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This may seem like a silly question but I have seen enough of this in the last bit to wonder.
The A in my life smokes an enormous amount of pot. I would say anywhere in between 8 and 12 times a day. Even when she does not drink or is trying to quit drinking she still continues to smoke up but probably uses more at this time.
She says (so I take this with a grain of salt) that lots of people in AA smoke pot but don't drink and that it is almost the norm. Okay, okay, so I don't buy it being the norm part. The thing is, I know at least half a dozen people who are in AA, some of them long timers who use pot in this way.
Which comes to my question. How can someone be clean and sober if they are continually stoned?
Awaiting wisdom
lilms
-- Edited by lilms at 20:58, 2007-01-02
__________________
Two things: 1. Recovery is a process, not an event.....and.... 2. You only get to go around once. Leave em laughing and make it worth your while
I anxiously await the replies, as my A has often used this as an excuse. He even had a name for it.. marijuana maintenance. IMHO the answer is NO, the person has just switched to a different drug and is still not dealing with life on lifes terms.
Forgive me. Its one of the oldest tricks in the books. I hope I don't hurt you, but I think you know already exactly what I'm gonna say.
Your loved one is on the marijuana maintence program. It is NOT sobriety. Additionnally, it is setting themselves up for relapse--they just dont know it yet. They'll drink again. Or go through a few drugs to get back to the bottle. But, yes, they'll get back to their crutches.
Additionally, she's fooling no one at the meetings. She may talk, she may get chips, but they know. They know. True AAs live program. Others just live with it.
I know she is not clean and sober, I know the others who do this are not. Am just wondering how someone can get the chips, have the anniversaries etc. etc. Makes no sense to me. Seems to be playing with the program while others watch them do it and no one says boo.
Was hoping for some AA answers to this.
lilms
__________________
Two things: 1. Recovery is a process, not an event.....and.... 2. You only get to go around once. Leave em laughing and make it worth your while
Marijuana Maintenance... LOL. My pot smoking period was relatively short. When I was a young drinker in college the guys I hung around with who were older than me and therefore could buy the beer, were also into smoking pot. I got initiated and I did it when they did, but rarely by myself, and almost never did I go buy the stuff. Drinking however, was a near daily activity and I did it by myself all the time.
After I got married I probably smoked the weed 2-3 times with her just because she wanted to (and got hold of some), the aging hippie that she was. She wasn't a drinker at all... half a wine cooler was about her limit.
My final year of drinking I got stoned one time, about 6 months before I quit drinking. When I had been sober some time - almost a year I think - I came across a small amount of pot. I just tossed it away - it just didn't interest me much but like I say, it was never my drug of choice. In my college days, it made me paranoid, cough my brains out, and gave me a sore throat... which beer, beer, and more beer would fix.
I can't vouch for anyone's sobriety, but the general consensus is that marijuana maintenance is not sobriety. I've heard of people doing it, and I've also heard probably two dozen different people admit to it, and changing their sobriety date on account of it.
For me, coffee, tobacco, chocolate, garlic, and pepperoni pizza could be considered mood altering substances. If that's the case you can measure my sobriety in minutes rather than years. But... I think the consensus is that these things do not impact sobriety and do not feed the "isms" we associate with alcoholism.
When I say I'm sober, it means I have not knowingly taken in alcohol, marijuana, any stimulant stronger than caffeine, any painkiller stronger than aspirin, any narcotic or hallucinogen.
There is no reason for me to ingest any of these substances. I recently saw a family member go through major surgery, and being on, and weaned off, narcotic painkillers. He came through it fine but he's a tough cookie. I dread ever having to have major surgery - as much for the fear of the surgery itself, but also of getting hooked on the painkillers. I have seen people with some years of sobriety get hooked and in some cases go back to drinking. I just hope if I ever have to go through it, I will have a strong program and people to talk to and get me through it, because left on my own, I could easily get myself into deep doo.
Forgive me. Its one of the oldest tricks in the books. I hope I don't hurt you, but I think you know already exactly what I'm gonna say.