Former stoner?
Why'd you stop?
Not to derail the topic (if this topic could be..) but for those of you who used to partake/imbibe of the bud, what made you become former stoners?
Well the SO basically got scary out of control. I was all casual, once-in-a-while smoker girl until we moved in together, and I'm not sure if he presented himself as casual smoker guy, or if he was always chronic and I didn't realize it til it progressed with us, but I was a once, maybe twice a month type girl until we shacked up. Then it progressed to once a week, then slowly to once a day. While I was not into this, it's sort of like tasty food - if it's right in front of you, you tend to partake. I didn't like this, and one of my SO's friends around that time was killed by a drunk driver, so I convinced the SO to cut back, but even though we both did cut back to twice a month, he increased his doing of scary things like driving while high or getting into vehicles with the driver either high or drunk or both to the point where I was scared for his life every time the 15th and 30th rolled around. He has one friend who is basically a drunk and another who is a chronic stoner, so between these two buds, I was worried for my SO almost every day. Also, the two times a month expanded to the moment it became midnight til a 24 hour period of the next day at midnight, then it slipped into two or three day jags. I got to a point where I worried if he was late coming home that he was either in jail or dead. Then one day my mom had one of her standard psychological breakdowns, and I was tapped and very depressed from dealing with her and told my SO I needed him to hang with me to keep me from getting too sad or stressed about the whole family situation, but shortly thereafter, he announced he was going to meet a friend of a friend of a friend for a pick up from a guy that he only knew as "the dude" (which is only funny if you're not the person in the situation) at a mall, and because of the sketchineses of the situation, I insisted on going along, but not taking part in the actual pick up. I had given the SO the whole "you have no idea whether 'the dude' is a cop, or a hells angel with a hit on him, or anything, why are you taking these risks?" to no avail, and was too worn out from dealing with my mom's melt down and too worried about everything to stand up, and the SO was insisting that this would only take 15 minutes, then he'd be home again, hence why I went along with him. I told my SO to meet me in a bookstore in 15 minutes, and I waited over an hour and a half with no sign of him, thinking the worst. Just as I was considering leaving, the SO and his other bad-news stoner friend (
the couch guy, if you remember that story) showed up and they were all casual like: "do you wanna go get some lunch?" Rather than blow up at the SO infront of the friend (I'm not a public figther, and infact, til this post, no one even knew that all this stuff went down) I quietly simmered until the next day. Basically, I slept on it for a night, and realized that I had to draw a line in the sand.
I examined my life and decided that I was not willing to spend the rest of my life with someone worrying if they were dead, or arrested, or who knows. I realized that my SO and I were about to move into a financially binding arrangement as co-signers on a mortgage, and, to put it bluntly, that we were not just fuck*ng around anymore. So I told him that he had to stop with the dope, totally and completely, or it would have to be over between the two of us. It was the scariest and most horrible moment I've ever had in a relationship. I was so sad, I had so prepair myself for the possibility that he might leave me. He and I have basically had a wonderful, loving and caring relationship, up to that point there was never an issue that made us question our future together. He had always been so kind and considerate of me, except in this one aspect of ourlives, and we had entered a relationship as pot smoking hippies. But driving while intoxicated wasn't part of the deal, putting us both in danger by taking stupid risks was not part of the deal, and since it was all tied to one big elephant in the room, there was only one option. I'm not the type of girl who makes people change to suit her needs, and I was basically asking him to change his entire life style for me.
It was a horrible and stressful time, he tried to bargain me back to the twice a month thing, but even though I wanted to cave, I stood firm, secretly terrified inside. He became convinced that I must have been planning to dump him for months or even years, since his pot smoking had always been part of his package, but I tried my best to explain that it was more like an epiphany moment for me. I had to do a lot of reassuring that the pot was the only issue, and it was.
Over a week or so of tears on both sides and very little talking, we finally talked it over and came to an agreement that he would not partake in the weed anymore, and that I would stop too in support of him. We agreed that to ever partake again would be equivilent to cheating on each other. While the use of dope wasn't particularly addictive, the psychological effect was something we both missed a lot, especially him. re-learning how to relax and chill out without smoking weed has been especially hard, but since I no longer worry about him being killed, the one major stressor of my life is gone, and I'm very thankful for that. About a month ago, he thanked me for getting him to stop, and started going through all the horrible things that could have happened, and tells me that he's come to realize that he's dodged a bullet in that he didn't get in an accident, get arrested or kill anyone else during his stoner phase.
It's actually been nearly a year - I seem to remember this all going down a little after New Years eve. Things are very sane, and we're very happy as a couple. My SO hasn't really lost any friends - even his stoner buddies still hang out with him, but they all know he doesn't smoke dope anymore, and that the rule is that they are not to smoke dope around either of us. So, while I still feel stressed, especially when the SO hangs with couch guy or some of his other stoner friends, I'm coming to feel that we've come to a place of calm and trust.
When I look back, I think that I was lucky, my bottoming out was long before I even met him when all my friends were going E and acid and shrooms. It was the first and only time I crossed the line and took pshycoactive drugs - I had a very, very bad high on shrooms that made me fully and compleatly realize how serious drug use can be. I had severe hallucinations and became convinced that all my friends were tainted. I hid in a bathroom screaming as the walls around me melted, saw snakes all over the floor, and basically just wanted a way to turn the high off, but couldn't get away from it. I got home and locked myself in my bedroom, terrified my friendly family dog was going to kill me, repeatedly believing my stereo was turned on full blast even though it was turned off. From that point on I new my limit, knew I was falliable, and that I needed to take care of and respect myself and my boundaries. Maybe if I hadn't recognized that so many years ago I would have needed something far more tragic to wake me up, I'm deeply, deeply relieved that no one got hurt or killed at my or my SO's expence during our partying times.
I was talking to my bestfriend about our younger partying days. She's now an early-years teacher. Did you ever think your grade one teacher was a major stoner who partied all night? We can't believe we made it through, with all the stupid, stupid things we did. Most of it was so much fun, but we both feel a great deal of peace with leaving it in the past. It was fun, but it was "then."
That's a very long story, and one I've never talked about with anyone, so thanks for asking AD. It feels good to put it out there to the universe.
When it comes to all the stoners on the board, have absolutly nothing against people who do smoke pot. I myself deeply enjoy drinking myself stupid every so often. I do however, have a lot against people who drive while intoxicated, who take risks that could result in others being killed or hurt. That shit is not cool.
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Topic: Ask me no questions, I'll tell you no lies. (Read 25265 times)