Hypothetical question: someone smokes marijuana once, and 2 months later, he has a blood test. Would the weed show up in his blood test?
I did try googling this, but got a lot of conflicting answers. Also, my teacher claims that weed stays in your system for 6 months after you use it, but that sounded a little fishy to me.
(Disclaimer: marijuana is illegal in much of the US. I’m not sure if this is legal to post this question here - the rules about posting about illegal drugs are here, and I don’t think I’ve broken any rules. I figured that this question would be okay since it’s just hypothetical, and it isn’t about where to obtain drugs or anything, and no, I’m not trying to get drugs.)
One-time use probably would not be detected after two months.
Regular users can test hot for months after they quit. Metabolites get trapped in fat cells, then released.
Six months seems unlikely, but a hair test might show it.
But 30-45 days is the standard timeframe for ‘typical’ urinalysis.
Marijuana is one of the most durable drugs as far as testing. (Alcohol is one of the least durable). You could detect marijuana use after two months pretty easily. Six months would be out at the edge but possible.
That’s for blood and urine testing. Hair testing can test a longer time period - twelve months is possible. Remember when Britney Spears shaved her head? A rumor was she was worried about a court ordered drug test and was destroying the evidence.
A one time pot user will test clean in about 5 days. A regular user who ingests or smokes 3 or 4 times per week will test clean in about 2 weeks. A chronic user may take as much as a month to test clean.
The stories of it taking 6 months to clear your system are just that, stories. There are standards that must be met by the reviewing officer and when the level falls below a certain amount the test is a pass. There is no maybe. It is either a pass or fail and only the reviewing person knows if there may be a trace.
I believe that the level in the Wiki below is wrong. It states 50 mg/ml but I think the level is 5 not 50.
This applies only to urine tests, and hair does indeed keep a record of drug use until it is cut.
Props to the OP on stating specifically what type of test he’s asking about, which makes the hair and urine responses interesting but irrelevant.
FTR: I wouldn’t consider your hair as part of “the system”. As I understand follicle structure (and I could very likely be wrong) your hair is biologically dead past the root (why dye jobs can stay until they’re grown out). You can still affect it by applying chemicals directly, but you couldn’t (for example) fix split ends by taking an anti-split-ends vitamin; it’d only take effect when new growth (after taking the vitamin) reached the end.
In Michener’s novel “The Drifters”, reference is made to little cookies made from hashish-which were available in Morocco. If you eat these, do yo experience a different “high” than that obtained from smoking?
As I recall, eating hashish was preferred.
Subjectively, marijuana users tend to report more of a “body high” when eating cannabis, and more of a “head high” when smoking it. A “body high” refers to physical effects, like relaxation, some pleasurable numbness or tingling and a mild pleasant dizziness. “Head high” refers to intellectual effects, like slight to moderate flight of ideas (not generally to the level of psychosis, but I don’t know a better term for it), increased (perception of) creativity, and sometimes paranoia and anxiety (not fun.)
But there are so many different varietals of recreational cannabis, it’s hard to really know if that’s a real effect, or if the cheaper marijuana that’s usually used for cooking (because you need so much of it) just tends to be the same varietals that cause more of a “body high” either way.
Eaten marijuana will still show up in the same tests, for the same length of time as smoked/vaporized marijuana - to bring the question into relevance with the OP.
Ohhhh, yes. The effect is subjectively different,seems to last longer as well. However, it is difficult to self-titrate the effect. Smoking allows small, quickly effective changes to be experienced. After eating cannabis you may wish a plateau would occur but you are unable to effect it.
OP also stated the drug being tested for.
Bloodwork is not the normal routine for marijuana detection.
A factual answer to the OP’s question doesn’t address the reality of the situation.
Given that the original question was an attempt to dispel ignorance, the answers seem appropriate to me.
Edit re eating cannabis: It’s a different experience, I agree with what was said upthread.
Dang old edit window.
Colorado is working on blood tests for drivers, looking for ‘active THC’, but that’s not what the OP is asking about.
That test will work more like current blood alcohol testing. How THC levels relate to impairment is a question the state has no plans to answer.
I’m not sure how this myth that we don’t have a test for acute marijuana intoxication got started, or why it’s so widespread. The technology certainly exists, it’s just not widely used.
