Am I in love with an marijuana addict? Here's my story. Looking for answers!

[sadgirlfriend]

I am the girlfriend of a marijuana user, and I am looking for support and answers on what I should do. Stick with him? Walk away? I am in love with this man very, very much, and from the bottom of my heart, I want to stand by my man. Here's our story (as short as possible):

We've been in a long distance relationship for about a year and get to see one another every couple of months. From pretty early on, we fell head over heels. He talked about how I was the one and how he wanted to have kids with me, and once told me that I made him want to be a better man. He did share with me early on that he smoked marijuana once in a while, and the longer the relationship has gone on, it seems clear to me that it's more than "once in a while." Of course, being long distance, the relationship consists of a lot of phone time. For the first half or more of the relationship, we talked all the time. Then a few months back, we went through a period of time where he did not call me for a number of days. Of course, I was worried that he was no longer interested in me. After reconnecting, he assured me that it wasn't me, he loves me, just been working doubles and tired and what have you. This periods of phone absence went on and off for the past few months...mostly just two days at a time...and I was always reassured when we spoke again that it wasn't our relationship. He made it very clear to me by saying that he absolutely loves me and wants us to be together. In the past six months or so, we decided that I would be moving to him sometime this fall. As recently as a week and a half ago, we were ironing out the logistics of my move.

Flashback: my last visit to him was mid-June, and it was the first time that he smoked pot in front of me. He's known all along that I am not thrilled with it. We talked about it, and he said that he's done it for a long time (decades), and that it's very under control, that he smokes because he likes it and that he's not addicted to it. He said that I have to accept it because he's not going to detox for someone else and that if he ever were to detox it would be because he decided to and not because I asked him to. That actually makes perfect sense to me because I believe the addict has to want to detox if it will ever stick. Anyhow, he knows that I smoked a tiny bit in high school (decades ago) and that I chose not to smoke any longer, but I told him that I am OK with his smoking from time to time if he isn't dependent upon it, and I also told him that I do not judge him for it or think less of him for it. He said he appreciated that very much. Also while I was visiting, we talked about those times when he went "absent" over the phone, and I told him how that scared me and made me feel like he was about to break up with me. He told me that I have to get that out of my head because he absolutely doesn't want to break up with me and loves me. He told me that "he met the most wonderful person and that he doesn't want to screw it up!" So now, flash forward...

After my recent visit, the next two weeks were great. We had a great visit and we talked on the phone a lot after the visit, including talking about and getting excited about moving forward with my move so that we could be a couple in the same place and not long distance anymore. Then, the absence started again. I would call and leave a message to say "hello and that I love you" or send an "I love you and miss you" text which he usually responds to, but a few days went by and nothing. I tried to be patient and give him space if he wanted it, but after three days, I left him a message to say that "I missed his voice and wanted to reconnect. Please call me when you can...I love you" He did call that night, but I missed his call because I was at an event. I called when I was on my way home and said a simple "Sorry I missed your call. Call me back as soon as you can. Want to reconnect! Love you!" He didn't call back, and after a few days, I really started to worry. I know he works every Sunday, so I left him a tearful message when I thought he'd be on his way to work this past Sunday morning. In a nutshell, I said I was worried about him. Was he OK? Were we OK? Please send me a text if you can't call. I miss you!" About an hour or so later, I got a text in which he called me by my nickname and said he was ok and that we are ok, that he missed me and that he'd call me during a break.... He did NOT call that day, nor the rest of the next day. I tried calling him a few times, and he would not call back. I left him a very long message saying a lot of what I wanted to say. I asked for him to dig deep and to just call me and explain what was going on. I had a very big meltdown that evening and tried him again and left another message asking him to just at least text me letting me know if he wanted to continue with our relationship or not and that he needed to let me know one way or another. He did not call back or text back, and he sent my calls into his voicemail. The following day (this past Tuesday), I sent him a very long, very heartfelt email letting him know that I am not sure why he is unable to reach out to me but that I believe in him and in us, and that I am not letting go of hope for us. I told him that if he needed to lay low for a few days and sort things out, that he should take some time and that I'd be as patient as possible and not call him for a while. I told him that I still believed that he loved me and that all of this was related to other pressures and stresses in his life, and that all I want to do is lend him my support. I did say that I wanted him to call me in a week or two, if that's what he needed, but that at some point we need to talk.

