WILL MY ANXIETY EVER GO AWAY???

so it all started about 2 years ago when i moved in with my girlfriend. after high school my best friend really got into pot. he came over a lot and i ended up smoking with them alot. at the time i didnt realize i was losing my self. every time i got high i fought the drug. i didnt feel good just letting go and having a good time. i was considered by many people to be a talented guitarist and songwriter. i lost my mind. i didnt feel like myself, i forgot who i was, i got lost, felt like i was dreaming all the time. got worse at thinking and had crazy panic attacks. after a year or so we broke up, mostly because i didnt know if i loved her anymore which i think was because of the pot. i started thinking about what i am? what is my soul? my vision slowy got blurry. i felt like i was in a constant state of depersonalization. my friends and family dont understand me and i am afraid to really open up to them beacuse i dont want to be a downer and try to talk to them about something neither of us understand. my perception of reality has changed, and it changes alot. i try to fight it, find that sense of clarity i had before i smoked. sometimes when i am not thinking about it i see the world as i should but only for a moment, until i realize it. i want to hold on to that, i want to be normal again. i was always a little weird but only in good ways, i was super smart. i had an amazing vocabulary, and i had so much confidence in who i was. i knew exactly who i was. it sounds silly to say i dont know who i am anymore when obviously this is all a part of me. its like a big paradox, a revoloution of the mind. i constantly question the fundamental properties of the universe and my existance. i am slouching horribly and i cant seem to think straight. at first a lot of people told me it was just growing up but i didnt account for my declining social skills and my cognitive abilities. i have tried to be normal. i have been for most of my life an intellectual and athiest. i was too smart to believe there was a god. but not i am begging him to save me. i found out that if i just let go of all the anxiety and just stop breathing and tell myself to just let go. sometimes i feel better. but i never really works. i was always a social smoker. never bought my own weed just smoked because it was convienient. i dont even know if i am an artist anymore. my songs suck now. they are all about the stupid things i think about. i know that my blurred vision is a result of my brain. my eyes are the same, or atleast they should be and sometimes things come into focus. but something is holding me back. i feel like i am dreaming. my roommates have diagnosed me having just about every mental disorder i can think of. i have done tons of research. i have be stone sober for months. i have prayed to god. i have talked to friends. i have done everything in my power to fix this except see a doctor. why? because i know that some underlying problem is causing this and the only way to make it go away is to fix the problem, not relieve the symptoms with another drug. i am not going to lie, i am really losing hope. i know there is a soloution out there but no one seems to have a definitive answer. i want to quit smoking pot but that doesnt fix the problem it only stops it from progressing. and i dont want to keep smoking because i am afraid i will lose all control and forget what little part of me is left. but also a part of me wants to keep smoking because the last time i got high, i just let go. and after wards i actually felt at least 50% better. i think what happens is, when you smoke pot you can either have a bad trip, or a good trip. depending where the trip ends is where you stay. so if i get high and let go with reckless abandon i think it will cure me, or at least lead me to believe i am cured. which in a sense is the problem, believing that you have a problem. i know it is in my head. forget about chemicals and hormones and dopamine and seratonin. you just have to remember that no matter what happens, you are still the same person you just have to believe in yourself. gosh this is hard. i dont know if i am getting better or worse but i do know that i care alot less what happens to me. i know i didnt offer any answers and i just rambled about my problem but maybe you all kind of know what i am talking about. i just want to be sane again. its like i have to try to be myself around. who has to try to be themselves? you are who you are because thats just who you are. its a fool proof theory but i still wander?

