Pychosis

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Cannabis was certainly only one factor in the development of my friend's paranoid schizophrenia. But it was a factor that could have been controlled had his parents known better. The fact that the parents were addicted was probably another factor. In the case of my friend with the long term addiction, cannibis was almost certainly the cause of his deterioration -his symptoms were the same as those long-established to be side-effects of long-term use. I believe there was something underlying his addiction though. As they should have told you in psych. class, you can't prove anything much with a case study example, much better to go for the randomised controlled trial to eliminate variables. However in practice case studies are done all the time where randomised controlled trials are not possible.

The thing about cannabis is that the active ingredient exists in much higher concentrations these days, and often other drugs are thrown in with it. The other thing about it is that, being a drug, it tends to interfere fairly unpredictably with how other drugs work, other drugs which have a more proven effect on the illness being treated. Obviously it can and is prescribed for medical use. That doesn't mean that these possible benefits should be used as an excuse for regular indulgence. Nor should the fact that it is 'natural' be used as an excuse - many 'natural' substances are very toxic indeed.

Our other case study here - your Aunt with a mental illness who smokes instead of taking medication. I imagine she experiences some short term gain from it but I can only be sceptical as to what it is doing to her in the long run. Why should she 'need three pills' if she doesn't smoke? Has this combination of pills actually worked for her in the past? And if so why did she stop taking them - did she decide she didn't need treatment because she doesn't think she's ill (that's another symptom - anosagnosia). Smoking of any sort will reduce the effectiveness of psychiatric medications. Cigarette (tobacco) smoking does certainly provide temporary relief of symptoms, but the effect is less as the addiction grows - you have to smoke more otherwise symptoms will come back en masse.

She has been managing her disorder with cannabis since she was 13, it seems like its done her more good than bad over that long period of time. And the three pills are what would otherwise control her symptoms but she decided the side effects of those three pills did not make it a good switch off. She finds the cannabis much more helpful and not nearly as hard on the body....but I don't know every reason for everything she does, I just know what I have observed. If she lived in Colorado she could probably get a Medical Marijuana license.

And with most drugs you have to eventually up the dosage if tolerance develops and if you stop taking the drug then of course the symptoms are going to come back.

It happened to me. I used to think that my tap water was poisonous and that my room mates were trying to kill me. You can be very paranoid when you're depressed, so you can have delusions which are psychotic.

It got to the point where I couldn't leave my apartment without thinking that everyone was giving me the evil eye and was out to get me. I really could have done with meds at that point.

Last edited by puddingmouse on 17 Oct 2012, 5:26 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Yes I've experienced psychosis and derealization caused by prescription pain killers (that I was taking appropriately, no abuse), I've also had psychotic reactions to valerian (herbal sleep aid) and fish oil . At this point I'm afraid to swallow any pill or herb out of a bottle!!

Drug induced psychosis is a known risk of smoking weed. I've seen it hypothesized that people on the spectrum are more at risk to drug induced psychosis...

I had psychosis, depression and mania at the same time. I was talking at a million miles a minute in a thought-disordered pattern. I thought I was an evil person. Later in hospital I thought I was in a concentration camp, and then I thought God had put me there to reform the entire hospital system and I attempted to do so by yelling at the nurses at three in the morning about how the signs in the hospital should have little pictures on them to be more disability friendly.

Well as long as she's happy I suppose. I certainly wouldn't begrudge someone who's had a lifetime of illness the right to have the occasional joint.

Maybe I'm prejudiced against pot because I really really hate the way it smells. But I still stand by everything I said.

Of course cannabinoids may cause or induce psychosis but it's only temporary. It's rare that it leads to genuine psychosis. The state that cannabis induces resembles psychosis is almost every way.

It depends how you define "psychosis". Doctors usually think that it's enough even if it's for a brief period, but I don't think those states should be considered as psychotic disorders.

So, yes, weed causes psychosis as a state.
And, no, weed doesn't cause psychosis as a disease.

The research may biased in this topic because the medical health care doesn't want to think that drugs are not dangerous. However, the studies haven't been able to show that cannabis would cause psychosis.

