Anxiety While Stoned : It's All In Your Head ...

I've had them quite a lot in the past few weeks. Nothing serious just thinking really bad situations happening and being paranoid. Most of the time it's around friends so it's all good.

 

I freaked out once, and I wanted to get to the hospital as fast as possible because I thought I would have an aneurysm or something (lol).

I told myself it was all in my head, took deep meditative breaths and realized that I would be fine in three hours after the high wears off.
I was glad AS HELL that I didn't venture to the hospital like I wanted to. That would have been a nightmare.

 

I've had this too...for me it depends on how I'm feelign before I blaze..if I'm already feeling anxious there's a better chance excessive blazing will make me feel anxious..but generally I find it helps releive anxiety when I don't overdo it

 

ive been tok'n for about 6 years now and about 2 years ago i had a bad trip. and its true, it all started with me counting my breaths and then some how i started to hyper-ventalate. Since this f'ed up experience 9 out of 10 I trip. I cant even enjoy a joint. The most i could smoke is about a snap every couple of hours. Its good for the wallet, but sucks aswell. I'm not a fan of booze, but i love my mJ. Unfortunatly, i dont have the full capacity to control my thoughts I guess. I makes me sad that i cant enjoy a blunt with my buddies and a good movie, or tok'm up and going on some bad ass adventure. for now i am going to take a break from my love. in a couple of months i'll toke again, and i'll post my experience.


....it's all in my head....

 

It annoys me that this post has been unmentioned. This is completely true.

To the OP..I really appreciate you going out of your way to share your wisdom, your experiences etc..But it REALLY is not as easy as you make it out to be. Just as the post above me has stated, marijuana is a powerful psychoactive...it is the nature of THC to cause feelings of paranoia, anxiety and deep introspection..of which can cause anxiety. If it makes you feel better..I will say it TRIGGERS it..as opposed to causing it.

The point is, I have experienced horrible anxiety from smoking pot as more of the rule than the exception. And I have tried to control my mind as much as I possibly can..it simply eases it for a little bit, for a short period..and then back into negative introspective hell. Or if I'm with other people, good friends or not, I become extremely socially anxious and examine them as I would examine myself if I were alone. I feel as though I'm suddenly seeing these people for who they really are and it never seems to be in positive light.

I'm like this to a much, much lesser extent when I'm 100% sober. I'm highly introspective sober...I'm a very deep thinker..and these thoughts are always going on to some degree in my head..unless I'm completely consumed by something else. I'm naturally shy and I naturally think and contemplate what others think of me. This is who I am..no matter how much I've tried to change it.

No..I don't have anxiety attacks sober though..sure I may think a lot about tons of things and get uncomfortable at times with my thoughts..but I rarely if ever have an anxiety attack sober. However, when I smoke pot..no matter the setting, no matter what I've eaten that day, no matter my current mental state, no matter who I'm around or if I'm alone, how much I smoke etc etc..I still experience paranoia to some degree and overly analytical thoughts about myself and others.

When you experience it the way I do..you come back and post about how easy it is to just say..oh it's in my mind..no big deal.

 

Anyone who has done a powerful psychedelic, dissociative, or deliriant knows how powerful your mind can be.

 

I hope I can always remember my first experience as vividly as I do now, its easy to remember since it was recent.

But when the high really did creep up on me, and while I was with trusted friends and at a safe place, I started thinking about alot of bad things, my heart started to rush, and as soon as they mentioned they wanted to go bring food, I was a bit nervous and paranoid about getting pulled over. Although Im nervous about that normally while sober. lol

4 things helped in my situation.

1. Telling myself I was fine, becuase I was. lol
2. Thinking about getting my favorite food.
3. Being with my friends.
4. And really just enjoying everything.

 

I haven't smoked nearly as much as most people here, but I bet smoking when you have nothing to do also has an effect. You just start thinking about stuff. Last time I smoked was with a friend, and we were playing some CoD: WaW. I was busy and got through half the game on Hard. At first, when it hit me, it hit me pretty heavy.. I just said "wooooooooaaaahhhh" to myself, my body felt really heavy and it was weird. Then I noticed that we didn't say a thing to each other for like 15 minutes. Then I concluded out loud: "oh, I'm high". My mind was busy.

On previous occasions when I got a little freaked out when high I tried to go to sleep but if I remained still, I fould feel my body buzzing which I sensed too strongly. Gah. Not comfortable.

But except for my first high, all of the spooky parts were the first 15-30 minutes. =D

 

My experience was similiar lol.

They asked me, "Are you high?"

I just smiled and shook my head.

 

People mainly get freaked out because of the chances you might get caught since it's illegal, pretty much the only time I freak out because I think i'm going to get caught

 

I love you, im high right now and my anxiety is gone. Bless you.

