Commercialization Of Legal Pot Has Led To Epidemic For Colorado Kids

[benjipwns]

http://denver.cbslocal.com/2015/09/20/smart-colorado-hearing-from-hundreds-hundreds-of-parents-about-pot-use/

The parents CBS4’s Melissa Garcia spoke with say they’re concerned about their children seeing messages promoting pot all over town. Activists say it’s the way pot is marketed and sold that has started to create some serious problems.

“I never dreamed in a million years that this would happen to my son,” said parent Kendal, who didn’t want to use his last name.

Kendal came home one evening to find his 13-year-old son unconscious from what he says was a marijuana overdose.

He was gray. His heart wasn’t beating and he wasn’t breathing,” he said.

Kendal used CPR to resuscitate him and later talked to his son’s high school peer and supplier.

“I had heard from kids that there was 60 percent of this particular high school using drugs, and she shook her head and said, ‘That’s way low,'” Kendal said.

“Kendal’s story breaks my heart, but I’ve got to tell you we have heard that from hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of parents throughout the state,” said Diane Carlson, Smart Colorado co-founder.

Carlson says Colorado’s child and teen use of marijuana has become an epidemic.

“Kids have no idea how dangerous or harmful Colorado’s pot is,” she said.

According to a report released this month by the Rocky Mountain High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, Colorado saw a 29 percent increase in emergency room visits, and a 38 percent increase in hospitalizations during retail marijuana’s first year.

The study states that over 11 percent of Colorado’s 12 to 17 year-olds use pot — 56 percent higher than the national average. It also cites a 40 percent increase in drug-related suspensions and expulsions — the vast majority from marijuana.

Carlson says the culprit is its commercialization.

“Marijuana might have been legalized in our state; it did not have to mean massive commercialization and promotion of marijuana use,” she said.

[Am_I_Anonymous]

Weed overdose? Fuck off attention seeking shitheads.

I'd rather see my kids high any goddamn day then see them drunk. Real talk.

But in this society everyone gets to bitch. So I guess I'll just reply "cool story bro"

[Joe Molotov]

[Am_I_Anonymous]

 

[benjipwns]

spoiler (click to show/hide)

best part, her scare quotes for "Marijuana Policy Project"

[close]

[Brehvolution]

Teach your kids to say no, brehs.

[Beezy]

Kendal came home one evening to find his 13-year-old son unconscious from what he says was a marijuana overdose.

He was gray. His heart wasn’t beating and he wasn’t breathing,” he said.

Kendal used CPR to resuscitate him and later talked to his son’s high school peer and supplier.

[Joe Molotov]

Kendal came home one evening to find his 13-year-old son unconscious from what he says was a marijuana overdose.

He was gray. His heart wasn’t beating and he wasn’t breathing,” he said.

Kendal used CPR to resuscitate him and later talked to his son’s high school peer and supplier.

[CatsCatsCats]

Real talk though, pot ain't for kids. Parent better.

[benjipwns]

Parent better.

I read this as "peanut butter."

Thankfully, I only take DEA-controlled prescription drugs, not that dangerous marijuana.

[Kara]

Taking prescription medication that you have to report missing to the police if you lose it.

[CatsCatsCats]

Oh and you totally can overdose on marijuana, it won't kill you but it can be pretty not fun lol

[Am_I_Anonymous]

Oh and you totally can overdose on marijuana, it won't kill you but it can be pretty not fun lol

 


http://www.omgfacts.com/health/8183/You-would-have-to-consume-1-500-pounds-of-marijuana-in-15-minutes-to-overdose-ab964-0

Idiot.

[brawndolicious]

My only concern is that a kid who is getting stoned everyday is much more likely to pick up tobacco and probably won't have much unstoned time to study.

Most teens are definitely stupid enough to develop bad habits.

[T234]

He ain't talking overdose like "get out the Narcan or else this man is dead" overdose, AIA. He talking about "what happens when you put a half-gram of CO2 oil in three grilled cheese sandwiches?" "Overdose".

You can overdo it, but not anywhere near as easily as coke or heroin in my personal experience.

[Am_I_Anonymous]

He ain't talking overdose like "get out the Narcan or else this man is dead" overdose, AIA. He talking about "what happens when you put a half-gram of CO2 oil in three grilled cheese sandwiches?" "Overdose".

You can overdo it, but not anywhere near as easily as coke or heroin in my personal experience.

Edibles? Probably

Smoking it like this kid? No chance in fucking hell and I dont care if he was hitting thunderfuck through a motorized garden hose.

[CatsCatsCats]

Yeah, maybe you should brush up on reading comprehension before calling anyone an idiot. Yes, it is practically impossible to consume a lethal amount of marijuana -- but you can have a pretty bad night with extracts

[studyguy]

Yes, it is practically impossible to consume a lethal amount of marijuana -- but you can have a pretty bad night with extracts

Not with that kind of attitude 

spoiler (click to show/hide)

On the real though, your kids are smoking, that says more about you as a parent than the drug itself.

