18 months

[Cthompson21]

Wow I cant believe it's been 18 months of weed PAWS. I'm still going through it. What happened to me was that I had PAWS from another substance, recovered over 2.5 years, was happy again and thought nothing could stop me. I tried weed once (!) and my life came crashing down. My story is a little different from most people on here, since I was never addicted, but I do have experience in that area. I dont know if it is truly weed PAWS at this point or if It reawakened my old paws, but I had symptoms I never had before, namely DP and DR which scared me. Also vivid dreams, which have not gone away. I had one low point where I had a very scary dream with deformed people in an office and I asked them, why are you in my head? And they basically said you cant get rid of us. Another where I was communicating with the dead...very strange and scary stuff. I have gotten a lot better from the beginning, where I had panic attacks nonstop. It was so awful I thought I would never get better but I did, and am still recovering, I am not thriving, just functional. Also still have bad short term memory. It's very frustrating. I hope to keep recovering and maybe within the next year have some semblance of a normal life i had before weed, but if not, I guess I'll survive. Thanks to all who have helped along the way. I couldnt have done it without you!

[Eroica]

Congrats on 18 months! You said you tried weed once and your life cane crashing down, but you were never addicted to it. Can you explain? How long did you smoke? And what substance were you addicted to? I was addicted to opiates for ten years and to weed for almost twenty. I also drank heavily for a few years.

[Cthompson21]

@Eroica thanks! if you see my threads you will see the whole story... it was not fun. Basically a bad combo of drugs and I had PAWS from it, starting Feb 2016 it was horrible, the hardest thing I've been through. I had horrible anxiety like never before. It got better by June 2018 and when I smoked later that summer, (and only once, and it was strong weed) it mustve reset everything with additional symptoms, it's hard to explain. It's like the anxiety now is different from the anxiety I had before. It comes at different times and is mainly social, but the experience of it feels somewhat different, esp with DP/DR. I know its weed related, or the weed damaged a different part of my brain, because even PAWS before didnt prepare me for what I'm going through. It seems like life has thrown me multiple curveballs and I've had no choice but to adapt.