Will I ever come back??

[Unregistered]

Ive been sober for 5 weeks now. I quit because I was becoming more and more stupid and unsocial. The highs were lasting longer and the paranoia was getting worst. I had expected to feel better and become more funny as I quit but instead I am anxious when im around people, even my family members. I'm anxious that I cant think of things to say to people, like im boring and they are just talking to me to be nice or that they are expecting me to be like my old self. I feel depressed lots of the time and sleep for extra long times so I can dream instead of being awake. And I also feel a weird sorta out-of-it-ness like im not as firmly connected to reality as I once was. Does somebody know what I am feeling, can somebody relate please. I never thought being normal would be something I wanted so badly, im just terrified i'll have to learn to live with brain damage and always look back at who I was.

[BFB]

Hi and welcome to the forum

I have experienced a similar thing my weed use really damaged me, it severely impaired my memory and cognitive abilities and put me in a cloud of haziness as if I were halfway between worlds, it felt a bit like as if I had half my brain removed. It’s now around 5 years later and while I have recovered to some extent, I am a lot better now than how I was, well partly that and maybe a little bit of getting used to it, but I am still not the person I used to be, not by a long shot, I still feel a bit cloudy, but that’s just my experience, everybody can have a different experience when it comes to the harm or damage they experience and the rate at which they recover, some people do fair much better than others, some people really can recover quite well. You don’t know to what extent you are going to recover yet so you just have to give it time. I wish I could be of more help I really do.

Take care, thanks for posting and please keep us posted.

All the best

[Unregistered]

Hi forum blogger
Thanks for your reply, can I ask how long did you smoke weed for and through what ages? And how did you learn to accept the brain damage, does is still bother you and can you function in social environments?

[BFB]

Hi again, I smoked heavily from around 21 to 27 give or take, well I suppose the way that it has left me is something that I have to accept whether I like it or not, I suppose that’s how it is for a lot of people in unpleasant situations, but like I say I am a fair bit better than I was, just still nothing like I used to be, yes it bothers me that I can’t function well in social situations, I am very socially phobic, but you learn to make the best of it, if I am not that much of a people person these days then that’s just how I am, I just try to be at peace with it, I found trying to take as Buddhist as possible a philosophy helps. Anyway try not to let my experience convince you that this is how your experience is going to be, I have read reports including on this forum of people who get far more back to normal than I have, every bodies experience can be very different. I watched one video about scans of people’s brains that weren’t working properly because of using marijuana heavily and they said that some are able to pick up function again much better than others, after they stop using. So like I say you really don’t know just how much you are going to recover, it could be more than you think, 5 weeks is still very early days.

Take care and please keep us posted.