It is a wonder as I get deeper into natural health, to observe people trying to find legal, safe (???), psychotropic drugs that they can repurpose for non-psychotropic purposes. I have never done drugs of any type in a recreational manner, let alone psychotropics such as those currently being studied for supposed use to help seniors overcome various mobility issues brought on by arthritis, or overcome mental issues brought on by Alzheimer’s. I have however, been on opioids once in my lifetime, as a prescription from the surgeon to deal with the pain post-surgery, and I was to be on them for up to 3 months. When I found out what was going on mentally and emotionally on those things, I weaned myself off them as fast as I safely could, which meant being on them a total of roughly 2 months. That experience included major foggy-headedness, inability to think straight at times, random emotional bouts, and in general was NOT a fun time! I actually didn’t realize just how foggy-headed I’d become until the weaning off was nearly done, and then I realized just how badly I’d been affected.
Active rumours have it that to a far lesser degree than opioids, marijuana, also known as weed, Cannabis, or pot, has pain-killing properties. But try as my daughter might, who loves to research claims to see if they are true, she has found less about actual pain relief and more about perceived pain relief among those who actively take weed for pain. (such as this study where reduced pain was more of tamping down behavioural responses than actually dealing with the pain itself) Among those studied for using weed for pain, are those who have suffered brain cancers and brain surgeries. Unfortunately, additional studies in this group show weed causing further brain damage while the placebo effect appears to numb the pain. We know a couple people who have had brain surgery due to brain cancer, and the thought of a medicated use for weed causing them further brain damage makes us shudder!
Before weed got legalized across Canada, many were quick to point out the dangers of the plant’s primary active constituent, THC. THC is found in most parts of the plant, the least of which is in the stems, which get pounded down into hemp for cordage and cloth-making. Many who grew up during the ’60’s like to claim that weed is harmless, non-addictive, they could quit whenever they wanted, no ill effects, etc. All I can say to them, is “good for you!”, because I’ve personally heard in-person stories where people did get addicted to it and labelled it a “gateway” drug, because if led them into deeper, harder drugs that gave them better and bigger highs. It was a trap for them. They did have ill effects, and they did get addicted. I’ve also been on the roads when a driver ahead of me was high, the smell of weed coming from their vehicle rather strongly, and not being able to navigate the road safely. I and several others reported them to the RCMP, leading to them eventually being caught and taken off the road for driving under the influence of a drug.
Studies done on youth taking weed, (visit the many links in this article for your own review) have noticed bothersome numbers in the supposed “laid back” influence affecting grades, ability to think critically, etc. THC on the juvenile brain has been shown in studies my daughter found, to be harmful. CTV News a few years ago, did an investigative piece to see if CBD Oil being sold in Canada, had less than the threshold 0.3% of THC in the bottle. They found that none of the bottles by the various companies they tested had that low a level, but that many had 3% or higher. I tried to dig up that report again and either not searching correctly, or it was pulled from the site.
Many in the proponent side of the argument, point to the human body have a cannabinoid system as justification for using marijuana on a recreational or medicinal level. It appears from the conversations I’ve had with these people, that they regularly either don’t know about, or brush off the fact that the safest way to feed the cannabinoid system is via Omega-3’s. This is because another name for the cannabinoid system is your lymphatic system!!! You read that right! Feed your body essential fatty acids in the form of Omega-3, and you will heal and benefit all the body systems that weed is deemed to benefit. It isn’t necessary to turn to a “mild” psychotropic to do the task when foods high in Omega-3’s will do the job just fine. What weed does that non-psychotropics don’t do, is give you a false sense of ease and well-being while taking a fix. Unfortunately, once the hit wears off, you’re back to facing your reality as it is and having to deal with it again.
This seems to be the biggest promotion for weed, that for a time, you can rest easy and not worry about the world. But this is taking responsibility for how you think and feel, and offloading it onto a plant-based drug rather than learning how to deal with the situation on your own. This concept bothered me enough to write about it over a completely different plant, when used to forcibly calm down hyperactive problem children. In effect, whether it’s an adult, or a child, whether it’s weed, or some other herb, using the herb as a regular forcible slow down, forcible behaviour modifier, or forcible calmer against life’s challenges, the consistent use of the herb in this manner is problematic, not teaching the child or adult how to handle the challenges they face in a productive, clear-headed, fully-aware manner.