So, he has not contacted me still at all, and I've cried A LOT. My very closest girlfriends have been pillars of strength for me and said that they'd support me no matter what I decided. We have spent a lot of time dissecting what this could all be about. These friends have all had firsthand experience with addicts and all agree that these are signs of addictive behavior. I think the closer we got to my moving to him, the more stress he might be under because maybe he doesn't want to disappoint me with his habit. Maybe he's feeling more financial pressures (I know this to be the case) and has been using more than usual to feel less stressed out. these are all just guesses and theories of mine. The bottom line is... I LOVE THIS PERSON. He's an amazing human being. So loving to me, so warm and kindhearted. I believe that he wants a family, I believe that he wants his career to improve and not be in a financial hole, but I know how stressful all of that can be. I wish he knew just how much I want to love and support him and help him through this, but he won't even call back, so I'm not sure what, if anything, there is for me to do. I'm torn up over this. I finally found the man I wanted to marry, who wanted to marry me, and now all of this. I have no doubt that going down a path with an addict would be a hard one, but I am ready to stand by him through thick and thin. Is there anything I can do...especially if he won't call? I am standing by my email to him of not calling him, but the more days that drift by without hearing from him, the more worried I am that he'll never pick up the phone again.

I would love to hear from other girlfriends out there, BUT I REALLY think hearing from other users to let me know if these behaviors sound like those of an addict, your opinions on what, if anything, I can do? Is it best to leave him alone or would I be better off reminding him from time to time that I still believe in him and stand by our love. I have not told him at all that I think he is an addict. I've come up with this on my own and with my closest friends. I want to be with this person, through good times and bad, and want advice on how to let him see this and that he can trust me with this. PLEASE HELP! Thank you.

[pursuit of happiness]

all i can say is TRY TO HELP HIM FROM THE BOTTOM OF YOUR HEART AND INSIST ON HELPING HIM. IF HE DOESNT WANT TO STOP GIVE HIM AN ULTIMATUM. THIS MAY SOUND SELFISH BUT TRUST ME WHEN I TELL YOU ( IM ALSO A MARIJUANA USER) THAT IF YOU STAY WITH HIM YOU WILL BECOME CO-DEPENDENT ON HIS ADDICTION. IM AT THE MOMENT REALLY MENTALLY PREPARING MYSELF TO STOP. ITS NOT EASY. GIVE HIM A CHANCE BUT REMEMBER...

[Cannabis Rehab Admin]

Hi sadgirlfriend welcome.

It sounds like there’s a lot going on, some of which may be related to his marijuana use some of which may not. I know when I was hooked I let relationships slide and yes that can be the behaviour of an addict, but that isn’t necessarily the only reason why a relationship can deteriorate even if somebody is an addict, which without knowing how much and how often he uses I couldn’t really say one way or the other. This behaviour could be related to an addiction or he could be just messing you about, unfortunately there are loads of people who will do that and still tell you exactly what you want to hear, I have to say in all honesty that I don’t really know what’s going on, whether it’s related to drugs or just him. So I can’t really say whether he is just treating you badly, or whether he needs help and you should stand by him or what and I am not sure you do yet, all you can do is see how it unfolds and act accordingly. What I would advise however is when you do next hear from him, is that you lay your cards on the table and have a very frank discussion with him, you need to tell him that if there is some kind of valid reason for why this is happening, then you need to know about it, so you can work through it together, but if he is just running hot and cold on you and messing you about for now good reason then I don’t really see much future in it. But as I always say in matters like this I can’t really tell you what to do, only you can decide that for yourself, just make sure you give yourself the consideration you deserve.

