r/WeedPAWS

12 years of heavy use and my symptoms started july 6. I went to the ER twice before I knew what was going on. Between them and my gp everything looked normal and I thought I was crazy along with those around me. It still comes in waves of course but the really bad physical symptoms aren't so bad anymore and I even have breaks of good. Today is that day and I'm grateful. I'm also going through a bad foot injury during all of this so I'm focusing on healing that mostly now because I know that this withdraw is gonna eventually go way even if bad days still happen.

Anyone still have headaches and head pressure after 2 years? This is my most annoying symptom. Just completed 2 years at the end of July.

Hi, I think I have PAWS, too. I went back to the pulmonologist after a year because of my chest pain, and everything still came back normal. I’ve now been prescribed Luforbec, and the chest pain is practically gone after the first dose. The other symptoms - like nausea, reflux, and extreme brain fog - were also much better today. Has anyone else had the same experience? I’m only 6 weeks in, but I’ve been having the problems described here for more than 12 months.

I was a heavy smoker and vaper for 20 years.

I (23m) had been a chronic THC concentrate user for about 2.5 years. Always had a dab pen on me when I was out, and my free time was spent getting baked into oblivion. What finally made me quit was the onset of breathing difficulties, and gut motility issues.

The night I had decided enough was enough, I was wheezing as I tried to fall asleep, and my stomach/small intestine was bloated to the point that it was pressing against my diaphragm. From that point, I quit cold turkey; there has been only two isolated instances of smoking since then, and they both made me feel like I was going to crawl out of my skin like some human-shaped insect.

Since quitting, I have experienced a myriad of symptoms that I struggle to explain. They are constantly on my mind, and I struggle not to obsess over them or connect dots that paint them to be something serious or life threatening. For context, I have been diagnosed with generalized anxiety, treatment resistant depression, and ADHD, so spirals are easy to fall into.

Symptoms I experience are: shortness of breath and a tight feeling in my chest, indigestion, further GI motility issues, brain fog, high heart rate, poor sleep quality, memory laspes, irritability, worsened anxiety, emotional bluntness/disconnect, and more that I'm most likely forgetting about. In all honesty, these may have been thinfs that were occurring during my use of THC; my psychiatrist has explained that THC makes it really easy to push aside negative emotions and sensations. I have been to my primary care office about once a month since May, and I have referrals to GI specialists and will be pursuing more.

How do you all cope with these things? The anxiety, the worry that you'll never be the same, and above all, the physical discomfort. Is there any specific path to feeling OK in my body again, or do I just wait for things to clear up, if they ever do?

TL,DR; Having chronic symptoms crop up after quitting weed (maybe during, timeline is fuzzy), and I'm afraid of never feeling OK again.

I was posting on here 3 years ago abt my journey with this bs. 3 years later I’m still experiencing dpdr. I have the memory of fish. Can’t remember things that just happened and just super forgetful. Constant headaches can’t focus, trouble thinking, and can’t feel any emotion. I feel like I don’t care abt anyone or anything. I never posted again bc I was locked up during that time and just got out a couple of days ago. I’m going to the doctors next week to see if I can get some type of answer or something. Idk how just smoking weed can cause this. I’ve tried smoking to see if it would go away but it just made it worse. Weed doesn’t have the same effect it use to. I can’t feel euphoric or any feelings you should feel when getting high I just get super spaced out and feel like I’m sped. Anyone experience this or still experiencing it ? There’s gotta be something I can do.

So this is my third time going through PAWS. As stupid as it sounds, I didn’t really put the dots together until I was this far into the process. I did a deep dive educating myself on the endocannabinoid system and PAWs and a lot came to light and I was just so shook that I didn’t realize it until I was this far along. It could’ve solved a lot of my problems way earlier if I would’ve known this stuff.