Theres not a person on this planet who does not have anxiety. Anxiety is natural, people get anxiety from meeting new people, doing new things, going to new places, getting into fights, or being upset. On the other hand the people who have "anxiety disorders" explained by doctors or counsillers, don't take it personally from a doctor or a counsiller or anyone else. Usually when a person gets anxiety its for many different reasons, its your bodies way of telling you theres something wrong, that you need change. If you've gotten anxiety from smoking weed, drinking, or any kind of drug, its because its your bodies way of telling you it cannot handle anymore of it. Maybe you got anxiety from an abusive relationship, your body is trying to tell you to get out of that relationship, that its unhealthy and making you sad or mad. After getting out of that abusive relationship or stop doing those drugs your body can't handle, the anxiety should go away but this is for the people whose anxiety is still happening. Your anxiety is still happening because you're not letting it go away. You fear the anxiety because when the anxiety is happening, you feel as if your dying, or you care to much about what other people are going to think about you if they found out. To be completely honest anyone who is around you while your having the anxiety attack, know one knows your going through it but yourself. I know the feeling is scary and very uncomfortable and you hate it. The best thing to do is face your fear of the anxiety and show it whos boss. Your the one who controls your body and mind. I know its hard and scary to deal with but once you know your the one in control. The anxiety is easier to deal with. Your counsillers or someone you talk to will tell you to watch your "scale" of anxiety, honestly in my opinion especially still dealing with anxiety. I think its best not to think about it and if it were to happen without thinking about it. Here are some easy steps to get through it. Take a break from whatever your doing and take some slow deep breaths, calm yourself down by easily distracting yourself by naming some things around the room, to ground yourself and to take your mind off the scary feeling of anxiety. Please do not think to far into the future or remember how horrible the anxiety felt when you last had it. Just remember that anxiety is normal and you can control it and that its a natural thing and nothing to be scared of. You can do it with out taking any kind of medication. If you start to feel better and feel as if your realizing anxiety is nothing to be scared of and its going away.. Don't lose your confidence if you ever get another attack. Anxiety is something everyone has and everyone always will have. Just some people are more scared of the anxiety it self, when anxiety may feel like a big thing, when really its only a little thing. First you must fail before you suceed. Learn from where you went wrong. I hope this will help anyone trying to find answers to there anxiety. Just like I am trying to find answers myself but now I know its all in my head. I am the one who controls the anxiety. I will tell you the truth, its hard at first but with time things will get better. Much love xo

Can you please tell me what kind of meditations and exercises did you do? The same thing happened to me!!!

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Thanks!!!

I get really bad anxiety when I smoke pot alone. I have struggled with anxiety and depression and social anxiety for the last 11 years. When I smoke, I can't stop my mind from thinking about bad things in the past and then I'll get super worked up and shake and cry and my heart feels like it is being squeezed out of my chest by a giant iron fist and I can't breathe, and then I get paranoid and start telling myself that everyone hates me and all my friends are just using me and they don't really like me and blah blah blah, I could go on and on. But yeah, my point is, I came to the realisation that it's when I smoke alone this happens. If someone else is smoking with me, and there's a conversation happening, then alot of the time I don't have time to think about panicking or being anxious.
Also say no to medications! They are not a cure, they just numb you from feeling anything at all, and in reality, what would make you feel more human, being able to feel your pain or not feeling anything at all? Plus, not to freak you out or anything, a high percentage of suicides are a result of people taking these drugs and then getting off them, because after being numbed for so long, they can't handle they're actual feelings when they arent medicated. Be careful what you wish for.
But I do agree with CBT, definitely try that if you are serious about overcoming your attacks, I highly doubt that anything else will work.
From

oh my god, i am SO glad i came across this page! PRAISE JESUS.
guys, im in the same exact boat.

ive had one or two really mild anxiety attacks before but i think that was side effects of some birth control i was taking.
anyway, so about a month ago, i went with my friend to someones house... ive always felt uncomfortable around that place (address 666 and really spooky/dim old apt) so i was already feeling kind of off and didnt wanna be there. anyway, ive never been a pot smoker but i have done it occasionally and i have had bad trips before. but this was different...WAAAY different. for the first time in..id say about 3 years, i smoked weed and got high as hell after like 1 big hit (i also drank a little bit and had a double shot of expresso before). after that....i havent been the same. i went all out with the symptoms, i was confused, high, feeling like i was going to puke (which i did a bit), fast and hard heartbeat, restless, out of breath, compulsions, overwhelmed, worried, it was a really severe anxiety attack. i didnt know what was happeing, what caused it or anything. i never knew what an anxiety attack even was..so i just thought i was dying or i OD'd on something.
i had to stay the night and eventually i tired myself out and went to sleep.
after that, like some of you have said, it hits me in waves. some days i will be feeling great, normal, the whole 9 yards and out of nowhere...bam. i CAN say they havent been as bad as the first and they generally last about an hour. sometimes i get them at work, which is a very boring and lonely office so it sucks to sit there alone in silence where you just have your thoughts. i start thinking about life and how everyones just a drone and life is so routine...what for? all these years im going to be stuck on earth just to die and get sucked into a never ending void? life seems so long yet so short. see, i would never think like this before. i used to love life and enjoy going out and going to work. now...it just makes me depressed and anxious.
i just wish i was normal again..ever since that night. i wish i had never gone out. maybe this would have never happened.

also, i dont know about you guys, but sometimes i find that generally after a meal i get an attack...i dont know why. anyone else?

anyway, i was starting to have one and then i saw this page and started writing my own experience. i feel a LOT better now. thanks for reading and i hope you all feel better soon too <3

hey!