Take care and please keep us posted on how it goes.

All the best.

[sadgirlfriend]

pursuit of happiness and Rehab Admin, thank you for your replies and for welcoming me to the forum. Of course, I couldn't agree more, BFB, that the troubles in our relationship may or may not stem exclusively from marijuana use. I, myself, am unsure of how just how much or how frequent my boyfriend's marijuana use is. Because his behavior of absence/avoidance has been an inconsistent but present part of our relationship in the past few months, and always seeming to be tied to times of stress, I cannot be sure if it is due to an addiction. Because he has shut me out in this recent, long, and very difficult stretch, I have been left on my own to search for and seek out answers. That is how I came across this site. I have read so many of your stories, and it has brought me both comfort and sadness to see so many ppl struggle with addiction. Comfort in that I might not be alone in my situation and sadness that the difficulties, circumstances, what have you, in life have left so many ppl dependent upon something that only offers a false sense of security and comfort. I cannot begin to understand the struggles that many on here face, but I can say that in reading the stories of hope and desire to change and take back your lives, you all have my utmost admiration, respect and support. As the loved one of a user, I beg all of you to dig as deep as you can to stay strong, believe in yourselves, and to conquer that which may be keeping you from the best possible life you can have for both yourself as well as all of those that love you.

BFB, you are absolute right that our problems may or may not be exclusively tied to marijuana addiction, and I am daily searching for the answers of what it might be that is keeping him from reaching out to me. He did, in fact, send me a text message in the middle of the night last night that he missed me. I struggle in whether or not to find comfort in that message because ultimately, we need to speak to one another...honestly about the problems and struggles that we face.

Of course, I will keep you posted on our progress as well as my own because ultimately, I have to take care of myself. And I thank you for even taking a moment of your time to help a stranger in need, looking for answers and with the desire to help the man she loves.

God bless all of you in your journeys. Ask your angels for help. I've found that to be very helpful to me. Our guardian angels are here to help, but they need to be asked for it before they can provide any intervention.

Godspeed.

[Cannabis Rehab Admin]

I know what you mean, I too have spent long periods of time on my own with nothing else to do but analyze things, you can’t help but not that’s just the way the human mind works and sometimes it’s so hard to know which is responsible for what, especially when there are a number of potential causes and very often there can be a number of reasons for why things are the way they are, lots of things in life are a very rich tapestry with a number of contributing factors, which makes it even tougher to figure out what is going on. You can quite literally drive yourself crazy!

I think the best thing you can do in a situation like this is try to communicate as much as possible, but as you already know that has to be a two way thing, so I guess it’s down to whether he is prepared to open up, I hope he is. Anyway thanks for your gracious reply your very kind.

Take care

[cbc990]

Dunno if you're still checking in, but I think this information is useful for anyone in the same situation.

Here's what you need to ask yourself: If you found out that he smokes all day every day, and has no intention of stopping or even slowing down, would you still want to be with him? If he has no intention of quitting, then you have to decide whether you accept him the way he is. If you move into his house, be prepared that he might smoke inside constantly and will be offended if you ask him to change his behaviour in his own home.

Quite honestly, I believe that if he was an addict when you met him, you would never be able to force him to quit. People have to see their addictions for what they are. They have to hit rock-bottom before there's any real motivation to stop.

Maybe losing the woman of his dreams will snap some sense in to him, force him to hit rock-bottom. He says he loves pot and wouldn't quit for someone else, and you're perfectly right about that not working. It's more likely to cause him to sneak around behind your back.

The other problem is that although this may sound like an addict's behaviour, I hate to tell you that it also sounds like a cheater's behaviour, and there's no way for you to know from so far away which one it is. But either way, it sounds like you're in for more heartache than you bargained for.

[Inpatient Outpatient]

Ex girlfriend of an addict

Hello, I am an ex girlfriend of an addict. I am an ex for a reason and I will tell you why.....