 

I was having some really bad issues with paranoia/anxiety etc - ie. the "its all in your head" problems. It was getting to the stage where every time i got a smoke i would convince myself i could hear my parents arguing about me etc, it would totally kill my night and because i was alone i'd lose my grounding with reality? After googling "hearing voices while stoned" and then looking up every piece of information i could on dealing with stoned anxiety, i'm hoping that things will return to normal again.

 

It's like having something in your room that makes a very distinct noise. I got a mini fridge in my room this year, and when i first got it i couldnt sleep cuz the noise was the only one i wasnt use to. But after a day or two, it becomes background noise. Almost like you forget the noise is there. But i heard it again about a week ago, and once you tell yourself you hearing it, you remember the noise is there and its the only thing you can focus on when you hear it. Same thing when your high, and you convince yourself something is happening that really isnt. Everytime you get high now you remember that feeling that wasnt really there. And it's the only thing you can focus on now. You have to forget about it, and make it a background noise again. Once you realize (probly after a few highs) that it really was in your head. You'll forget about it, and it wont ever effect you again.

 

Your so right, i know what mini fridges sound like (that humm). I was playing my ps3 alone for the first time while baked and cause i had muted the sound (to put in my surround sound headphones) i heard the humming, it morphed into the arguing! Took me a good ten minutes to figure it out when i went over to the ps3 to switch the game. I'm trying to make sure i do everything sober during this week that i will do when high so that not as many things take my by surprise? Also i've bookmarked so many anti-anxiety threads lol

 

... Of course anxiety is all in your head... that's what anxiety IS. haha.

I mean it's always good to try and just chill if you start to feel freaked out but if you have some mental issues to begin with, trying to relax won't help much.

 

Thanks for this post man. Usually when I smoke I don't trip has hard as I did yesterday. So I looked up the symptoms and I thought I was gonna get somthing called depersonalization disorder. Since it was the first time of me being that high

 

This is exactly right and equally true with mushrooms. Weed a lot of times makes people nervous because of the stigma attatched to weed and it's legality. If it were 100% legal and accepted, no one would feel anything but stoned. No nerves. A lot of times I get "nervous" around older, judgemental fuckers. The kind of people who would tell me I need a haircut are the people that make me nervous. Only because I feel like they assume I'm a stoner (which is true, but totally unfair and prejudice)

 

hey i saw this thread on google and just had to make an account so hi, im Jo, (girl)
Ive been smoking weed every other day for about 4 or 5 years now. So I should be used to it now right?
Basically everytime i meet new people, or people that ive known for time I get all shaky and nervous, and i cannot stop it, i say its all in my head but it still dont work, i take deep breaths. I dont even have the courage to sit up and talk to people. This only started happening about 2 years ago but i cant sit up straight, or get comfy and its really embarrassing cos im moving my self every other second and im scared im making other people feel uncomfortable.
This is even when i have about 5 tokes on a spliff when im around them.
Oh and quitting weed isn't a option for me.

can someone just tell me if they've ever had this before? and how i could solve it? thanks.

 

Hey Jo (girl) ,

My name is Bryan Basamanowicz and I've been running a service in vancouver, British Columbia for 6 months now called Marijuana Paranoia Management Coaching. I have 10 clients currently who are medicinal or recreational marijuana users who struggle with various persistent anxieties associated with their highs. I've interviewed well over a thousand people who've experienced these challenges with pot.

The subject of MIPA (Marijuana Induced Paranoia/Anxiety) is much more vast than we tend to give it credit it for. I could write a book on it-- In fact, I did. Check it out here

For now though, I just want to share two things with you Jo,

1) You're not alone in experiencing social anxiety. Half of my clients tend to be more or less comfortable when smoking in solitude, but have a dramatically different experience in social settings. This is something that can be improved over time, but not overnight, and not with any quick-fix burst of "wisdom" or phraseology that you'd find in a casual, social online forum. If you're interested in improving this and becoming a better person for it, it will require focused and dedicated work.

2) Developing MIPA even after smoking for several years is also very common. The vast majority of the people I meet tend to be in their early to late twenties and have used cannabis comfortably for several years. In most all cases, cannabis was used regularly before the age of 19, which heightens the risk of developing these types of anxieties.
There's a chapter in my book Handbook for the High-Functioning Paranoiac that offers a helpful "narrative psychological" view of how neural development patterns, from adolescence to young adulthood, can affect the way one's brain responds to cannabis.

As of now, I'm only taking clients in the metro Vancouver area, but I may be interested in working with you, Jo, free of charge through my youtube channel. I'm designing a type of Q&A video forum that will allow me to do my best helping those like yourself who would like advice and guidance on how to find the root causes of their own MIPA and ultimately overcome it.

Best,

Bryan