[close]

[CatsCatsCats]

Just thinking about the time I swallowed a frozen chunk of budder because I was too lazy to bake anything still makes me gag.

[studyguy]

Just thinking about the time I swallowed a frozen chunk of budder because I was too lazy to bake anything still makes me gag.

Eat butter in any form straight up brehs.   
That's a low point even if it was an edible lol

Also I fucked with dabs but once. I don't think I could ever do that shit regularly.

[CatsCatsCats]

No part of it was a good idea, I just convinced myself that since it was frozen it was like swallowing a big pill

[Am_I_Anonymous]

Dabs aint for this nicca. You all cacs got that market cornered

[T234]

He ain't talking overdose like "get out the Narcan or else this man is dead" overdose, AIA. He talking about "what happens when you put a half-gram of CO2 oil in three grilled cheese sandwiches?" "Overdose".

You can overdo it, but not anywhere near as easily as coke or heroin in my personal experience.

Edibles? Probably

Smoking it like this kid? No chance in fucking hell and I dont care if he was hitting thunderfuck through a motorized garden hose.

I still think it's crazy that you can get everybody in this thread high as fuck off this one gram of Juicy Fruit Solvent-Free Honey sitting in front of me. Shit tastes like just like the gum, with a strong banana aftertaste.

You probably ain't had no good dabs, being from Ohio. Good dabs are fucking amazing.

[Brehvolution]

I've turned down every offer to have some dab. I don't need to get that high.

[Trent Dole]

Weed overdose? Fuck off attention seeking shitheads.

I'd rather see my kids high any goddamn day then see them drunk. Real talk.

But in this society everyone gets to bitch. So I guess I'll just reply "cool story bro"

I don't even have any kids but this. If somebody gets drunk they might get in a fight. If somebody gets high they might ...get a pizza.

[studyguy]

Simply not down with dabs or that big on edibles.
As strong as some strains get, I prefer not being completed fucked moments after I hit something. First dab I took was this fattest looking marble and within the first few minutes I was incoherent and kept getting worse. My friend just straight up puked after his first dab, took a hit sat back for a few minutes, put his head down and just let go 

[CatsCatsCats]

Co-sign all that. I'm a flower only guy these days. Craziest I get is the kief from my grinder

[Brehvolution]

kief

[Joe Molotov]

Hitting up Kief on Grindr

[mormapope]

Simply not down with dabs or that big on edibles.
As strong as some strains get, I prefer not being completed fucked moments after I hit something. First dab I took was this fattest looking marble and within the first few minutes I was incoherent and kept getting worse. My friend just straight up puked after his first dab, took a hit sat back for a few minutes, put his head down and just let go 

Reminds me of the year or so I smoked spice. Some people could handle it, while it would completely fuck up other people.

 

[CatsCatsCats]

Oh god, spice, k2... We try not to think about that

[Purrp Skirrp]

Shit is garbage. I never had issues with it, but it can definitely bring out psychosis in people prone to that.

Met a chick that smoked K2 and thought she became a mannequin, so instead of striking a pose she tried to kill herself

[chronovore]

Oh and you totally can overdose on marijuana, it won't kill you but it can be pretty not fun lol

But of course the whole point is the big difference between "not fun" and "dead," combined with the loaded term "overdose."

[Purrp Skirrp]

I'm doing an outpatient program for my mental health and have a few classes focusing on drugs & addiction.

Weed always seemed pretty innocuous, but my therapist wants me to quit :'(

Main reasons being that I have depression & anxiety, plus the fact that I started smoking before I was 21.

Gonna give it up bruhs, at least for a while since they say it takes 6-12 months being drug free to get an accurate diagnosis.

Good thing there's like zero withdrawal with MJ.

I'll miss the devil's pubes RIP

[chronovore]

If you're already diagnosed with mental health problems, self-medicating is almost always a bad idea. What did your therapist say about alcohol?

[Purrp Skirrp]

Her and I don't really discuss alcohol too much since I don't drink often, but she'd say that it's worse than pot.

Usually I have a beer or two and that's it since drinking heavily, as in college, really messes with me. Worsens depression, no surprise there.

My sister got a DUI this past year and it's been rough dealing with her alcoholism. The fact that it runs in my family is further motivation to avoid it.

[Kara]

GL Swish. Shit's tough, but you gotta keep on trucking.

[studyguy]

Her and I don't really discuss alcohol too much since I don't drink often, but she'd say that it's worse than pot.

Usually I have a beer or two and that's it since drinking heavily, as in college, really messes with me. Worsens depression, no surprise there.

My sister got a DUI this past year and it's been rough dealing with her alcoholism. The fact that it runs in my family is further motivation to avoid it.

