For instance, just because your friend’s muscles began aching within four days of quitting doesn’t necessarily mean that’ll be the case for you. Basically, “this is a really individual and unique experience,” Fong says. “By day three or four is when I really started to feel it,” she recalls.īut this timeline, as well as particulars about the onset and duration of certain symptoms, again, differs from one person to the next. Benton’s experience fit this description. They usually peak one to four days after the last use and gradually dissipate in a few weeks’ time. If you’re a heavy, chronic cannabis user, you might begin to notice withdrawal symptoms roughly a day after you last used weed, Lin says (although Fong has seen symptoms emerge as early as a few hours later). “Typically this happens in chronic or heavy cannabis users” - those who imbibe every day, says Yu-Fung Lin, an associate professor at the University of California, Davis who teaches a course on the physiology of cannabis. Various uncomfortable physical symptoms.According to the DSM-5, symptoms of cannabis withdrawal include: Abnormal serotonin levels can lead to nausea, for example. “It’s such a stress on the body” - which explains why it feels like death. “When you’re in a state of withdrawal… your body is working hard to get to normal function,” Fong tells Mic. So, how long does it take for cannabinoid receptors to return to normal once you quit? As with withdrawal symptoms, this varies from person-to-person - but according to one study published in the journal of Molecular Psychiatry, people who chronically smoked weed had their receptors back to normal levels after about four weeks of abstinence from the drug. Removing cannabis (or drastically reducing your intake of it) throws off this balance, which your body has to restore by once again altering cannabinoid receptor and neurochemical levels. To restore balance, your body alters its natural levels of cannabinoid receptors (which the THC attaches itself to), as well as neurochemicals like serotonin and adrenaline. When you heavily use cannabis, you drastically increase the levels of the high-inducing compound tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) in your bloodstream. ![]() The minimum reduction needed to cause withdrawal varies from person to person, though, reflecting our individual biological differences, Fong says. Nonetheless, “it can be debilitating, and can create a lot of physical and emotional suffering.”Ĭannabis withdrawal syndrome can be triggered by not only quitting weed altogether, but also significantly decreasing your use of it. ![]() Unlike alcohol withdrawal, which can be deadly, cannabis withdrawal isn’t life-threatening, says Timothy Fong, a professor of psychiatry who helps lead the UCLA Cannabis Research Initiative. ![]() Cannabis withdrawal syndrome can be triggered by not only quitting weed altogether, but also significantly decreasing your use of it. ![]() In fact, it didn’t appear in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) - the psychiatry “bible,” used to diagnose mental health issues - until the release of the most recent edition of the DSM in 2013, the DSM-5. Her symptoms finally subsided roughly three weeks later, but it took a full month for her to feel like her normal self again.īenton may have been experiencing cannabis withdrawal syndrome, though medical professionals are only beginning to understand what happens when you quit smoking weed. Her head throbbed with a dull, persistent ache, and her stomach felt queasy. “My anxiety was through the roof,” Benton - a 33-year-old Oakland resident - recalls of her experience five years ago. She struggled to fall asleep, and when she did, she’d have horrifying nightmares, or wake up in the middle of the night, drenched in sweat. Within two days of quitting, she experienced a panic attack. Liz Benton recently quit weed after smoking it at least once a day for seven years - and the first week was especially brutal.
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