Did anyone else "just say no"?

In My Humble Opinion
101

That’s a good point about the expense. For me it was mostly who I’ve spent time with. When I was a kid my two best friends and I had no money at all.
In junior high thru college I’d spend time with the science and math kids and they weren’t into drink or drugs. As an adult I’m legally responsible for all the other employees’ wellbeing in a physical sense so I couldn’t ever really be lit in any way naturally.

But I wouldn’t look down on my neighbors for what they use. I see life is tough and people need something to take the edge off.

102

Mental Health | Health Effects | Marijuana | CDC).

Serotonin Syndrome versus Cannabis Toxicity in the Emergency Department - PMC.
Young men at highest risk of schizophrenia linked with cannabis use disorder | National Institutes of Health (NIH).

A few articles linked above. I don’t know how much of a risk the occasional joint presents. Nor do I know if there’s a causative effect (pot tweaks the brain chemistry and allows these illness to develop in those who are susceptible) or it’s “just” correlation (people whose brains are at risk are self-medicating).

I do personally know of one young woman (my daughter met at a residential treatment facility) who has been diagnosed as schizophrenic. She was discharged from the facility, was doing OK on her own, then started really going downhill. Quit taking her meds, was smoking a lot of weed, etc. It was pretty rough - she wound up homeless for a while. Last I heard, she was back at the facility and doing much better; my daughter hasn’t reported back to me on how she’s doing now.

Anyway: if it affects the serotonin levels in the brain, that clearly would affect mood one way or the other.

103

No drugs, no drinking, no smoking for me. All personal choices, without much thought beyond “not really interested” but I don’t regret it, it seems like many of these can be a real problem for some folks, so I’m glad to have missed out on that.

However, there is a certain amount of social bonding that I have subsequently never experienced, which I am of two minds about. On the one hand, many opportunities for friendships or relationships may have been missed; but on the other hand, I am more comfortable as a social loner anyway, which seems to be common for a lot of people as they age, so maybe I would’ve inevitably ended up this way and I just figured that out early.

104

This is my concern. The only person I can think of who would or could be my trip-sitter for my first time on shrooms would be my sister, who’s done both ayahuasca and shrooms before. But she tends to be a rather snarky, sarcastic person with a short fuse. I’m concerned she may say or do things during my trip that could totally throw me off.

105

Lots of “yeah, said no”, and then list the drugs they used.

106

In my older and (theoretically) wiser years, it’s occurred to me that I never really enjoyed socializing with those who were impaired, whether because of alcohol or other substances. I don’t find drunks amusing - just annoying and maybe a little scary. Certainly not the sorts of folks I’d want to bond with socially or otherwise.

FWIW, I’m 69, so Just Say No came well after my school days. My anti-drug messages were more along the line of Reefer Madness, and I was a pretty hard-core goody-goody anyway. Then there’s the financial aspect - I doubt I could have afforded to indulge even if I’d been so inclined.

Similarly for me - I remember my first taste of wine - it was something like watered down Mogen David over ice. I thought I was such a big deal! Then when I was a bit older, my folks let me try a whiskey sour, tho I’m sure they cut way back on the whiskey for my serving. But as a result, alcohol had no forbidden-fruit appeal to me.

A definite benefit to that - spousal unit and I don’t order drinks when we dine out. I’m sure that’s saved us a small fortune over the years!

107

I’m actually in a slightly weird place about “just say no” - as late 40-something, I’m a bit younger than the average here, and growing up, my parents were pretty darn liberal east coast types. Thus, I had good at home sex ed and drug ed by puberty.

Their attitudes towards “just say no” was pretty much correct until college, then try what I want, but wanted me to know the dangers. For example, smoking was a pretty hard no from them, but that was in an era where it was becoming obvious how medically risky it was - and I had by that point lost 3 grandparents due to smoking influenced deaths.

Booze was suggested as try in college, and my parents didn’t really drink (I take that back, my step-father drank like a fish, but that’s a different story) and I was told that if I did end up drinking, or was out with my friends drinking and someone who had was then going to drive - NO, call them (my folks) and they’d pick me up or get me a taxi no questions asked.

As for Pot, well, my folks said they smoked it and enjoyed it when they were younger, but that the trouble of getting it and keeping it wasn’t worth the effort after they moved. They considered it far less risky/dangerous than booze, and years later, when my mom met my wife-to-be the first time, shocked her by talking about how much mom hoped MJ was legal by the time she was in her 70s because arthritis gallops in our family and she wanted some good pot to deal with it. Sadly, she lives in TX right now to be close to my niece and nephew, but if she was here in Colorado…

Anyway, TL;DR, I followed my parents advice and tried stuff in College. I found booze to be a bit relaxing, but doesn’t particularly taste good, so I’m a Rum and Coke kind of guy 2-3 times a week, or a splash of rum in a late night decaf coffee.

I tried MJ enough times for it to have an effect (I could hardly have avoided it as my mandatory roommate in freshman year college was very into it), and found I did NOT like the loss of control I felt while using. So, yeah, no more of that.

Smoking, cocaine, and most ‘harder’ drugs, the TV reports, emerging science, and other sources convinced me it wasn’t worth it, and I never tried, with no feeling of loss on my side.

108

Yeah, even as someone who’s pretty good at taking hallucinogens and keeping a handle on things, I’d be a bit leery about tripping around someone who I think might mess with me. I can normally tell myself “Look, you’ve taken a powerful drug, and some of the stuff you think is happening may or may not really be happening” and usually figure things out pretty quickly. That becomes much more difficult if someone is actively messing with you.