One of my cousins went from choir singer (literally my uncle owns his own small church) to raging alcoholic in less than a year when he refused to stay medicated, dude dipped out sometime around December in 2012 and we didn't see him till like a year later. Some scary shit to contend with I can't even imagine.

[Purrp Skirrp]

GL Swish. Shit's tough, but you gotta keep on trucking.

Thanks bruh. Main goal right now is just steady improving my health and then going back to school to finish my degree.

One of my cousins went from choir singer (literally my uncle owns his own small church) to raging alcoholic in less than a year when he refused to stay medicated, dude dipped out sometime around December in 2012 and we didn't see him till like a year later. Some scary shit to contend with I can't even imagine.

Damn, hopefully he's doing better. It's got to be difficult abstaining with how accepted alcohol is in our society. My GF's grandfather for a while couldn't step foot in restaurants that serve alcohol.

He doesn't drink anymore, but now he's doped up on prescription meds

[CatsCatsCats]

MJ withdrawal can be a bit emotionally trying in my experience, unfortunately. Wish you the best, my man

[Kara]

Really depends on the crowd wrt being a teetotaler. In professional settings no one gaf when I didn't drink
 (Now I pad that bill with some classy drink orders.)

[Purrp Skirrp]

MJ withdrawal can be a bit emotionally trying in my experience, unfortunately. Wish you the best, my man

Thanks dude. I think there will be some light anhedonia where everything seems boring, but I know it'll pass.

[chronovore]

Her and I don't really discuss alcohol too much since I don't drink often, but she'd say that it's worse than pot.

Usually I have a beer or two and that's it since drinking heavily, as in college, really messes with me. Worsens depression, no surprise there.

My sister got a DUI this past year and it's been rough dealing with her alcoholism. The fact that it runs in my family is further motivation to avoid it.

I might come off as a dick here, but if you've got a car mechanic, and you know the car mechanic would tell you to fix your brakes if he knew they were shot, just avoiding mention of the brakes won't make the car any safer.

[Fifstar]

Since I have anxiety disorder I have to really limit how baked I get. Normally 2-3 hits of average-strength weed is enough for me. If I ever tried to dab, I'd probably spend the next 4-6 hours convinced I was having a heart attack.

Same for me. The first time I hit a bowl I thought I couldn't stop thinking how I would either die from a heart attack or from a arterial thrombosis. Absolutly terrible experience, among the worst in my life.

Alcohol in absolute terms is much worse than pot, seeing how much shit happens because people are drunk and can't control themselves. On an individual level things are different though, some people just don't tolerate THC nearly as well as the internet and "stoner culture" make you believe.

[Kara]

Her and I don't really discuss alcohol too much since I don't drink often, but she'd say that it's worse than pot.

Usually I have a beer or two and that's it since drinking heavily, as in college, really messes with me. Worsens depression, no surprise there.

My sister got a DUI this past year and it's been rough dealing with her alcoholism. The fact that it runs in my family is further motivation to avoid it.

I might come off as a dick here, but if you've got a car mechanic, and you know the car mechanic would tell you to fix your brakes if he knew they were shot, just avoiding mention of the brakes won't make the car any safer.

You're not coming off as a dick, just someone without much time in the system.

To answer your question, your mechanic won't ride you about your brakes every subsequent time you bring your car in and they won't care about the brakes on your blood relatives' cars either. They also won't tell you that they can't work on your car anymore if you keep coming in because they have a duty of care.

[chronovore]

Your vocabulary always impresses, and then some days I see it is rife with additional meaning which usually makes me fret.

[Purrp Skirrp]

Her and I don't really discuss alcohol too much since I don't drink often, but she'd say that it's worse than pot.

Usually I have a beer or two and that's it since drinking heavily, as in college, really messes with me. Worsens depression, no surprise there.

My sister got a DUI this past year and it's been rough dealing with her alcoholism. The fact that it runs in my family is further motivation to avoid it.

I might come off as a dick here, but if you've got a car mechanic, and you know the car mechanic would tell you to fix your brakes if he knew they were shot, just avoiding mention of the brakes won't make the car any safer.

No dicks detected. Alcohol is covered a lot in groups, but when it's just me and my therapist we focus on cannabis since I rarely drink.

[benjipwns]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonkblog/wp/2015/09/24/taxpayers-are-paying-60-for-every-pot-plant-the-dea-destroys-in-oregon/

The Drug Enforcement Administration spent $960,000 to destroy marijuana plants in that state in 2014 as part of its "Cannabis Eradication Program," according to a recent report by NBC affiliate KGW in Portland, Ore.

That year, the DEA succeeded in removing 16,067 pot plants from Oregon, which at first blush sounds like a lot of weed. But when you do the math, that works out to a cost to taxpayers of $60 per uprooted plant. That is a lot when you consider that nationally, it costs the DEA *ahem* $4.20 to eliminate a single marijuana plant under this program.

