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America’s Invisible Pot Addicts
The Atlantic , ( getpocket.com -reprinted ) ^ | August 20, 2018 | Annie Lowrey

Posted on 11/25/2019 5:13:25 AM PST by urtax$@work

This is an excerpt for discussion purposes, see article for full story.

More and more Americans are reporting near-constant cannabis use, as legalization forges ahead.

The proliferation of retail boutiques in California did not really bother him, Evan told me, but the billboards did. Advertisements for delivery, advertisements promoting the substance for relaxation, for fun, for health. “Shop. It’s legal.” “Hello marijuana, goodbye hangover.” “It’s not a trigger,” he told me. “But it is in your face.”

When we spoke, he had been sober for a hard-fought seven weeks: seven weeks of sleepless nights, intermittent nausea, irritability, trouble focusing, and psychological turmoil.......

Public-health experts worry about the increasingly potent options available, and the striking number of constant users. “Cannabis is potentially a real public-health problem,” said Mark A. R. Kleiman, a professor of public policy at New York University. ......

For Keith Humphreys, a professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford University, the most compelling evidence of the deleterious effects comes from users themselves. “In large national surveys, about one in 10 people who smoke it say they have a lot of problems. They say things like, ‘I have trouble quitting. I think a lot about quitting and I can’t do it. I smoked more than I intended to. I neglect responsibilities.’ There are plenty of people who have problems with it, in terms of things like concentration, short-term memory, and motivation,” he said. “People will say, ‘Oh, that’s just you fuddy-duddy doctors.’ Actually, no. It’s millions of people who use the drug who say that it causes problems.”

Users or former users I spoke with described lost jobs, lost marriages, lost houses, lost money, lost time. Foreclosures and divorces. .....

(Excerpt) Read more at getpocket.com ...


TOPICS: Health/Medicine; Science; Society
KEYWORDS: cannabis; dopersrights; freedom; godsplant; marijuana; medicine; mrleroy; pot; smoking; whythecallitdope; whywoddiescantspell; wod
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To: z3n

Habits and addictions are not precisely the same thing.


41 posted on 11/25/2019 6:26:52 AM PST by chris37 (Where's Hunter?)
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To: chris37

You are absolutely correct - on all counts. As far as identifying what you love more than your ‘bad thing’, I think the answer is in your answer. I can’t think of anything more worthy of our love than Jesus himself.

His salvation isn’t a magic pill (even Paul apparently had ongoing struggles after his conversion), but we’re to strive to be increasingly obedient to His Word - and a right obedience is not ‘because we have to’ but ‘because we want to.’


42 posted on 11/25/2019 6:27:35 AM PST by Quality_Not_Quantity (A law means nothing if it isnÂ’t followed.)
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To: urtax$@work

You go to pot if you smoke pot.


43 posted on 11/25/2019 6:30:34 AM PST by minnesota_bound (homeless guy. He just has more money....)
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To: chris37

... That is what an addiction is

I understand the horrible physical consequences of addictions
Been there, done that, got the t-shirt

Pot is not “like that”
It does seem to degrade one’s self command
Pre-frontal cortex activity, so it’s not that they “can’t” quit
It is they can lose the will to “want to”

https://www.quora.com/What-are-the-effects-of-marijuana-on-the-prefrontal-cortex


44 posted on 11/25/2019 6:34:39 AM PST by HangnJudge (Kipling was right about Humanity)
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To: Lurker; NobleFree
Libtards. R U paying attention?

Drugs are bad. M'k?

45 posted on 11/25/2019 6:35:21 AM PST by LouAvul
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To: HighSierra5
Marijuana good! Tobacco......BAD! 1984 squared.

You sound like you are anti-"science", just like that Orwell guy. ;-)
46 posted on 11/25/2019 6:37:23 AM PST by cgbg (The Democratic Party is morphing into the Donner Party)
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To: chris37

“None of them are actually addicted to pot, because pot is not an addictive substance.”

More than a few have told me: “I’ve got to have it.”


47 posted on 11/25/2019 6:38:08 AM PST by odawg
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To: chris37

what’s that, a voice of reason in the crowd. Touché


48 posted on 11/25/2019 6:39:09 AM PST by Pilated (.)
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To: silverleaf

Hmmm, must investigate these.. I thought pot was only “medicinal” in NYC?