When I was a child, I had diagnoses of PDD, ADHD, and conduct disorder. As an adolescent, I had Asperger's syndrome, OCD, and Schizotypal PD. I now have diagnosis of Gender Identity Disorder and Panic Disorder.

I have experience with psychosis as an early adolescent and was hospitalized for it, though I do wonder how much OCD may have contributed to it. Also, before, when I was under a lot of stress, I remember being really paranoid and everything being a haze as I was walking around.

Although there is a link between pot and psychosis even a dose dependant one as the strength and quantity of pot smoked has gone up over the years cases of psychosis haven't. Which points to self medication and a none causal link. People who are genetically predisposed to getting psychosis like to smoke pot.

Also in countries where pot is legal pot psychosis doesn't seem to be a problem.

The latest research shows that bi-polar and schizophrenia are cased by lack of connectivity (myelin) in the brain and that they have genetic links and are not down to a chemical imbalance.

http://www.schizophrenia.com/sznews/arc ... 00663.html

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/245591.php

"At its core, schizophrenia is a disease of decreased cellular connectivity in the brain, precipitated by environmental stress during brain development, among those with genetic vulnerability."

I don't think it's a new concept that people with severe mental illnesses are thought to have had a genetic predisposition. The key part of your above quote is "precipitated by environmental stress during brain development". The brain keeps developing into the twenties. And who says pot smoking isn't severe environmental stress? Medication can be a trigger for symptoms of these diseases, so why not pot?

I'd like to hear more about studies from countries where pot is legal.

I'll see if I can dig up some studies from counties where pot is legal, the netherlands springs to mind.

The key part about what you said is "can be a trigger for symptoms of these diseases", drug induced psychosis http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Substance- ... _psychosis
goes not too long after the drug is stopped. unless the drug in question is an anti-psychotic in which case upregulation means that the psychosis only clears after the brain damage has gone. (also alcohol and opiates can causes psychosis as part of the withdrawal symptoms but not like anti-psychotics can).

There is no causal link between pot smoking and psychosis in later life, no matter what the quack would have you believe. if there was then the number of people having psychosis would have risen with pot use, which is hasn't.

http://web4health.info/en/answers/add-h ... chosis.htm

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/03/ ... 1320120301

"The effects were fairly small and seemed to be limited to social life and financial independence, rather than mental health symptoms. But the findings did support conventional wisdom that people who have ever suffered from psychosis should avoid smoking marijuana."

So to be in danger of psychosis from pot smoking you have to be susceptible to psychosis in the first place. Hmm. So how do researchers differentiate the pot use itself from the fact that people who are reaching for pot are likely to be in a more difficult place in their lives than people who aren't? That it's the stress that brings on the disease, not the self-medicating?

This has been a good discussion. I still maintain that it (pot) smells really bad. Really really bad. Things that smell that bad can't be good for you.

I had pseudohallucinations of 'ghost' people and animals, felt like death, really spooked me the first time, but I don't believe in ghosts so I just sat back and enjoyed the really freaky feeling of things of death coming towards me. This was a side effect of risperidone.

Risperidone stopped my psychosis but brought on nasty extrapyramidal symtpoms. I couldn't swallow properly and I kept drooling -I couldn't speak properly and I was uncoordinated, just like I'd had a stroke. This stopped when I changed to arapiprazole, but when I came off arapiprazole I started finger twiddling, which has persisted for the last four years. My nails are going black from it - neurologist says it is tardive dyskinesia. But I haven't had psychosis from anti-psychotics, though I've heard it's possible. I got some psychosis from zoloft though. mixed with manic and depressive symptoms. The ghosts came of their own accord with no drug influence whatsoever. I like to think that perhaps my ancestors stopped me from drowning in the sea. This was all before the bipolar was diagnosed.

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tardive dyskinesia can last long after antipsychotics are stopped, I have a friend we call wobbly waine because his tardive dyskinesia lasted so long. the brain damage the antipsychotics cause can lead to psychosis and things like pseudohallucinations (hallucinations where you know it's a hallucination so your not psychotic)