About three years ago there was a switch that was flipped and I could never tolerate cannabis again after that. I started having a lot of panic, rapid heart rate, DPDR and just feeling like my whole equilibrium was off every time I smoked so I quit that first time for eight months, to my surprise I never got better for months and months and months, so I thought that I had an illness of some kind ( I already have one autoimmune disease called Hashimoto’s so I thought it was something to do with that, I am wondering if having preexisting immune issues could make these withdrawals WAY worse? 🤔) but I was going to all sorts of doctors, ending up in the ER several times and yet pretty much all my tests were normal, other than my test for my autonomic nervous system functions came back abnormal and I also went to a functional medicine doctor and paid out of pocket for special hormone testing and it came back with super high levels of cortisol, all which now I know could be explained being secondary to PAWs. The PAWs was awful. I just didn’t even know it was related to the weed so after eight months, I started smoking again same thing happened. I couldn’t tolerate it but yet my addiction overrode the signals and just kept me smoking even though I didn’t enjoy it anymore. I smoked for about six months and then I stopped again for about six months and went into PAWs again still didn’t know what was happening. Still went into a frantic state going to the ER and going to 1 million doctors trying to figure out what was wrong with me. After the six months of sobriety the second time quitting, I was starting to turn a corner for better, which seemed to be about the timeline 6 to 8 months where things would just begin to settle down some, even just a little , the very first glimmers, and that’s when I would always start up smoking again this last and final time I smoked for 10 months straight again 😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫, and I absolutely hated it entirely, thankfully I really started to come out of denial and realize that I was in fact reacting poorly to the cannabis and that I didn’t enjoy it AT ALL. It made me stop and think maybe there’s something going on with this cannabis and this whole health crisis I’ve been in for 3 years, maybe it’s connected 🧐 it was getting so bad, it seemed like my tolerance was going in reverse. I could not handle even a couple hits without plunging into a reaction of tensing up , feeling my heart race, my mind would start speeding up panicking, I would get twitches everywhere and feel all dizzy and disoriented brain fog, off balance like my coordination was being impaired and felt like I was glitching, super slow reaction time, and shakey and my chest and air ways tightening up like I couldn’t breathe, my jaw clenching, getting all flushed and feeling so weak in my body and feeling froze up like I didn’t want to move an inch, quite literally paralyzed in fear, I’d get stomach aches sometimes too and I’d just have the worst time, EVERYTIME, contemplating on everything negative and getting literally suicidal and telling myself I’m never gonna smoke again I need to stop I need to stop I need to stop but yet I kept smoking multiple times a day and I felt out of control like I wanted to stop so badly and I kept attempting to quit, but I kept failing, and I kept going back to it and it was getting so out of hand, it was just draining the life out of me. I felt sick and fatigued all the time. I’m pretty sure that I was in the beginning phase of CHS before the vomiting starts. Anyway, I’ve made it five months clean now and I’m still going through it. I don’t know if my recovery is gonna be a lot harder this time and long lasting because I’ve cycled on and off so many times.

The symptoms I’m still having fluctuating but still present : insomnia, I have times that I’ll stay awake for like say 33 hours straight and then crash for 15 hours and then the next night I’m thrown back into the insomnia loop and I’m just trying to get a grip and then I’ll have stretches where my sleep is actually getting back on track but even if I’m sleeping, I’m still waking up exhausted , and when another wave hits, everything gets super choppy and dysregulated all other again, anxiety, depression, no motivation, no interest, anhedonia, trouble staying on task or starting tasks, trouble focusing, a lot of autonomic issues like heart flutters, trouble breathing, random heat waves or flushing, dizziness, lightheadedness, pressure in my head, headaches, random nausea, twitches all over my body still , buzzy, internal vibrating sensations, EXTREME FATIGUE, feeling super lethargic, like my limbs are made of lead, I get out of breathe so easily, generally feeling extremely depleted, chronic pain, and feeling inflamed, my skin is so sensitive I get little rashes or breakouts , my hair seems super dry and unhealthy now, I’m super sensitive to meds, I got desperate and my doctor prescribed me gabapentin but sent me into a really big flareup especially the days following, i’ve tried a number of medications and even over-the-counter supplements, I can’t tolerate anything. I can’t even tolerate melatonin or magnesium glycinate. I’m really sensitive to heat, food, exercise, my luteal phase and menstrual cycles also play a big role in symptom severity, but some months it’s just the whole damn month sucks. I feel disabled. It’s so confusing because I feel like some of my withdrawal symptoms actually mimic some of the symptoms that the weed was causing me when I was still smoking it and I think it has something to do with my endocannabinoid system being downregulated in withdrawal, but it was already downregulated and burnt out while I was still using and the reason it felt so bad to smoke was because I was basically pouring fuel on the fire, over saturated myself with THC with a system that was far gone already , my whole ECS was offline for literally years before I even quit smoking this time.

Does anyone else relate to this ?