The DEA has budgeted $760,000 in marijuana eradication funds for Oregon this year, according to KGW. Considering that marijuana is now legal in that state, many Oregonians — including some members of Congress — are questioning whether that's a sensible endeavor. They are trying to defund the federal anti-pot program that costs about $18 million a year overall.

When will this war on our children end? We'll have drug epidemics of 10-15% of teenagers using pot everywhere at this rate.

[Kara]

Your vocabulary always impresses, and then some days I see it is rife with additional meaning which usually makes me fret.

When I talk about things that make me uncomfortable I retreat into metaphor that's ambiguous to the point of becoming meaningless or making so many precise word choices that it becomes impossible to understand my actual meaning without a dictionary, and even then...

spoiler (click to show/hide)

This week in therapy, my therapist said that they'd never worked with someone who so thoroughly disengaged with their feelings when talking about their feelings.

[close]

To more clearly answer your question, a mechanic repairs things objectively. It may take some testing, but eventually the cause of an issue will be determined and resolved.

While a science, mental health is far more subjective and relies (too much imo) on the subject for diagnosis. To borrow your metaphor for a moment, picture the smallest automotive mind you know. Now imagine if your mechanic could only diagnose the problem on a car by talking with your small automotive mind. Now imagine most of the cars the mechanic works on are hamstrung in a similar way. Welcome to mental health.

There are two principal consequences of this. One, there's generally an assumption on the part of provider that you're not qualified to judge the severity of something like substance use/abuse and two the patient is put in the position of weighing productive use of session time against being honest.

In intake I'm honest about two things. One,  I grew up around alcoholism and two, I handled the first major depressive episode I experienced in university by drinking. (To contextualize this, there is a period of months in my life that I have no real memory of because of alcohol abuse.) While I drink now again, I was a teetotaler for around two years after this part of my life, which I consider relevant because something obscene like 90% of alcoholics can't stay sober one year.

Because of my honesty, I'm subject to periodic enquiries into my drinking in session that while I intellectually know come from a  desire to help, make me feel infantilized and burns a session for me because it pisses me the fuck off. I also have to have things alcohol related hijacked by discussions of alcoholism. For example, last Valentine's Day was my first solo one in a long time. Instead of dealing with that like a big boy, I bought a bunch of bourbon and got crunk as heck. I reported this in session without being asked because I was disappointed in myself for not even trying to face the travail. How was this handled? Like I relapsed. Still don't know why I wouldn't face my fear, eventually I just lied so that session could be productive again.

[CatsCatsCats]

That's something that deters me from entering therapy -- I know I would do a terrible job examining and expressing myself and consequently make a therapists job excessively difficult. Actually same deal with a medical physician, as a special fellow I have weird sensory functions and don't feel I'm reliable to report things like pain accurately.

[Kara]

They're used to terrible, they're not used to enfants terribles. :'(

Besides, whatever it is that you think you need therapy for probably won't get sorted out without therapy.

[benjipwns]

discussing yourself as if it's a third person not in the room

[Fifstar]

That's something that deters me from entering therapy -- I know I would do a terrible job examining and expressing myself and consequently make a therapists job excessively difficult. Actually same deal with a medical physician, as a special fellow I have weird sensory functions and don't feel I'm reliable to report things like pain accurately.

It's their job to get those expressions out of somebody who is bad about opening himself up and ideally they are trained exactly for that situation. It's also a good idea to try a couple of therapists until you find someone that you click with.

[Kara]

discussing yourself as if it's a third person not in the room

I should try this.

spoiler (click to show/hide)

The one time I tried it I crashed and burned horribly.

[close]

[chronovore]

Yeah, again, I was worried about oversimplifying the problem, and I definitely was. I'm thankful for your insight, and hope I didn't cause distress.

From what I understand of alcoholism, even if one rarely drinks but then gets blackout drunk when they do finally drink, that's a type of alcoholism. And, as you say, relying on the car to be objective about its own repair is part of the problem. I'm going through some of this with my own family. It's hard.

That's all I got. I like you, and want you to be healthy.

[Kara]

Sorry to hear about that. It's tough to go through that with family. And no worries about the other stuff.

As for being healthy, I have treatment resistant major depressive disorder. Unless there is a momentous breakthrough in medicine, which given the way that resources are allocated inefficiently in medical research seems doubtful in my lifetime, I can never be healthy, only prepared to navigate my next episode when it decides to strike. (On the whole, I feel I handled my second episode much better than the first, though obviously there is still room for improvement.) It's both humbling and liberating to know that the only thing you have to fear in life is your own psyche.

[chronovore]

You've got a lot of people here pulling for you. Hopefully it helps sometimes.