vary his experiences and opportunities and to show him its okay to be okay. I think he feels wasted and stoned are an integral part of his personality and image, a bit like, hey man im a tragic depressive....cool.

Still it is very hard to penetrate when someone is going through the bad phase of these patterns and when they arent, its hard to interfere because you want to let them alone and get some clear time under their belt.

Also i believe its more to do with himself and his emotions and worldly understandings insecurities etc. and that pot is the window dressing which draws it all out.

So it's pretty clear that this emotional/intellectual side is what needs addressing and not the actual smoking itself. But its hard to pin him down to get into these things because you dont see him that much and when you do you dont want to be always harping you just want to hang and talk shit like a normal person.

 

As for doctors, from personal experience when things escalate above the norm, its all their personal opinion and they make a lot of things up. In other words they dont know shit, and id be lucky to take a panadol if one of them told me to.

Here try this pill, did that do anything? no? try this one then, what happened? try this one then, try this one then...

Theres a graph which shows something like this - If %10 of the population suffers a problem %90 of diagnosis are inaccurate

and if %90 of the population suffers a condition %10 of the diagnosis are inaccurate.

In other words the less common something is, the less chance they have of even diagnosing accurately, let alone treating it effectively.

And i wouldnt let them near me if it was the slightest bit to do with psychology, you are better off going to the pub and talking to a stranger, at least you get more than fifteen minutes of their time. And the people at the pub usually have more life experience because they havent been locked away half their life studying somewhat questionable western medical practices. A bit like questionable western farming methods, eroding the earth away to a skillet, and western big business practices, lying cheating stealing

ha ha rant rant

thanks again...

[naturalmystic]

Western medicine and pharmecuticals are desgned to make money , if spinach cured all ills thered be fuck all money in it , half the problems we get come from our westernised eating habits and pharmecuticals , both physical and pyschological . If youve ever got health issues a good sight to check out is www.curezone.com there a site designed to steer people away from taking pills etc and good info for general well being . Hope your brother comes out the other side ok , yeh pressure can compound the problems and cement them more , good luck .

[WantDaChronic]

pressure can compound the problems and cement them more

 

very true, if under pressure, he is likely to want a few cones to mellow out and to have a bitch about his situation with his mates :thumbdown

[Pickle]

Understand i am not saying you don't have his best interests at heart but nobody likes to be bitched or bickered with when they're stoned, try only discussing it with him when he's straight. If you and others keep on at him when he's stoned and trying to unwind he's not going to want to listen.

 

That having been said you sort of know what the problem is, if he has, "deep set patterns and insecuriteis" then he should be looking to some counciling and sort through the problems rather than bury them in ganja. I have been working through some depression problems that have arisen in the last year that i needed to deal with and although i havn't been smoking for a good long while i can tell smoking isn't going to help, i am far better off dealing with the issues rather than ignoring them. It's not the easiest thing to deal with, he's probably going to have a hard time just like i have been but it's worth it in the end to get on top of things.

 

If he decides to look for help tell him to understand it's not like putting a bandaid on the problem and it goes away, it needs work and time and a lot of discussion with his doctor to get a good result. It wont happen overnight but it will happen. If he sticks with it he will learn alot about himself and how he interacts with people.