I feel like I can’t talk for shit or be myself cause of how in my head or like overly aware and self conscious I am. It seems as if everyone can just converse, be social and confident so easy while I can’t leave the house without stressing about my fit, can’t talk to people cause I overthink it instead of letting it happen naturally and then thinking that people don’t like me or that I’m doing too much…

Anyone else deal with this? Did it get better? I used to be a social butterfly had my insecurities but I could go to a function and be THAT guy

It’s been almost 3 years in total and 3 months since last time relapsing since touching it. The relapses weren’t consistent js weekends nd 2 weeks all spread out

Im going crazy

First time posting on here. I quit after my mates birthday on the 12th of april this year, so about 4 months in. I have been smoking weed and vaping nicotine heavily the year prior to quitting, and decently a lot the years prior to that. I would say i properly smoked and vaped for 3.5 to 4 years. I quit because i started to experience panic attacks. These past 4 months have been very hard, but it definitely has gotten better. The hard times are coming in their waves, and a big problem is aches. I also get tight chest, weird vision, slight dizziness, breathlessness but something i have noticed more recently is how many aches i get around my body. Chest, back, arms, neck, jaw, legs, just always changing places. On slight occasions i will get a very intense ache, sometimes sharp, which will trigger a panic attack because it is so alarming. It always goes away but its really bothersome. Anyone else have this experience?

I quit smoking weed on October 11, 2025, after smoking extremely heavily for about 10 years. At my peak, I was smoking around six Amnesia Haze joints a day- Everyday.
At some point, I also started using HHC gummies, and I feel like that’s when things really went downhill. I suspect I may have taken a gummy containing an extremely high dose of HHC.
When I smoked my final joint, I suddenly started shaking violently, became extremely nauseous, had to lie down in bed, and felt like I was either going to die or somehow lose touch with reality. I also had an extremely unpleasant sensation throughout my body that felt almost like battery acid flowing through my veins.
After that, I experienced severe and prolonged DPDR (depersonalization/derealization). It genuinely felt as though the old version of me had died. I also struggled with extreme nausea and a strange acidic/burning sensation in my stomach and esophagus. At my worst, I felt so terrible that I genuinely couldn’t see a future for myself.

I’m now almost 10 months sober, and thankfully I feel much, much better than I did in the beginning. I’m exercising regularly again, enjoying things in life, and generally feel like myself much more often.

The only symptoms I still experience are:
Very vivid dreams — it often feels like I’m dreaming for the entire night.

Occasionally, a very mild internal acidic sensation. This is probably only 5% as intense as it used to be, and thankfully I no longer have that overall feeling of being extremely unwell.

I get irritated more easily than I used to.

I get tired relatively quickly. After a busy or stimulating day, I notice that the symptoms above become more noticeable. It’s almost as if my nervous system is less able to handle stimulation than it was before.

Considering how severe things were initially, I’m incredibly grateful for how much I’ve improved.
Has anyone else experienced something similar after quitting heavy cannabis use, especially after using HHC? How long did it take before you felt completely back to normal?

I'm about 6 months fully sober, and I still have periods of insomnia, nightmares, and brain fog, and i swear i'm not crazy, but I can feel my hormones. I can feel the hormones drop every night right before I pass out, my face tingles a day or so before my period, it's whacky.

I have low egg reserves so i'm pushing through with the plan I quit weed for, but i'm worried about how pregnancy will interact with these ongoing experiences. Anyone been through the same?

Hi, i’ve been sober for about 40 days now and was wondering if it was normal to have a tight feeling in the right side of your chest that sometimes spreads to the back. I also was sick last week so it could possibly be part of that too. Any response or advice would be helpful, thanks!!

Getting to a strange point, I go large chunks of my day feeling fine or forgetting PAWS all together, then occasionally I get such bad brain fog it feels like dpdr, I rarely feel bad anxiety anymore but it's usually linked to brain fog and the brain fog is usually from eating a big meal or something super processed. Still having some visual snow like symptoms, not so much static but more after images and occasionally trailing when I walk past or move my vision, an object will have a slight faint trail behind it and usually only in low lighting. I think I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, but occasionally I get super depressed over the fact I still don't feel 100% myself yet.