49 posted on 11/25/2019 6:43:30 AM PST by newnhdad (Our new motto: USA, it was fun while it lasted.)
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To: Migraine
It’s a dropout drug. It ruins your give-a-hooter.

People I have known who were heavy users are exactly like that. Unmotivated. I get enough of that feeling from medications I take. If I smoked pot I'd be a complete zombie.

50 posted on 11/25/2019 6:44:41 AM PST by Sans-Culotte (With every passing day, I am a little bit gladder that Romney lost in 2012.)
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To: LouAvul

“Drugs are bad. M’k?”

So are alcohol, tobacco, and fatty foods. You gonna ban them, too?

C.S. Lewis had you pegged before you were even born:

“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.”

L


51 posted on 11/25/2019 6:47:13 AM PST by Lurker (Peaceful coexistence with the Left is not possible. Stop pretending that it is.)
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To: urtax$@work

Debunking the myth that pot is not addictive. Current research is showing that it absolutely is.

In case you need ammo when you talk to your kids.

https://www.healthline.com/health-news/marijuana-addiction-rare-but-real-072014


52 posted on 11/25/2019 6:48:44 AM PST by jazminerose (Adorable Deplorable)
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To: urtax$@work

Invisible? Hell, they litter the streets of the cities where pot is legal.


53 posted on 11/25/2019 6:48:44 AM PST by CodeToad
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To: urtax$@work
I have a BIL, fairly functional upper middle class guy, who spokes pot all day, every day and has for as long as I have known him. (20 years).

It must affect people differently because I find it to be an extremely unpleasant feeling. Most drugs, I can, at least, understand the initial attraction but pot, horrible feeling, IMO.

54 posted on 11/25/2019 6:48:48 AM PST by riri
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To: urtax$@work
"Tobacco is anathema!
Ban it!
Give no quarter to offenders!"

~The Democrat Party~

"Marijuana is just wonderful!
Legalize it!
Everybody should give it a try!"

~The Democrat Party~

55 posted on 11/25/2019 6:49:05 AM PST by Savage Beast ( The curse of high intelligence:having to watch the unintelligent try everything you know won't work)
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To: HangnJudge

I can’t argue with that.

Pot smoking makes one content to do nothing.


56 posted on 11/25/2019 6:50:39 AM PST by chris37 (Where's Hunter?)
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To: chris37

“It has been my personal experience with this drug that such changes do occur with pot use, and that they revert within a few weeks of cessation. They aren’t permanent.”

There is a kind of sliding scale for how long lasting various effects are - how long and how heavy someone has has been using is a big factor.

After many years of heavy use, dopamine regulation in the brain will be less efficient - it won’t spring back as quickly or completely. The risk of depression and psychosis increases.

Additionally, long term heavy users show physical changes to the brain (shrinking the hippocampus, which is associated with short and long term memory), as well as chemical changes. Such physical changes have not been shown to reverse after stopping use.

Some cognitive abilities beyond memory, like decision making and planning, also seem to be permanently impaired after long term heavy use.

There are distinct short term cognitive impairments (like memory), that improve noticeably after stopping use, but they are not the only ones that can result from heavy/long term use.


57 posted on 11/25/2019 6:51:38 AM PST by BeauBo
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To: odawg

That’s because they’re ignorant.

They have not a clue as to what “I’ve got to have it” means.

And I pray that they never do.


58 posted on 11/25/2019 6:51:51 AM PST by chris37 (Where's Hunter?)
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To: chris37

Truer words were never posted.


59 posted on 11/25/2019 6:52:13 AM PST by Lagmeister ( false prophets shall rise, and shall show signs and wonders Mark 13:22)
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To: urtax$@work
Ironically I just came across this story:

New this Thanksgiving: Cannabis infused gravy

From the “What will they think of next?” comes a California company that plans to sell cannabis infused gravy for your holiday meal.

“This cheeky take on a normally mundane holiday staple features a groundbreaking, fast-acting technology that allows for faster THC absorption

https://fox61.com/2019/11/24/new-this-thanksgiving-cannabis-infused-gravy/

60 posted on 11/25/2019 6:52:39 AM PST by McGruff (Does no one is above the law apply to Democrats?)
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