I also just wanted to say how great full I truly am to have come across this forum!! I have been experiencing the same thing you guys have and I found it very difficult to open up and tell people because no one seems to understand unless they have gone through it.

I was dealing with a lot in my life. I lost my best friends and my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer. I felt determined to escape reality and at the time I felt, what a better way then to smoke up with a friend. We met up with some guys and started smoking weed.I wish I had someone to tell me not to do it so that I would still be living a normal life. I wasn't an everyday weed smoking girl. I did it about 4 times my whole life and would never do it again. I started to get lost in my thoughts. I didn't know who I was or what was going on. I had never felt this way in my life!!!! All I saw was my friend laughing with these random guys and all I could think was OMG they must have laced the weed with something so they could rape us. I got the worst panic attack. I couldn't breathe properly, my heart was beating so fast as well as skipping beats, I was shaking and I felt like I was in another world. I started crying. So the guys dropped me and my friend off near my house. (I personally do not recall allowing them to drive me at all but I guess I was soo out of it that I just ended up arriving near my house and was happy about it.) I called my older sister crying and screaming telling her I didnt know what was going on with me or if I was even going to survive throughout the night. She told me to come home since my parents were in bed and she tried to take care of me as much as she could. My friend seemed to have been fine however I feel that it RUINED MY LIFE.

Since this night my life has NOT BEEN THE SAME WHAT SO EVER!!!

I have been having anxiety attacks everyday of my life! At first I thought I was going crazy since I had NEVER experienced it before. But i mentioned to my mom about how I had been feeling and she told me it was normal and that it was just anxiety. I was confused because I didnt think that weed could just trigger something like that and never in a million years had i thought anyone else would even go through what I was going through. (Thanks to this forum, I now understand that I am not, THANK GOD) I felt like I was living a dream everyday of my life! I had lost connection with the "real world". I started to question who I was and how I got here and why I was here. I kept telling myself to stop with these thoughts but they were hard to control. I eventually came closer to God and tried my best to understand that this was meant to happen. I know that he wouldn't put me through something if he knew I couldn't get through it. My faith started to help me get through my anxiety and I "started" feeling "normal" again.

My anxiety slowly started calming down and I got a new job thinking it would help me control my mind and feelings. Unfortunetly this job worked against me. It was constantly busy and all the other employees were screwing around making me do all the work. My anxiety got even worse to the point where I was thinking about death constantly mine as well as others. I knew it was wrong but it wouldnt leave my mind. I used to cry because I was soo afraid that I would God forbid act up on it. The thought made me soo sick that I couldnt eat anything and constantly felt like throwing up. I told my mom and she told me she went through the same thing when she was going through depression. My mom took me to a doctor and she told me I had no specific reason to be depressed which was true. I hadn't!!! It was all anxiety! There are over a hundred different kinds of effects anxiety has on people. She gave me medication which is slowly but surely helping me. I quit the job and am now trying with God's help to get through this difficult time!! As difficult as each day is, I am looking forward to get through each anxiety attack and to prove to myself and others that I will be the old me one day!!!

I hope this has maybe helped someone!

Good Luck to you all!!! I know it isn't easy but it sure helped me writing about this!!

uhggg im goin thru itt rite now i realize i havent been da same since i smokedd n now its drivin me crazyyy :-( n im scared when dose it gose awayyyy n how do i make it go away

i know wht ur going through ive had the same thing happen to me but with XTC ive rolled more times in 8months thn ppl should in a life time. i overdosed twice first time wasnt so bad minor withdrawls having no signs of anxiety second time alot worse 184 heart rate muscle cramps all tht shizz.... a few days after ive been out of the hosptial i started feeling the same stuff u are all crazied getting the feeling tht ur gunna die all tht type of sh*t..... but u gotta remeber its just all in ur head, like i never had anxiety until i started doing all the sh*t i was doing but stuff in drugs an bud can bring it out..... just stay on ur meds an remind ur self tht everything is okay an ull be fine an eventually off your medication!