Welp. I quit nicotine, started using more caffeine for a while, and honestly I was starting to feel better. I was also using L-theanine, which seemed to help. Then I quit the caffeine and L-theanine too. The first day I was actually doing okay, but by day two I feel like my brain completely turned on me again.
My social anxiety is fucking awful right now. My confidence is basically nonexistent, and I feel like I have 100 thoughts running through my head at once, constantly analyzing everything I say, everything I do, how I look, how I’m acting, whether I’m being awkward, etc. It gets to the point where I feel paralyzed and I can’t just live normally.
This has basically been part of my experience since PAWS started. It did get significantly better at one point, and I genuinely thought I was finally getting my life back. Then I had a relapse, and now it feels like I’m right back in this shit again. I know recovery probably isn’t perfectly linear, but damn, it’s exhausting when you’ve already experienced what feeling normal again feels like.
My job requires me to talk to people, and the fucked up part is I actually WANT to talk to people. I want to be social. I want to have fun. I want to go out and make memories like other people my age. I look at other teens/young adults just casually talking, joking around, being confident, enjoying themselves, and I envy the hell out of it because I feel like I’m constantly stuck inside my own head.
I’m so tired of being tired. I’m tired of feeling like I’m fighting my own brain 24/7. Sometimes it genuinely makes me wonder if this is just what my life is going to be like forever, and that thought scares the shit out of me.
I’m not planning to hurt myself, but I’m at the point where I just desperately want all of this to stop. I don’t want to die—I just want to stop feeling like this. I want my brain to shut the fuck up for once.
I feel like a failure sometimes. Like everyone else is living and I’m just trying to survive my own thoughts.
Has anyone else gone through something similar after quitting nicotine/caffeine or during PAWS? Did the anxiety/social anxiety eventually calm down again? I could really use some perspective from people who have actually been through this.

Hi wonderful people, currently at 2.5 months.

Was feeling generally ok since i quit, first month was hell with super strong anxiety and muscle tension, my body felt horrific. Month 2 was better, i had 2 weeks of feeling quite good.
Now, since the start of month 2 my anxiety has returned and now my sleep is awful. I generally feel ok falling asleep but wake up within 30 mins to an hour with a tight chest and feeling anxious. Takes me another hour or so to calm back down and then get back to sleep again for a few more hours. I suspect its some cortisol reaction or something like that. Anyone got any tips or am i just riding this out?

Cheers

I was a daily smoker for over 20 years and an heavy one the last 5 years with my over a gram a day, only strong weed 20% + THC.
I stopped last year 4 months and it was hard but went smoothly except a bit of loss of weight and sleep at first but got better after 2 months (I was in a beach environment and was doing a lot of exercise) but this year I stopped for 4 months now and it’s brutal.
I stopped right before moving in a big city when I’m more use of the beach life and my nervous system totally hates it.
And it’s getting worse I feel, first month at first I lost weight , I had trouble sleeping and had all my trauma resurfaced, but also a lot of fatigue. I felt better around the 2 months. But the last month and half… oh boy.
It’s physical mental and emotional struggle almost everyday, I don’t have friends or family in this new city and my physical and mental state preventing me from socializing. I lost a lot of hair, I experience an extreme fatigue that is hard to push through a day without napping. I had neck issue and occipital neuralgia. I have anhedonia and everything feels flat, work or struggle. I have a lot of anxiety as I wake up, cortisol feels through the roof and I’m looping on my loss of muscle loss of hair loss of confidence which make things worse. I had blood work done and everything is fine, but I’m living one of my worst period mentally and physically I got a bit of comfort seeing this group, that showed me I’m probably not that alone in this. What helped you guys to feel better? Did you go through some of the same symptoms (hair shedding, anxiety, neck pain, extreme fatigue)?

Hi,

I don’t know what to do anymore. I smoked every day for 20 years, and out of the blue I started having problems with nausea and a stabbing pain in my left chest—more specifically, in the lower ribs on the left side, right in the middle. It’s gotten better over time, but as soon as I lie down, I can barely breathe and, as a result, can hardly sleep. I’ve been sleeping sitting up for a year now. Reflux was suspected, but PPIs don’t help at all.

The pain on my left side is now very mild, and the brain fog is almost gone, But the breathing problem persists. The pulmonologist, cardiologist, and internist can't find anything wrong. Does anyone else have this, and can someone reassure me? I've been THC-free for 4 weeks and nicotine-free for 3 weeks. My life is actually great—I have a good job, the best wife, and a gorgeous little daughter. But my life totally fucked up.

Hey everyone. I'm dealing with a deep skin infection, and my doctor prescribed Augmentin 625 (amoxicillin/clavulanate). I'm quite sensitive right now and terrified that the antibiotic or the gut disruption will trigger a severe nervous system flare-up or set my healing back. Have any of you taken this specific medication while in PAWS? Did it cause a setback for you, or did your system handle it okay? Looking for any experiences or advice. Thank you!

I’m currently 14 months into PAWS, and I’ve dealt with a lot of the symptoms. Most of them have improved, but 14 months later, my memory and having a blank mind are still my biggest concerns.

I can’t start conversations with anyone anymore because my mind just won’t come up with anything to say, and it’s starting to affect my relationships with people.

Has anybody else dealt with this beyond 14 months and gone on to recover? I’d really appreciate hearing your experiences.