Intrusive Thoughts From Weed PAWS

Intrusive thoughts can be unnerving and there isn't really anything you can do other than distraction techniques or mindfulness to snap out of them. I have had them, some quite disturbing ones, but I realised as long as I remain in control, so I don't act on them, they're just annoying. I'm not sure weed abstinence causes them as I haven't used for well over 10 years and still have them at times, probably when I'm a bit wound up or have things on my mind. Distraction is the key and understanding they're not real, like wild dreams but whilst you're awake.

MJM wrote:Hi everyone. I have been abstinent from weed for quite a few months but find that really bad thoughts have been entering my mind uncontrollably during this time. Usually it’s around horrible things happening to people I love or just something that will make me really upset in the moment. It’s never logical but the feelings they create are real. Does this happen to anyone else? Is this a symptom of weed paws?

Hi Mate

I can totally relate what you are going through. I’ve had these thoughts ever since I stopped smoking nearly 4 months ago. It’s the scariest thing I’ve ever experienced in my life. They have gradually been getting better over the last few months. Been exercising, meditating and seeing a therapist has helped me. I personally believe anxiety makes it worse. When I’m feeling okay and I get thoughts I find I can more or less move on and not let them bother me. But when the anxiety is there,it’s really hard not to focus on them ( why am I thinking this and that etc etc) there’s a few posts about people having intrusive thoughts after stopping weed. Below is a response I found which for me was helpful :

Hello.
Yes I had intrusive thoughts too. It is symptomatic of OCD. The intrusive thoughts tend to be of something that you are the total opposite of. It makes you question your morals and principles. it can be very powerful and frightening. It is caused by the brain being unable to put the brakes on anymore. Your brain always wants to reach homeostasis and so when external chemicals like alcohol or whatever sedates the brain often enough the brain says hey I’m being heavily sedated here. I need to speed up to get balanced again. And so this is what it does. But what it also does is downregulated the calming receptors that binds to your brains naturally sedating chemical. this is called gamma nucleic acid (GABA) because it thinks it no longer needs these as we have alcohol weed etc to do the job. So then the person is dependent or ‘addicted’. You then come to quit and you now have effectively a brain with a Ferrari engine with no brakes. This is what is causing these feelings of despair and OCD.

But good news! Like I said the brain always wants to reach homeostasis. It always seeks balance. And so gradually these anxiety surges will lessen and your receptors will upregulate again to bind to GABA to calm the whole excitory and inhibitory system back to normal. But it does this very very slowly. Good luck ‘

Just keep going and take it day by day.

Take care

Yes like clockwork every time i've stopped after about 2 months. Now at 4 months and they seem to be getting worse. It's a symptom of PAWS and like stated above should get better once neurotransmitter levels balance out. I get a lot of nostalgia and looking back, regrets, etc. Either that or cannabis just was medicine. Only one way to find out and that's to keep moving forward. It could also be related to our sleep cycles and rem rebound which i'm still strongly experiencing although the dreams aren't as intense anymore.