How High Can Marijuana Get You Before You Can't Feel It Anymore?
What happens when you're smoking the strongest bubblehash and barely getting buzzed? 
My friend who grows the finest hydroponics marijuana called to say he was worried because all he was smoking was marijuana “concentrates.” He meant concentrated marijuana products like bubblehash and butane hashish, which are to regular marijuana what grain alcohol is to beer.
“Doesn't sound like a problem to me. What’s the worry?” I said to him. “Most people would be envious of you.”
“It’s because I can’t get high off regular bud anymore,” he replied. “I could smoke an entire ounce of OG Kush, Diesel, Haze, BlueDream, Trainwreck, whatever, and not feel it. Hell, I can barely feel the concentrates.”
It reminded me of my own efforts to make the most of my marijuana when I too was smoking more THC than ever, but feeling it less.
To truly understand how high is too high, we need to remember that marijuana gets you high because it contains unique chemicals, called cannabinoids.
When you smoke marijuana or eat marijuana edibles, these cannabinoids bind with "receptor sites" in your brain and the rest of your body. It's like a lock and key mechanism, and it changes your personal chemistry.
You feel the change as being "high," as your body makes major adjustments trying to handle the influx of THC and other cannabinoids.
For example, influx of external cannabinoids makes your body decrease the amount and/or circulation of some natural chemicals your body would normally produce. The most important of these natural chemicals is “anandamide."
The word anadamide comes from the root ananda, which is a word that means "bliss." Anadamide and its receptor system are part of your body's way of making you feel better, hungrier, more relaxed, more positive.
Marijuana plants make THC, a cannabinoid that's functions almost exactly like anandamide in your body. THC fits into cellular structures in your brain (and other parts of your body) that Nature designed as receptor sites for anandamide and other chemicals your body internally produces.
When cannabinoids enter your body and bind with receptor sites meant for anandamide, the process triggers a cascade of physiological effects that alter the number and/or activity of receptor sites.
And because the anandamide system is a major receptor system in your body, cannabinoid use has wide-ranging effects...not just in your brain, but in all kinds of tissue and organs. That's one reason marijuana is such a versatile, safe medicine.
But as your brain and body habituate to marijuana, it changes you physically, and changes how you experience the marijuana high. Here's what happened to me as I got used to marijuana...
When I first started smoking marijuana, I smoked leaf. It probably had 2% THC, if that much, but it got me absolutely blasted.
However, after a few weeks smoking leaf, I had to smoke a lot more of it just to feel anything. So I started smoking primo bud. At first, bud stoned me hard. A half-gram was all I needed. Pretty soon, I needed a gram. Later on I could hit bongs all day and night and only feel about as high as I used to feel when I smoked a wee bit of leaf.
Before we continue with the thrilling saga of how high is too high, consider this insightful rant from comedian Joe Rogan as he talks about marijuana's effects on the body's internal chemistry...
Joe Rogan rocks, but let's get right back to how high is too high. When I got bored smoking bong hits all day, I started smoking concentrates. Pretty soon, I got to where I could smoke the strongest concentrate known to earthlings: an alcohol-extract hashish paste that's almost all THC.
The first time I hit that hashish, it was about an eighth of a gram on a knife heated by a propane torch. I inhaled the vapor through a glass tube. The high rushed my head like a rocketship and in about half a second I turned into a blob of quivering, ecstatic jelly.
The intense first rush of that high felt like a psychedelic drug, and lasted six hours. I enjoyed a warm, fuzzy, smiley residual high the next day and the next...the gift that keeps on giving.
After a few weeks of smoking that stuff (they call it "hippie crack"), I still got a very nice buzz every time, but nowhere near the buzz I had gotten the first few times I smoked. It was kind of funny at parties...people shared with me connoisseur marijuana, and were surprised when I didn't get stoned and fall off the couch.
I was too high to get high.
Finally when it got to the point that I never felt high anymore, I decided to stop using marijuana until I was "unstoned" again.
For the first ten days I felt fine, although I missed my daily marijuana fun. But then, after a certain percentage of THC had leached out of my system, I lost my appetite, couldn’t sleep at night, all kinds of aches and pains wracked my body, I was angry and depressed all the time.
During that unpleasant phase, I talked to specialists, researchers and potheads trying to figure out how I can enjoy marijuana without becoming so THC-habituated that even the strongest hashish barely gave me a buzz.
My research recognizes the fact that each of us have a different relationship with marijuana. I've met people who can feel every hit they take. Some folks smoke a bowl every few days, while others constantly smoke smoke smoke and have no worries about it.
Me personally, I couldn't accept that I was smoking so much THC, and not feeling high. It just wasn't fun anymore. I needed to do better than that- for myself, my friends and my family.
Turns out there are ways to take care of your brain, manage your marijuana use, and keep it fun and healthy. Check out the follow-up article here that tells you all about it. And stay tuned to BigBudsmag.com, cuz we're the only magazine dedicated to helping you grow premium connoisseur marijuana and use it intelligently.
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Thursday, 06 October 2011
