stoned-parents-second-hand-smoke

Stoned Parents from a Child’s Perspective

Growing up around marijuana smoke was not easy

I was born in 1967 and my mom smoked while she was pregnant with me. So I was born premature at 4 lbs, and I contracted pneumonia. I spent the first month of my life in an incubator. Then I developed asthma and have lived with it all of my life.  Back then the pot was a lot milder than the strains they are growing now, and I can’t imagine what kinds of birth defects and illnesses the new, stronger pot will cause in a developing fetus.

When I was growing up neither of my parents could hold down a job because they were too busy partying, and they both used marijuana in our house several times a day.   A relative gave them a small apartment to rent at a discounted rate, which is the only reason we had a roof over our heads.  They were always starting a new job and then getting fired because they were either stoned on the job, or late for work or calling off.

Parenting and Pot Don’t Mix

They smoked pot daily in front of me, without caring about my respiratory illness.  I would get pneumonia and bronchitis a few times a year.   Often times they would forget to pay the bills and the electric or heat would get shut off, and they never had food in the house. So many times my only meal would be the free lunch that I qualified for in school, or the block of government cheese we would get because someone was always on unemployment.

What Saved Me from Stoned Parents

I went home with friends a lot, so that I could get a hot dinner and do my homework.  If I tried to do my schoolwork at home I couldn’t because I got stoned regularly on the thick clouds of secondhand pot smoke that greeted me when I walked in the door.

I lived with my grandparents on and off, and this helped a lot.  They were not drug users and they provided hot meals and a clean environment where I could study and relax.

I could never relax at home because my parents were always smoking pot with their friends.  It was on an hour to hour basis because my Dad was selling drugs on the side.  I would put damp towels under my bedroom door to try to keep the secondhand pot smoke from floating into my bedroom.   Sometimes they would have creepy people come over to buy the pot, and a few times strange men tried to grab me or abused me in some way.  My parents were unaware of this because they were usually so mind-numbingly stoned.

My mother got sober in her 30s and my dad in his 60s, because he had a heart condition and his doctor warned him that smoking pot would give him a heart attack.  They are both mostly sober now, and sorry for neglecting me as a kid, but they don’t really remember much of it because they were constantly stoned.  I tell them things now that they did and they are amazed and horrified.

How Cannabis effects me today

I can’t bear the stench of pot smoke now, and I am repulsed when I see someone using it in a public place, like in a movie theater, a grocery store or a shopping mall.  I feel sorry for the upcoming generations of kids who may suffer birth defects because corporate pot is pushing it on people like a medicinal wonder.  It’s a tragedy that millions will be neglected or abused because their parents are addicts like mine were.

I was so blessed to have wonderful grandparents, two sets of them, as well as teachers and clergy who looked after me.  I am a success and not an addict myself because of them, and I know how lucky I am…. because not every child of drug-addicted parents has anyone else to turn to.

Submitted by an Anonymous PopPot Fan.