does marijuana cause back pain?

I've never understood why some don't understand the health benefits of Medical marijuana. I've never been a recreational smoker & unlike alcohol, I've never seen MJ ruin anyone's life or health. I was taking very strong painkillers prescribed by my doctor for back pain & fibromyalgia. The pain is real, chronic & getting worse. Rather than up the pain meds, I LEGALLY tried medical MJ. It helped the pain but most importantly, it lowered my blood pressure. I had been on pills for high BP & had a horrible reaction. My face swelled & I was immediately taken off them. No other pills worked. No herbs worked either. So I tried MJ & it worked like a charm until it began enhancing my pain. I stopped all MJ & BP went back up. I do not have an addicted personality& those who say MJ is a gateway drug to more potent drugs do not understand that an addict will always find drugs or alcohol to feed their addiction. MJ is not harmful taken as prescribed. But who prescribes alcohol? What diseases does it help? Has anyone overdosed on too much marijuana? No. But too much alcohol can definitely kill you. Right away or eventually. I guess it's all a matter of moderation, except for hard illegal drugs. MJ is legal in my state & NOT a hard drug. I wish I could use it again, not because of the high but for my BP. I will try a diff strain & see what happens. Thanks

Blood pressure seems to be of great concern for you... It should be. I hate to be so obvious, but have you made the basic necessary changes for lowering your BP through lifestyle changes?

8 cups of water/day? Staying hydrated is key to BP regulation.

Decent diet? A diet high in fiber and other whole foods has done the trick for high BP for a long, long time. Western menus don't accomidate for this. You have to be a creative grocery shopper. Did you know the skin of an apple will literaly scrub the walls of your arteries? The body requires a certain amount of sodium, but try not to exceed 2000 mg daily. Buy unsalted chips, eliminate soda completely, easy on the dipping sauces, forget about sweets unless it is an occasional reward for a good work out, etc.

Exercise? A 40 min. brisk walk every day can only help vascular and circulatory defficiencies.

Maybe you have already done so, but certainly look at basic lifestyle changes that can be made before trying to find a mirracle herb/drug, because they don't exist at this time. Any herb/drug/supplement that you consume that has potential beneficial properties will ALWAYS have non-beneficial propertie(s) in another area.

Sure, maybe MJ causes some degree of vasodiolation, but what about the mass amounts of vein/artery stiffening carbon monoxide that is inhaled? Carbon monoxide = cellular sucide. The same reason that anyone who smokes anything will age faster and end up with high BP, stroke, heart attack, and anneurisms later in life.

Try to ignore the obvious stoners who only have/advertise knowledge of potential positive benefits of smoking pot. Yes, there are some positive benefits for some people, but the negatives outweight the positives 10 fold for all.

dirtyaudi wrote:

Blood pressure seems to be of great concern for you... It should be. I hate to be so obvious, but have you made the basic necessary changes for lowering your BP through lifestyle changes?

8 cups of water/day? Staying hydrated is key to BP regulation.

Decent diet? A diet high in fiber and other whole foods has done the trick for high BP for a long, long time. Western menus don't accomidate for this. You have to be a creative grocery shopper. Did you know the skin of an apple will literaly scrub the walls of your arteries? The body requires a certain amount of sodium, but try not to exceed 2000 mg daily. Buy unsalted chips, eliminate soda completely, easy on the dipping sauces, forget about sweets unless it is an occasional reward for a good work out, etc.


Sure, maybe MJ causes some degree of vasodiolation, but what about the mass amounts of vein/artery stiffening carbon monoxide that is inhaled? Carbon monoxide = cellular sucide. The same reason that anyone who smokes anything will age faster and end up with high BP, stroke, heart attack, and anneurisms later in life.


