Question: I am trying to beat a very long and hard marijuana habit. I have been a heavy smoker since grade 10 and I have been a daily smoker since my first year at college. I am now about to graduate and I need to get my life together. I am trying to quit but I am so used to smoking before bed that I can’t fall asleep if I don’t have at least a couple of tokes. I have not smoked for 3 days now and I probably haven’t slept more than a couple of hours combined since then. I am so tired but I can’t sleep. It is like torture. How long is it going to take before I can sleep without needing to smoke first…?

Scott Graham Says...:

It may feel like torture. Remember that there is a physical component and an emotional component to addiction.  You have used marijuana for many years to help you manage your life -- from sleep to frustration.  Now you have to develop those skills.

People develop these skills over time with smaller things as they develop and that equips them to deal with bigger things.

Addiction by-passes this.

Think of it like this:  your and your friends have joined a gym; they started working out with 5 pounds and have, over time progressed to 50, 75 or  more; while you have also been present at the gym; and it looked like you were working out, someone else (named marijuana) was doing the weights for you; now they (marijuana) is gone and you are faced with 50, 75 or more to lift when you really can only lift 5; you need a personal trainer (in other words, a counselor or coach) to help you progress faster.

Question: synthetic marijuana - aka/herbal incense: Hi5 ?? I would like to know if the above mentioned is harmful to the body and how addictive it is. My friend claims he no longer takes it but I find those little packages tucked away in secret corners in his garage. I'm told by a distributor of herbal incense that it can really 'f' someone's life. First it effects the brain in the 1st yr & guarantees cancer in 10 yrs. My friend gets very irritable, fights over nothing, seems to misunderstand & twist around anything I say to something negative yet other times he is in his own world like in a trance... He is also loosing weight, bad tossing & turning at night. Once he got so sick throwing up and almost passed out & that's when he confessed to me that he was using this herbal incense called Hi5.. please inform me how to help and how bad is it?? thank you...

Scott Graham Says...:

Vega,

Looking over your question, it seems you already know your answer.  You outlined some significant consequences from using Hi5:  "My friend gets very irritable, fights over nothing, seems to
misunderstand & twist around anything I say to something negative
yet other times he is in his own world like in a trance... He is also
loosing weight, bad tossing & turning at night."

How to help?  The first step is to connect your friend to a counselor.

If your friend came up to you and thought his roof had suffered hurricane damage, you wouldn't hop up there and poke around yourself (other than a cursory look or two).  And you certainly wouldn't replace the roof to help him out.  You would hire a professional with the experience and the tools to get the job done right.

That's the same thing you need to do with his Hi5 use.  Connect him with a counselor who has the experience and the tools to get the job done right.

Question: Are e cigarettes really a safe alternative to regular cigarettes? I have tried so many times to quit smoking and I have never been able to.

Scott Graham Says...:

What you are referring to could be called "harm reduction."

We see this from public health advocates who talk in terms of methadone maintenance programs (as just one example) and sight a success of reducing the consequences of heroin use (both personal and societal).  Heroin addicts take methadone as part of their treatment to abstain from heroin.

Another reflection (albeit a somewhat more personal reflection) of this topic relates to diet-related foods.  For example, many people concerned about their weight drink diet sodas (although this is correlated actually with weight gain, see:  http://www.webmd.com/diet/news/20050613/drink-more-diet-soda-gain-more-weight).

My thoughts are these: 

1. Should you stop smoking all together?  Yes, the personal and societal consequences are immense. 
   
2. If you can't stop smoking right now, is an e-cigarette a better option? Absolutely. 
   
3. Is it easy to go back to smoking if you are smoking an e-cigarette?  Probably. 
   
4. Could you, in working with a professional, work to shift to an e-cigarette and then shift your habit behaviors so that you start to disassociate smoking with your triggers?  Definitely.
   

Question: I am interested to know what someone who works as a counselor with drug and alcohol addicted people feels about the war on drugs. In my opinion it’s a tragedy and legalization or decriminalization makes a lot more sense, and the criminalization of a medical issue just creates a lot of unnecessary pain and violence in our society. But then again I don’t have a personal experience with addiction and so maybe I don’t understand the whole story. What do you think? Is decriminalization a sensible idea, or is the drug war a war that needs to be won?

Scott Graham Says...:

I consider the "war on drugs" to be more of a political issue.  And from what I see in the addictions counseling field, that "war" is not winning.  And I don't know if it can.

I think the real "war" is about the choices we make and helping people to make better choices whether that is around alcohol use (legal in the use), cigarette smoking (legal in the US and kills more than all other drugs combined), the overindulgence of chili-cheese-fries and other "addictive" behaviors.