I understand where you guys are coming from im 19, ive experienced that as well from smoking alot of dro and use 2 pop xtc a while back when I was 16 going onto 17 because of the crowd I was hanging with, eventually I felt it was getting 2 me cus I couldnt eat or sleep I just kept thinking so i snapped out of it and refused anymore drugs beside natural weed, I noticed i started getting anxiety when i was in public and i wasn't used to this feeling because before i was fine and even a social person but i didnt feel the same person as i once was, like something was missing and then i knew i had to be closer to God in times like these. Taking those types of drugs helped opend my eyes making me realize how the world truley is and what this generation is turning into. I felt the world becoming "fake" i felt nothing was real anymore and it was hard to look at things the same. I took a break from it i guess trying to find my place in this world, all i did was smoke alot of pot and listen to REAL hip-hop like guru from gangstar, mfdoom, wu-tang clan, quasimoto and a list of others that really have an impact on this world for the greater good and understnd how this world can decieve, I read a book called The Tao Of Wu by RZA who is the leader of the hip-hop group wu-tang clan and in his book he talks about lessons that he had to learn growing up in his projects and mathematics of life that numbers represnt symbols of a human being, he also talks about 12 gems that have to do with a person finding themselves and understand 12 levels of life and at the end of the journey you should find enlightment wich in other words means peace. Those types of guidence helped me get past issues with life and with people. Making me a better person that has knowledge and wisdom but im still learning everyday to overcome issues like anxiety becus it gets tough with the reality pressure but you just have to say to yourself f*ck it know one else's opinon or view should matter besides your own if your willing to open your eyes.

I'm a male 18 year old and I recently just started getting symptoms of anxiety the night after I smoked weed for the first time 3 days. I gave in to peer pressure, which was the worst mistake I've ever made in my entire life. NEVER smoking weed again. That night, I started developing shortness of breath. The next morning was the same. Then the day after that, I was dizzy and lightheaded all day. And that night I couldn't sleep and had an uncontrollable gag reflex where I could not stop gagging. I'm scared because I've never had anxiety problems before. I had normal stress, but that has never affected me. I'm more focused on my breathing now and my symptoms and making it go away. I'm glad I'm not the only one going through this because it makes me feel like I'm not alone. I am, however, still scared. Will this get any better? I'm gonna schedule a doctors appointment soon just to make sure there is absolutely nothing wrong with me. 

Hi just lay off the weed and symptoms will go please try and keep away from the weed.......Bob

Christian I don't know why you would smoke again after this terrifying ordeal happened to you... Anyway not to be rude I think I can help... What happened to you as you probably know by now happens to a lot of other people who smoke marijuana, and I'd like to tell you now if you are thinking of smoking again DON'T!!!! It will happen again.... Marijuana causes panic attacks not in all people but in a small amount of unlucky few. When you get a panic attack you are very likely to develope a panic disorder which consist of constant worrying, terrifying thinking, when am I gonna get another panic attack? I know because I went through the same thing and I want to let you know; YES it can go away! remember that... Medication has a very high success rate, I don't want you to listen to people who tell you that antidepressants or antianxiety medications are bad cause they are NOT... You probably hear this from people who don't understand what you are going through and have heard negative things from TV or from someone else who has no idea what they are talking about and have no experience with medication, DON'T listen to them christian listen to me, I have gone through it, I have lived with the constant fear, the overwelming thinking, the panic and the worrying after the panic. I was afraid to take medication because of the negative things I heard about it but, after I could take it no more I finally gave it a shot. The medication I took was called Effexor XR, after about a week and a half of taking the meds I could feel the anxiety slowing going away, then in a month I could feel the anxiety almost completely going away, I could consentrate more, I was not afraid to leave my house, I could go to the store these things before were so terrifying. Now its been almost 5 years since and I feel great, there are still times when I feel a bit anxious but nothing compared to panic attacks, I still take the meds and they work great, side effects only last about a week then go away... there is hope christian i know you probably don't believe that now because I didn't when I was in your shoes but take it from me that "old you" is still there, if you don't act now nothing will change but if you do decide to give this a try i promise you, you WON'T regret it... ***this post is edited by moderator *** *** private e-mails not allowed*** Please read our Terms of Use

hey man, i feel your pain. But first I would just stop smoking. Let the green clear your system. Then just try and convince yourself that everything will be alright and use the placebo effects backwards... if you know what i mean. I think your just shocking your body again and again by smoking pot and your body is probably asking you to stop.