PTDS, Cannabis & Me: Alice explains how Cannabis helped her escape Wonderland.

This weekends CannaStory comes from the lovely Alice (@stoned4_20reasons). She shares with us how she was introduced to cannabis and how cannabis helped her recover from one of the most traumatic experiences anyone can go through. This beautiful soul is a true warrior and I am honoured to share her story with you now. 

TRIGGER WARNING: The following piece contains an reference to an experience of rape & sexual assault that some readers may find distressing.

I was introduced to cannabis at a young age as my mum used to smoke it quite a bit so me being young obviously found it and wanted to act hard and try it haha. I think I was about 14 the first time I found some of it and me and the boy who lived across the road and was a little older than me rolled what was probably the most awful spliff ever. 

I smoked a few times after that with friends before school or when my mum had some but never really got smoking properly till college. At first we were making a 2gs last a week between 5 of us smoking it every day, which seems fucking crazy now but there we go aha. By the end of the first year I was smoking quite a bit, I’d started to find a real love for weed and all my closest friends smoked quite a lot and still do, it became a large part of my social life. However it wasn’t until 2017 that I started to smoke cannabis daily and by myself. 

In 2017 on December the 1st I was raped, I very quickly told someone and got help within 6 months of it happening, I couldn’t have dealt with it any better than I did. However no matter how hard I tried it still left me very broken and depressed. I was diagnosed with PTSD and had a lot of support but rape really isn’t easy to go through. You almost think beforehand well I’d just push them off... except you can’t and I didn't. I froze and stared out at the stars till it was over...  I think that is what troubled me most, I was so angry that I didn’t fight back. The only real relief I would get from my mind running crazy and the anger built up in me was smoking. At that point I was smoking bongs from when I woke up till I went to bed. I don’t know how I would have coped without cannabis at the time, honestly I’m not even sure I’d be here if I hadn't had it [cannabis]. PTSD comes with a world of shit, one of the worse things I experienced was nightmares, every single night. I hated sleeping. I never wanted to sleep. Cannabis was the only thing that would relax my body and mind, it would stop the constant fight or flight mode I was in and give me a little peace. Although I would still get nightmares I wouldn’t sit there dreading going to sleep for hours on end till morning came and day went again. Cannabis was the only thing that would help me to eat. After being raped I constantly felt disgusting, which just made me feel sick... I learnt to go without food in order to stop myself being sick, and taught myself to enjoy being hungry. I'd go as long as I could without food, I just didn't want to look like the body he touched. However smoking gives you beautiful munchies, which at the time probably saved my life. Cannabis helped massively to get me to eat and be relaxed for long enough that I would manage to keep some food down. Through the whole process of trying to move on from what happened cannabis helped everyday, with every step. 

Almost a year after what happened I started getting really bad back pains and my arms were really weak, I was struggling loads at work and it just gradually started then hit me like a brick wall. I was put straight onto co-codamols and referred to a rheumatologist as I have psoriasis so they automatically thought it was psoriatic arthritis. It took 6 months for the appointment; I’d been back and forth the doctors 300 times in that time. The rheumatologist said there were definitely signs of arthritis and sent me for an MRI, however he also quickly flagged onto the PTSD and started going into fibromyalgia... That was it, within a day I’d gone from being fairly average to chronically ill... forever... Since then it’s all been a whirlwind of a journey with a whole lot of pharmaceuticals to take every single day. I take a cocktail of pills every day now and am slowly losing myself in them, I do find with myself the benefits have outweighed the risks of taking them and I’ve found a good balance at quite low doses. Regardless of this I still find that cannabis is the biggest help with all of the symptoms I have! Since being diagnosed me and my partner at the time had been smoking more and more as well as experimenting with other ways to have cannabis and how they help with the pain. I find that edibles are a massive help with the pain and they can give me a whole day of relief which is amazing! We’ve made cannabutter on a few occasions and I found having some on toast or crumpets in the morning was a massive help, as well as delicious. We also use the butter to bake with and combine in any meal we could ahaha. It’s amazing heated gently with herbs and garlic then put on plain pasta! (Oh Shut the fridge that sounds gorgeous!!) I found that concentrates were amazing to help with the pain and sleep!! We’d quite often make our own shatter to smoke on the rig which is incredible at helping with almost everything. It’s a lot lighter of a smoke, almost like a vapour so it is much kinder on the chest which for someone with asthma is brilliant!

I hope one day to manage my pain and other symptoms with just cannabis so I don’t have to take a cocktail of pills 3 times a day however for now I’m just smoking as much as I can afford to give the tablets the extra helping hand they realllyyy need. I love smoking cannabis and I love how many unbelievable properties it has. It is a very magical plant that should never have been made illegal. Cannabis has helped me more than any drug the doctors gave me. I love being able to share how much cannabis has helped me in my journey and educate people on all the remarkable things cannabis can do!!  I don’t believe in god much, but I do believe some fucker put cannabis here to be the ultimate medicine and I believe we all have every right to make the most of that.

 That all said, I’m gonna go roll a spliff cause all this love for cannabis got me craving a fatty! ;)

Thank you so much Alice for sharing that experience with us. Despite it being 2020 this is still a stigma surrounding sexual assault with victim blaming rife in the language used around such subjects, so when survivors like Alice speak about their experiences I feel it is one of the most bravest things you can do. 

Cannabis is proving to be medication for PTSD time and time again with more studies supporting this theory. It is just another reason to add to the mountain of reasons why I feel we should be looking at more natural forms of treatments and reduce our reliance on toxic and addictive combinations of pharmaceuticals. (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6007739/)

If you or a loved one has been effected by rape and/or sexual assault and would like help and advice, there are many resources online available. 

Here is a small list. 

National Domestic Abuse 0808 2000 247 / www.nationaldahelpline.org.uk

Women's Aid womensaid.org.uk They offer a Survivors Handbook and offer help via email and through their comprehensive website. 

Rights of Women offer legal advice about sexual assault to women. https://rightsofwomen.org.uk/get-advice/