My boyfriend and I met about four years ago. We got together and fell in love. We spent so much time together and we knew we were right for each other. He smoked a little the drug but not even enough to get upset over. His friends at the time were chronic the drug smokers. My ex boyfriend used to talk about them all the time, telling me how he was worried about them and that they smoked to much and reassuring me that he would never be like that.

Time went on and he started hanging out with his friends more. It was two guys that were twins. He started smoking more, I will let you know he only smoked twice a week with half a joint or one bowl from a pipe getting him high.
He started smoking more, and started smoking every time he was with them. He started spending money on bongs and spent $300 on a vaporizer because his friends like the vaporizer. He started making home made tools to smoke with. Pipes from different kinds of veggies, and bongs from different type of drinking equipment. He started trying more ways to smoke. I will list all the ways he smoked,
Pipe
Joint
Bong
Blunt
Bucket
Vaporizor
Gas Mask
Hukah
Cross-Joint

Those are just the only ones I know of. He soon started making up excuses of why he needed to smoke. It was his friends birthday, his old time friend was coming down, he would see a friend that he would never see again. Any event he would try and make an excuse to get high at.

I started smoking as well. At one point I almost started smoking as much as he did. Well not close. The most I smoked was 3 or 4 times every weekend.

One thing that I was really sad for me was that our sex life went WAY down in this process. He made excuses of why he didn't or to him "couldn't" do it. He told me he didn't have any sex drive but ironically enough was a horn dog when he only smoked once or twice a week. He told me it was because of his asthma, how he can only do it at 3 in the morning when I was basically asleep. Later on I was tired of the excuses and he just told me in the long run, it was because he didn't care. He didn't want to have sex with me at all. I think for two months we went with out doing it, and I mean with out doing ANYTHING!

When hanging with me, he wanted to smoke before doing anything. We couldn't watch a movie with out being high together.

His dad owned a grow up which he got highly involved. At one point he was basically doing everything for his dad. Trimming, planting, growing, selling, delivering, anything that went a long with it. He loved it and soon talked about how he wanted to start his own grow op and just start by cloning plants. He stole a seed from his dads plant.

I told him my concerns I had for him over and over. It hurt me so much to know that he was smoking 3 times a day at least now and needing to smoke around 3-7 bowls to get high. I tried to encourage him to quite. I probably didn't go a good job of it because I was stressed. He said he really wanted to but always told me that the current moment wasn't a good time and never gave me any reason on why.

Not to long ago his dad got busted for grow op. He is getting charged with trafficking, growing with the attempt to sell and having cannabis resin on him. He is also getting charged with having brass knuckles on him.

Even with getting charged, and is loving pot more then ever. Pot is now basically his religion. Pot fixes everything and has a hard time befriending anyone who doesn't have the same views on pot. He is in love with Gods seed as some pot smokers put it. I think he is now smoking twice as much as he did before. I think it's his way of saying "**** You" to the government.

He loves his pot and will quite for no one. He is willing to risk getting cought any time. To him, nothing matters but his tolk. I left him because of it and after almost 3 years, doesn't have a problem with it. He is tolking away and is probably fine about the hole thing. I do not talk to him anymore.

What he did broke my heart to the extreme. We are not meant to be even though I some times think we would of been. It's not like I left him because we couldn't get along or we didn't enjoy each others company. He is totally obsessed with pot. With his friends it kind of like their own cult. They live by the rules of pot, and pot comes first before anything. I left that circle of friends and have very few left to lean on, so I come on here.

I have be clean from any drug for a while but have been clean from pot for 16 days.

I hope my story helps a bit and you can think more clearer on what you want or should do.

Saxon.

[gatu]

Hello, I am an ex girlfriend of an addict. I am an ex for a reason and I will tell you why.....

His dad owned a grow up which he got highly involved. At one point he was basically doing everything for his dad. Trimming, planting, growing, selling, delivering, anything that went a long with it. He loved it and soon talked about how he wanted to start his own grow op and just start by cloning plants. He stole a seed from his dads plant.