Thanks for your input. Yes, I eat a low-sodium diet--no fast food, check all sodium levels, etc. I can't exercise because of chronic pain. I do what I can when pain is low. Right now sciatica has returned so I stretch. The high BP runs in my family. My three older brothers died at relatively young ages. The last one died two years ago, at my age now. I've never smoked or drank & always had good BP until menopause when it began to creep up. It's pretty much borderline w/diastolic highest. When I smoke MJ, it's only 2 puffs at most at night only. I switched to edibles & that also worked. The good thing about med MJ is that it keeps my BP down, even when I skip a night. My doctors know I tried it & my cardiologist after seeing affects of pills he gave me, told me to stay on edible MJ. Believe me, I've never been a stoner; don't like the feeling, never did & I grew up when everyone was smoking. I tried it once, got horribly stoned & that was the end of that until 30 yrs later for pain. I've got to say, it doesn't do much for the pain except in my case when it made it worse. Right now w/sciatica I'd never try it. But I read a lot about MJ lowering BP after I noticed it. They were credible sources, not stoner blogs. Guess I'll wait for sciatica to go away & keep on eating low sodium, healthy food (I don't touch foods w/preservatives; they make my pain worse). Have you ever tried eating low sodium? It's so difficult because it's in everything. I've stopped eating out. It's impossible. Even carrot juice is high in sodium & that's natural, not added. As for water, I drink 2 large bottles a day. Don't know what else to do. Thanks.

dirtyaudi wrote:

Blood pressure seems to be of great concern for you... It should be. I hate to be so obvious, but have you made the basic necessary changes for lowering your BP through lifestyle changes?>>

Thanks for your input. Yes, I eat a low-sodium diet--no fast food, check all sodium levels, etc. I can't exercise because of chronic pain. I do what I can when pain is low. Right now sciatica has returned so I stretch. The high BP runs in my family. My three older brothers died at relatively young ages. The last one died two years ago, at my age now. I've never smoked or drank & always had good BP until menopause when it began to creep up. It's pretty much borderline w/diastolic highest. When I smoke MJ, it's only 2 puffs at most at night only. I switched to edibles & that also worked. The good thing about med MJ is that it keeps my BP down, even when I skip a night. My doctors know I tried it & my cardiologist after seeing affects of pills he gave me, told me to stay on edible MJ. Believe me, I've never been a stoner; don't like the feeling, never did & I grew up when everyone was smoking. I tried it once, got horribly stoned & that was the end of that until 30 yrs later for pain. I've got to say, it doesn't do much for the pain except in my case when it made it worse. Right now w/sciatica I'd never try it. But I read a lot about MJ lowering BP after I noticed it. They were credible sources, not stoner blogs. Guess I'll wait for sciatica to go away & keep on eating low sodium, healthy food (I don't touch foods w/preservatives; they make my pain worse). Have you ever tried eating low sodium? It's so difficult because it's in everything. I've stopped eating out. It's impossible. Even carrot juice is high in sodium & that's natural, not added. As for water, I drink 2 large bottles a day. Don't know what else to do. Thanks.

When is the last time you've had your vitamin D level checked? A lot of your symptoms are identifyable with being vit D deficient. Either way, and I'm not a doctor, a vitamin D supplement could only help. 2000 iu/day. It should be common practice for everyone to supplement with vitamin D at least in the winter months. The governments RDA of vitamin D is 200-400iu (the amount found in a multivitamin.) They stated this almost 10 years ago, and since then, there have been many studies that prove it's a flat wrong reccomendation. Probably has a lot to do with why so many people are defficient in this vitamin. Again, I'm not a doctor, and I'm not saying this is the solution, but it can only help. Research it.

I hardly ever smoke, but when I do I smoke the best available. I also only take 2 or 3 bong hits per session. I don’t cough much either or sit in the same position for a long time nor do I have small hernia or pinched nerve in my back or scoliosis. And I too experience extreme muscle aches and tightness to the point that I have the urge to stretch for long periods of time. however this does not help to alleviate the uncomfortable feeling in my body. I wont smoke before I’m going to bed because this uncomfortable feeling keeps me up. I also don’t like to smoke when I am going to be around people who aren’t smoking because it makes me quite, slow, and uninteresting This unfortunate side effect keeps me from smoking more often even though I really want to. I am looking for help with this because I like the way my mind gets the chance to relax.

I was just wondering. Have any of you tried smoking pure hashish or straight keif and observed the effects of that method of THC igestion? I suffer the same negative side effect from weed and I'm wondering if maybe (hopefully) its a negative reaction to another compound in the weed and not the THC itself. This is just wishful thinking, but any insight is appreciated. Thanks

i have the same problem. I am a guitarist and i am an avid computer user as well. I began going to a gym a few months ago and it seemed to help quite a lot. I find the pain in my hands, wrists, and forearms now rarely run into this problem. I have found that stretching every day and not sitting in the same position for more than an hour without taking at least a 15 minute break have been the two simplest means of reducing this pain. I sympathize with you all, and I'm glad this forum is here, as I haven't seen much on this topic, which was very frustrating. Keep sharing your thoughts and experiences of this condition.