EDIT August 24, 2024
Mercola recently wrote about this issue regarding a different class of psychotropics known as benzodiazepines. This article is commentary as well as further research on the topic as covered by a documentary film titled: Medicating Normal. He shares:
“Long-term use of benzodiazepines can lead to impaired thinking, confusion, disorientation and negative effects on fluid intelligence. Even teenagers are increasingly prescribed psychotropic medications for mental health issues”
“According to a study published in The Ochsner Journal, long-term effects of taking benzodiazepines include impaired thinking, confusion and disorientation. Increased tolerance and dependence are observed, too.
In another study published in 2021, long-term benzodiazepine use was observed to have a negative effect on fluid intelligence, which is the brain’s ability to interpret data and come up with solutions to puzzles or abstract problems”
“… drug marketers deliberately conflated “normal” with being comfortable. Therefore, if you’re feeling uncomfortable, you’re automatically “abnormal” and must take a pill.”
Benzodiazepines are often prescribed to treat anxiety and depression, but as shown above, often cause further anxiety along with more problems along the way. People want to feel calm, collected, and not having to fight with the harsher elements of human daily life. Mercola’s article mentions how Big Pharma played off on this tendency to make money off the general population. I include this class of drugs here to show that psychotropics in general are not something we want to be offloading our lives onto. It is far better to get to the root or cause of a given situation causing us grief or pain, and deal with that, than to pass off our difficulty in coping onto a harmful substance.
end edit and back to the discussion around cannabis.
My own mother would argue that you won’t get high off CBD Oil and that it was used to great effect to calm autistic children (which suggests autism to some degree being a form of inflammation on the brain due to how many terpenes in Cannabis are anti-inflammatory). See earlier comments about how THC affects the brain! Even hemp hearts have THC, low levels thankfully, but still there. I don’t buy snacks that contain hemp hearts as a result.
I’ve recently seen arguments by proponents of weed, who say that seniors taking weed and experiencing adverse effects would have suffered those effects without taking the drug. This is a weak argument. Some of those voices made it sound like adverse events from the “shots” were only experienced by seniors who would have suffered those effects without the “shot” too. I can only assume such people are not only pro-weed, but pro-vaxx as well, and don’t believe the VAERS database or anyone they have met who is far younger than a senior, suffering adverse effects from the “shot”. What I’ve been seeing since weed legalization, is a lot of justification. Every now and then my daughter hears that “studies say” this good thing or that good thing about THC, but they won’t share the links, forcing her to go looking for them. She’s found a whopping 2 out of an apparent claim of 100’s of such studies! I actually pondered the idea of NOT sharing any links to any studies whatsoever, to force those reading this to have to go hunting for themselves to see if what I said was true or not, but I finally relented and stayed true to how I write, and chose to include at least a couple links that you can check out for yourself, such as this study discussing not only the placebo effect, but also how the media began hyping any studies they thought would positively promote weed, because remember, the mainstream media is in the pockets of string pullers who were trying to lull the population before all the control measures finally reached us over the past 5 years.
Proponents of weed regularly do to former weed sufferers, what pro-vaxx people do to those who have suffered or know others who have suffered adverse events from “the shot”. They try to explain away the realities as being other than they are.
In my own home, everyone to some degree, is allergic to weed. Myself, I get downright ill to the point I am laid flat out on the couch with extreme nausea until it passes a few hours later after just 10 minutes of nonstop exposure. My adult kids get terrible headaches from it, as does their estranged dad. We can’t promote what causes such ill effects in our own home. But this leads to a professional insult anytime people discover that I teach natural health with a focus on wholefood as medicine that might grow outside your front door. One of the first things people think of, is weed!!! They want to know if I harvest it myself, if I teach how to use it, etc. NO, NO, NOOO!!!
There are many safer alternatives to weed that won’t mask your responses to life’s challenges while you are taking them. There are many safer alternatives to address pain, Alzheimer’s, post-surgery convalescence, and other conditions that don’t rely on low-level harmful placebo effects to do the job.