I told him my concerns I had for him over and over. It hurt me so much to know that he was smoking 3 times a day at least now and needing to smoke around 3-7 bowls to get high. I tried to encourage him to quite. I probably didn't go a good job of it because I was stressed. He said he really wanted to but always told me that the current moment wasn't a good time and never gave me any reason on why.

Not to long ago his dad got busted for grow op. He is getting charged with trafficking, growing with the attempt to sell and having cannabis resin on him. He is also getting charged with having brass knuckles on him.

Even with getting charged, and is loving pot more then ever. Pot is now basically his religion. Pot fixes everything and has a hard time befriending anyone who doesn't have the same views on pot. He is in love with Gods seed as some pot smokers put it. I think he is now smoking twice as much as he did before. I think it's his way of saying "**** You" to the government.

He loves his pot and will quite for no one. He is willing to risk getting cought any time. To him, nothing matters but his tolk. I left him because of it and after almost 3 years, doesn't have a problem with it. He is tolking away and is probably fine about the hole thing. I do not talk to him anymore.

What he did broke my heart to the extreme. We are not meant to be even though I some times think we would of been. It's not like I left him because we couldn't get along or we didn't enjoy each others company. He is totally obsessed with pot. With his friends it kind of like their own cult. They live by the rules of pot, and pot comes first before anything. I left that circle of friends and have very few left to lean on, so I come on here.

I have be clean from any drug for a while but have been clean from pot for 16 days.

I hope my story helps a bit and you can think more clearer on what you want or should do.

Saxon.

wow! my ex is also obsessed about clonning and planting and that really breaks my heart..I cannot understand it. I saw him after few years and he adores his pot more tahn ever... he says he would quit for no one and that he prefers it more than a woman..! I was like WTF!? I just hope he realizes very soon that his addiction won´t take him anywhere! he is 38, lives with his grandma and has no car, nor a job! neither other ambitions apart from his seeds... I still love him because I think he is a great guy, but maybe not for me... or any woman really, he knows that though! he is conscious ... after long time we still have the connection and I still love him but .... not for me, as much as I would like it to be (((

[Cannabis Rehab Guest]

hello. I just had to respond to this poor girl. I am coming out of a brutally painful 10 year marriage to a cannabis addicted wife. She has torn my heart to shreds. Abandoned me multiple times for 6 months and a year at a time. She has cheated on me and betrayed me many times. Lied to me a million times. All but destroyed me as a man. I dont even know who i am anymore. I am forsaken again by her. Alone. Sad. Despair. Pain. She left me for a younger man half her age. He smokes chronic. She has always thought other pothead men were sexy. Thats what she wants. I would never join her in her addiction. I got addicted to weed as a teen. I almost committed suicide at 18. I remember what it did to me. I will never go back to it. I told her this. She knew it. I tried to make her stop for ten years. We were just incompatible. She was a ganja worshipper. I wasnt. That simple. It destroyed our marriage with two little beautiful girls.
As for the ignored calls for days on end. IT WONT STOP IF YOU MARRY HIM. IT WILL GET WORSE. Mine turned into weeks on end. MONTHS ON END. Ignored phone calls and texts by the THOUSANDS. Why? Because she was STONED. And she didnt care. Period.
I judge no one. To each their own. If you like smoking weed. Go for it. Leave non smokers alone for romance. Spare them the pain. Find a smoker.
To the girl contemplating her relationship with her boyfriend who ignores her calls. ITS THE PLANT HE SMOKES. You will not change him. These things happen early in relationships to WARN us. I ignored the warnings with my late wife who i loved with all my being but i eventually had to say goodbye to because she was a pot addict. It wont work. If you think he is causing you pain now~ Try being married to him. Having children with him. And he continues to worship in the temple of the plant. Which he will. Unless he decides to change. THINK LONG AND HARD BEFORE MARRYING A POT ADDICT.
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