Thanks for your input guitarplayer. How significantly was the pain reduced when you became more athletic and stretched daily? Were you able to smoke and barely notice the pain or was it just slightly reduced? Thanks!

Dear hippie nay-sayers,

Did they really not offer health class wherever you guys went to school growing up?

Of course, smoking anything is bad for your heart and life, in general.

Your heart and lungs are directly related. You junk up your lungs and cardiovascular system with carbon monoxide and tar (among the hundreds of other chemicals) and your heart is going to suffer. If you are a regular smoker (of anything) you will have a higher resting heart rate. It's a medical fact that those who have higher resting heart rates are at a greater risk for a heart attack. I've never known a single pot smoker who eats right and gets daily exercise. The lifestyle of a regular pot smoker is a sedetary one. A sedetarty lifestyle will bring your cardiovascular (lungs and heart) system way, way down - inviting all the related diseases and "events" that come with the territory.... ie: Heart disease, heart failure, heart attack, stroke, aneurism, and sudden death. You also invite regular episodes of bronchitus, pleursy, etc. which cause inflamation around the heart and lungs- making it have to work over-time and at a reduced capacity.

I hate to make enemies, but I'm really trying to figure out if it's ignorance or just plain stupidity as to why these things need to be explained. This is all very basic stuff, and it starts with this simple fact.. If you ignite anything and inhale it - you are consuming carbon monoxide and tar. Put down the pipe and do some research on the affects of CO in the human body.

The rapid thumping heart beat is a direct result of carbon monoxide that has entered the blood stream. If you sit in your car with the engine running and door down, you'll experience the same thing minutes before passing out and dying of CO poisoning.

Buddy,

I think most of us understand the repercussions of smoking and the cause and effect of a poor heart. Most of us here are not even hard core smokers. Most of us here do not mention ANYTHING about smoking cigarettes, a habitt that causes you to smoke several times throughout the day. And those of us that smoke marijuana, these are people who do it once or twice a day to very causual people like myself (once or twice a month).

And the issue is not about a bad heart. Read the entire responses, it talks about pack pain, and pain in the body when smoking. Were not idiots here. There is something in the substance that is causing us pain, and this is what needs to be addressed.

Show a correlation that inhaling smoke causes pain then Ill believe its that. Dont be talking about bad hear c**p as none of us are talking about this (maybe one or two people that I might not have read, but Ive read no one complaining about this).

The fact that pot is causing people to hurt is disturbing. In most of the posts people are saying that pot did not used to make them hurt. Did the people change or did pot. I don't agree with the nurse.
If your legal to grow, Find some old seeds from the days of old and grow them and see if that plant makes you hurt.

I know that one strain of pot will make me hurt and another wont and all the popular strains available from medical marijuana growers that are popular have made me hurt.
In time this thread will prove useful in finding out the truth - did our bodies change or did the pot ? again Those of you who can legally grow, find some old seeds from way back, grow them and see if you hurt. All the new strains of seeds are most likely going to cause you the severe pain- if your prone to it -

This is mindblowing guys. I didn't think it could be possible that weed would do this to me. I love weed! But f**k, I have been trying to think about when all this screwed up back sh*t started happening. And I think it may be based on when I was smoking more weed. Every time I get high, I would feel some back pain. Not usually that severe though. But it kept getting worse. Again, not all the time, but a lot of the time I was high. Eventually I got so bad that I went to the hospital twice in a week. They gave me percocets the first time and I think that was a bad idea because now I just want to take them. Then they found out I have prostatitis and gave me an antibiotic for that. It was getting pretty bad to the point where I had symptoms like you guys describe above - really sore lower back and groin. So I don't know if it's the prostatitis that is doing this to me, or the fact that I smoke weed a lot more now than I did when the back pain started. What's the solution? Quit - cold turkey? I guess I'm gonna have to. This could be my last high. Good bye!

well the back pain related to smoking marihuna is not directly related to it... What happend is that marihuana affects neurotransmiters cuasing elavated levels of anxiety. This anxiety causes back pain due to muscular spasms

So iTHink iMay Have a solution for tHe smokers tHat Have tHose back pains wHen tHey smoke...Drink ALOT of Water (At least a Gallon a day)...Weed (ESPECIALLY Hydro, KusH, Exotic, Loud) deHydrates you and pulls fluid from all over your body. You Have to replace it.