As a Christian, I have to ask why people want to use weed so badly that they excuse away, mask over, or refuse to admit the problems associated with it. As a Christian, I have to ask why people would rather offload their reactions to life onto a herb, rather than learn to deal with life with a clear head. As a Christian, I will readily tell you that marijuana is a plant, is a herb, was created by God, but that like many other plants out there, it too suffered the effects of sin when Adam and Eve fell. All of creation suffered the effects of sin, plants are not exempt. Weed isn’t the only plant to offer psychotropic behaviour of some kind. Opium, from the flowering poppy, is just as old in usage and just as problematic in usage if not worse, (see my post-surgery story above), and therefore a herb to be careful of. Poppy seed muffins don’t make most people high, but an athlete’s story from over 15 years ago now, shared how having eaten poppy seed muffins a few days prior to drug testing at a competition, knocked them out of the competition, because testers thought they found opium in her blood test! We stared at this article laughing, because it was the first time any of us had heard such a story from eating poppy seed muffins! Now contrast that to eating hemp hearts and you can see my hesitation. It’s become a subconscious thing now that I rarely eat poppy-seed muffins. I like their flavour, but I won’t subject myself even to hidden levels of unnoticed intoxication.
All these thoughts have come rushing back to the fore lately, as I see people actively seeking out other herbs that act as psychotropics that you can grow in your own yard. I’m pretty sure that Trudeau here in Canada, sought to legalize weed not merely for his own mother who actively smokes the stuff, but to fuzz out as much of the Canadian population as he could before the covid attack was launched, so that people would go with the flow to the “vaxx” clinics without a fuss, no challenge, just “taken ‘er easy” and playing the part of good little lemmings. It’s already come to light that regular use of tylenol can lower a person’s risk assessments so that they don’t perceive risky dangers as readily. Tylenol has found it’s way into well over 300 OTC drugs, which is shocking when you look at the lists. But between governments wanting easier control of their citizenry who will readily defend the government’s legalized method of control, and people trying to justify use of such drugs for off-label purposes that other herbs will handle far more safely, I seriously, honestly am left asking WHY??!!
I don’t have any good answers for this question. It’s true that people want free from the stresses piled on us over the past 5 years. It’s true people want relief from the health issues that the modern diet has thrust on us. It’s true that people want relief from the illnesses and degradation of bodily systems that the modern lifestyle has thrust on us. But using herbs to escape isn’t the only way God intended His provision to be used. It is how the enemy of our souls presents the herbs God created and because sin invaded the plant and animal world, there are herbs we shouldn’t use on this side of eternity.
But there ARE herbs we CAN and SHOULD use, and that is the focus I bring to the natural health discussion! Using a clear head and clear thoughts, we can look at more useful herbs that won’t alter our perception of the world or damage us via hidden, unnoticed intoxication.
My daughter recently found a chemical breakdown of Arrowleaf Balsamroot, and idly chose to look up each of the compounds listed, only to discover a number of them benefit the cannabinoid, er, lymphatic system. Prior to discovering this, we’d been using Arrowleaf Balsamroot dried leaf to aid in respiratory issues around the house, usually in tea infusions. It has been used to treat headaches and arthritis, coughs, skin conditions, respiratory issues, stings, boost the immune system, etc. I’ve now made more entries about this plant from this list of compounds that she found, in my nutritional/medicinal wholefood database. What is nice about Arrowleaf Balsamroot, is that for all the compounds apparently pointing to boosting the cannaboid system, internal use of the plant doesn’t cause any sort of intoxication, noticed or unnoticed, no altered view of the world, no damaging placebo effects. This is more than likely due to the fact that the terpenes that enhance these aspects of THC aren’t in Arrowleaf Balsamroot, and neither is THC itself.
Arrowleaf Balsamroot contains five of the 11 primary terpenes found in Cannabis: Beta Caryophillene, Myrcene, Humelene, Lymonene, and Ocimene. In addition, Arrowleaf Balsamroot contains 3 of the secondary terpenes found in Cannabis: Phellandrene, Sabinene, and Borneol.
Beta caryophillene is known as the only terpene that binds to CB2 receptors in the central nervous system. This particular terpene can also be found in basil, cloves, cinnamon, and black pepper among other foods.
It would appear, that the medicinal benefits of weed are not in the THC itself, but in the terpenes the plant contains, which are available in a wide range of other plants God created, without those plants having any psychotropic components to them. Arrowleaf Balsamroot now has renewed appreciation in our home, as does black pepper! It would also appear, that people would rather choose Cannabis, because it “makes them feel good”, than other plants that would honestly contribute to their well-being longer term without instigating behavioural changes to whatever pain they are dealing with. Weed is a herbal band-aid used for coping, rather than a way to actually heal in a beneficial manner.
God created us with a brain, with emotions, with the ability to think and process our world. Let’s not offload management of these abilities onto herbs, but instead, learn how to manage them in full, alert, cognition while addressing other health conditions in a wise manner.
