no, I’m not a druggie

to those that think I am a lazy pothead that just sits around stoned all day & marijuana ruins my life, I don’t & it doesn’t but thanks for the concern!

the basic facts

1. I tried weed for the first time in 2022 amidst dealing with my horrific kidney stone & god awful gallstones. I’d spend hours sitting in hot baths, doing weird yoga, taking other herbal supplements and remedies trying to find relief and I was desperate to try anything that would help. The edible I had was incredible – both for my pain, but it also was the first time in my entire life that my brain felt quiet. I didn’t know my brain could be silent with no thoughts, it was an entirely new form of relief and relaxation I never knew existed!
2. Ever since, I have only ever purchased it legally & primarily used it medicinally for physical & emotional pain relief (unbeknownst to me, but looking back, yeah, I was really fucking hurting and weed was the perfect bandaid patch to keep me functional and “happy” on a regular basis)
3. During my time in New Hampshire, my usage peaked in late 2025 (daily medicinal usage, I genuinely don’t remember the last time I’ve been actually “high”). Why? My mental health REALLY took a tank due to Emmy’s serious surgery, not being able to go home for the holidays and spending them entirely alone, horrific burnout from work and life in general, and then actually realizing I was entirely alone (the few people I thought I had in New England just simply weren’t there for whatever reasons I’ll probably never know, I know everybody has their own lives and problems to focus on and my shit is no one else’s shit to deal with, but it just really stung because I had been close to them (or so I thought) and could rely on them to just spend time with me (I didn’t think I was asking a lot of them, I genuinely just didn’t want to be alone in my own head for a couple of hours so I turned to the green as a way to numb all of my awful thoughts and feelings that were just too heavy to deal with on my own, in the midst of several crises
4. when I started having seizures, I stopped using weed because of all of the major medical unknowns & changes to my medications. we now know that marijuana did NOT contribute to me having seizures (also, side note – none of my doctors have ever advised me to stop using weed, I stopped more because I just wanted to be on the safe side. I know you were thinking that, it was my first thought in the ER room and I needed to know the right answer so I spent months researching and consulting professionals to get it – thanks for the concern!) then from february through may? june? (idk, it all blends in together), my entire body and brain functionality was held together by 11 (yes, you read that right, 11!!!) different prescription medications – all prescribed by licensed, medical doctors that were fully aware of my situation & my long list of diagnoses and medications. I’ve had a couple of people make comments to me that I just seem stoned and out of it 24/7. I wasn’t stoned, but I was sure out of it constantly, felt like my brain was swiss cheese. Try living your daily life being strung together with a whole medicine cabinet in your head – two seizures meds, two anxiety meds, two depression meds, three adhd meds, and two sleep meds (why I had multiple of each? different dosages/usages/time of day – like my anxiety meds were “as needed” based on how my body was feeling & I had different dosages of adhd meds depending on how long I wanted to be functional during the day). I woke up and took pills to get me moving, I took meds throughout the day to keep me going, and I took meds at night to get my brain to turn the fuck off. I’ll never forget my discharge appointments with my doctors in New Hampshire, they all wanted to make sure I had enough of my prescriptions to last me a couple of months as I transitioned to new doctors in Texas. We spent the entire appointments reading through my entire list of medications and the whole time I kept thinking to myself “why are none of my doctors concerned I’m on so many different medications? this is NOT normal, something deeper is fucked up with me”
5. Towards the end of my time in New Hampshire I did start consuming small amounts of weed again at night (under the approval of all of my doctors, because I am always 100% open and honest about my substance use & I asked all of them explicitly if marijuana would interact with any of my meds or fuck up my brain further beyond belief than it already has been – I’m not a reckless dumbass, thanksss 💕). And the main reason? Just to get myself through the next few weeks until I was safely back in Texas and my nervous system wasn’t constantly on alert 24/7 – also listening to musicals while high is a very fun experience and was I not allowed to feel a singular ounce of joy while drowning in a cabal of loneliness?
6. Now I’ve been back in Texas, I’ve successfully weened off of 9 medications and just have one seizure med and one sleep med (plus the varying “as needed” anxiety and adhd meds BUT I have not taken them once since being home, I just keep them on hand in fear I will need them at some point…)
7. I’ve realized I spent the first 26 years of my life crushing it without any mind-altering medications. I graduated high school with honors, flew through college in 4 years (mind you, while working full time + forming/leading my own student organization + having a social life), and climbed my way up the corporate ladder to my fantastic job – all without any chemical support. So what the hell changed that I somehow needed a million different medications just to get in and out of bed on a daily basis? Still processing/figuring that out – but as soon as I got home, I said bye bye to most of those meds and will never look back.

I know people will always assume and say things about me that aren’t true, and I usually just don’t give a shit, I expect it being the colorful, complicated person I am. But it really, really rubs me the wrong way when I’m accused of being some horrible things I am not – especially when they don’t know the whole story and all of the facts. Which then leads me to one question – do they actually care about me (and the truth and my feelings) or do they just want to spread gossip about me being a piece of shit to feel better about themselves? Guess I will never know!