109

What I don’t like about a trip, is laying there at the end, waiting for sleep that never comes, or is fitful, feeling “Squeezed” like a lemon, all through your limbic and brain. It is like you are recovering from mousekiller and more taxing. The buzz in your spine is trypophobic and teeth grinding.

110

Yeah. That’s no fun. Eventually I learned that if I was going to trip on LSD, to start early. That doesn’t happen for me on shrooms.

111

I never knowing tied pot. I was told once that I ate a brownie from the wrong plate and it had pot in it, but I felt nothing. I sat in the Fenway Park bleachers many a Saturday and I’m sure I inhaled quite a bit as they were passing joints around passed us. I’ve never had anything harder.

I’ve sipped champagne at various wedding, but have never drunk anything else alcoholic except possibly some hard by accident cider.

I’ve never used tobacco.

I guess I’m just boring.

112

I “just said no.” That’s what Nancy Reagan and the grownups told us to do, so I did it. In college I succumbed to peer pressure and tried getting drunk, but as a teenager/young adult, I could never understand why anyone would ever even try an illegal drug. The grownups said they were bad. Why would you do something that was bad?

In reflecting on this in later years, and wondering why so many people apparently didn’t think the way I did, I’ve tried to psychoanalyze my younger self, and the conclusion I’ve reached is that it’s common to identify with your peer group much more strongly than I did. A socially mainstream teenager who’s been told all his life that drugs are bad, when his friends start trying marijuana, his reaction might be “hey… wait a minute… I know Nancy Reagan and the grownups told me it was bad, but if Jim and Rob are trying it, maybe that means it’s OK! I mean, they’re my friends, so they can’t be the Bad Kids!” But I wasn’t a socially mainstream kid, and I kind of identified more with Nancy Reagan and the grownups than I did with the Jims and Robs in my life. So when my friends started experimenting with marijuana, my only reaction was “Aaaaaggghhhh! Even my friends are turning into Bad Kids! Help! Get me out of here!” and to stop hanging out with them. And that apparently is not the reaction of socially mainstream people.

113

Well, they’d also told me that dirt bikes, bb guns, and premarital sex were bad. I’d already tried those, and thought they were awesome. Maybe they didn’t have the same idea of “bad” as I did. Either way, something wasn’t connecting.

114

That fits with my theory, though. I didn’t try any of those other things either.

115

Something I thought of while reading this; anyone ever try Mail Pouch chewing tobacco? In my 30s at some point I bought some. I tried liking it. I honestly tried. I guess I got a little nicotine buzz, but it was messy and totally unenjoyable. My first pouch was my last.

116

It’s interesting how people all have this threshold where everyone who does less alcohol and drugs is a boring nerd and everyone who does more is a pot/crack/meth head loser!

On the one hand, kids are supposed to do stuff adults tell them not to. Some of that stuff is awesome. Some of it isn’t good for them. Some of it is both. And the reality is, relationship with alcohol and drugs is a big part of how teenagers and 20-somethings socialize (or at least it was in the Just Say No days).

OTOH, drugs and alcohol don’t really provide any real benefit. And they can be detrimental once you outgrow the “keg party” age and have real responsibilities like a career or family (unless maybe if that career is on Wall Street).

But as I said, I never found those anti-drug messages particularly effective. For every cautionary film like “Less Than Zero”, Hollywood cranks out “Animal House” or “Fast Times at Ridgemont High” or pretty much every other movie about partying that makes it look TOTALLY AWESOME! And Even Less Than Zero made that lifestyle look pretty cool, except for Robert Downy Jr as the one dude who couldn’t handle his shit.

Come on Hollywood, make up your mind. Will drugs and booze turn me into James Spaders bitch or will it turn me into Tony Stark and…well James Spader still tries to make him his bitch, but at least it’s as a giant robot.

In college they had some Just Say No lady come around to each of the fraternities to teach us about alcohol and drugs. She played this video of an experiment showing the (mostly hilarious) effects after each shot. So what do you think was the first thing every fraternity did that night? They attempted to recreate the experiment (or exceed it).

117

Goodness, I can’t begin to fathom that kind of obedient mindset. When I was 18, I was convinced that the elders running things were complete morons and I’ve seen little to influence this thinking otherwise in the ensuing decades.

And one of the things they were wrong about was weed which was very enjoyable.

118

Well, to be honest, there is often an “herbal” and “acrid” taste or slightly, late, to set “aftertaste” to some edibles. Not necesarily “skunky” at all, just s bitter herbal, like medicine. And it really depends on the process of extraction and the type of edible. If you suck on a candy or gummi or somesuch, it will come through. I have had nearly impercetible bake goods and some grungy ones…Again, I think it is all about extraction and recipe…

119

I always thought Nancy Reagan was a dunce. So nothing she said influenced me at all. Maybe pushed me a little in the opposite direction.

120

Not only did the “just say no” campaign fail on me, it taught me a valuable lesson at a young age - the government isn’t always telling the truth. Had teachers, law enforcement, and politicians been honest with their information about marijuana, that might have actually worked. But some of the claims were so outrageous that when I did try pot, I discovered that they were lying to me. The downside of this was that I then tried other drugs that were far more dangerous. I’m not sure if I would have done that, had they not made up so much crazy shit about smoking pot. Thankfully, I left those other drugs behind fairly quickly, and just stuck with pot. I still smoke it, but I don’t drink alcohol because I consider it a far more dangerous drug.