{"id":61249,"date":"2015-02-06T20:26:00","date_gmt":"2015-02-07T02:26:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/?p=61249"},"modified":"2025-10-03T15:08:04","modified_gmt":"2025-10-03T20:08:04","slug":"marijuana-causes-long-term-changes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/marijuana-causes-long-term-changes\/","title":{"rendered":"Marijuana Causes Long-Term Changes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\t

Source:<\/strong>\u00a0[“Marijuana Causes Long-term Brain Changes<\/a>,” Amen Clinics, 2015 February 06].<\/p>\n

“Dr. Kabran Chapek … says, ‘I’m not surprised when someone with anxiety tells me that they use marijuana or alcohol to help them sleep, or calm their nerves. It’s predictably people with over activity in their brains and problems like anxiety or PTSD who use sedating substances-we can see it on their\u00a0SPECT scans<\/em><\/a>. The problem with marijuana is that it’s not selective.\u00a0 Not only does it calm the parts of the brain that are overactive, it calms the entire brain-long-term-through a slow and insidious process.'”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Source: <\/strong>[“Marijuana Causes Long-term Brain Changes<\/a>“, Amen Clinics, 2015 February 06].<\/p>\n

“When someone stops using marijuana, significant irritability is common as the temporal lobes regain full functioning.\u00a0 According to Dr. Chapek, one can expect to see improvements in motivation, concentration, and focus after abstaining for just 2-3 months.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Source:<\/strong>\u00a0[FM Fibley, “Marijuana Craving in the Brain<\/a>“, PNAS].<\/p>\n

Source: <\/strong>[Aalok Mehta, “Marijuana Craving Affects Brain like Alcohol, Addictive Behaviors<\/a>“, 2009 September 18].<\/p>\n

A good summary of the above study.<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Source:\u00a0[“Marijuana Causes Long-term Brain Changes,” Amen Clinics, 2015 February 06]. “Dr. Kabran Chapek … says, ‘I’m not surprised when someone with anxiety tells me that they use marijuana or alcohol to help them sleep, or calm their nerves. It’s predictably people with over activity in their brains and problems like anxiety or PTSD who use…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[42],"tags":[372,540],"class_list":["post-61249","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-issues","tag-drugs","tag-marijuana"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":5449,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/attempts-to-compensate-for-damage-hides-marijuana-effects-in-the-short-term\/","url_meta":{"origin":61249,"position":0},"title":"Attempts to Compensate for Damage Hides Marijuana Effects in the Short Term","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"July 9, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Source:\u00a0Alice G. Walton, \"The Brain May Compensate For Heavy Pot Smoking -- Until It Can't Anymore,\" Forbes, 11 Nov 2014. \"The research, published in\u00a0Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, found that an area in the front of the brain called the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) is smaller in people who\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Issues"","block_context":{"text":"Issues","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":57690,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/dangers-of-recreational-marijuana\/","url_meta":{"origin":61249,"position":1},"title":"Dangers of Recreational Marijuana","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"January 6, 2023","format":false,"excerpt":"Source:\u00a0Dr. Liji Thomas, MD, \"Dangers of recreational\/medical cannabis use,\"\u00a0News Medical and Life Sciences, 26 October 2022. More people are using marijuana and starting at a younger age. \"Now that many American states have legalized cannabis, the already high rate of cannabis usage is increasing from ages as young as 16\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Issues"","block_context":{"text":"Issues","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5445,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/accumulative-marijuana-use-impacts-short-term-memory\/","url_meta":{"origin":61249,"position":2},"title":"Accumulative Marijuana use impacts short-term memory","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"July 9, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Source: Christopher Ingraham, \"What happens when you get stoned every single day for five years,\" Washington Post, 1 Feb 2016. \"If you smoke a lot of weed \u2014 like a\u00a0lot of it \u2014 it can potentially do permanent damage\u00a0to your short-term memory.\" \"The study found that people who smoked marijuana\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Issues"","block_context":{"text":"Issues","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":36097,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/marijuana-smoking-isnt-healthy\/","url_meta":{"origin":61249,"position":3},"title":"Marijuana Smoking Isn’t Healthy","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"December 11, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Source: Kathleen Doheny, \"Recreational Marijuana: Are There Health Effects?\" WebMD, 11 December 2012. Lung Damage \"'Putting smoke in your lungs is not good for the lungs,' says Roland Lamarine, HSD, professor of public health at California State University, Chico. ... Some research shows that marijuana smoke has up to 70%\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Issues"","block_context":{"text":"Issues","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":83761,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/marijuana-impacts-memory\/","url_meta":{"origin":61249,"position":4},"title":"Marijuana Impacts Memory","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"January 29, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"Source:\u00a0Julia Milzer, \"Largest Study Ever Done on Cannabis and Brain Function Finds Impact on Working Memory,\" University of Colorado, 28 January 2025. \"The researchers found that 63% of heavy lifetime cannabis users exhibited reduced brain activity during a working memory task, while 68% of recent users also demonstrated a similar\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Issues"","block_context":{"text":"Issues","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2376,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/marijuana-and-mental-illness\/","url_meta":{"origin":61249,"position":5},"title":"Marijuana and Mental Illness","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"February 3, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Source:\u00a0Alex Berenson, \"Marijuana, Mental Illness, and Violence,\" Imprimis, vol. 48, no. 1, Jan 2019 \"They've told you marijuana has many different medical uses. In reality marijuana and THC, its active ingredient, have been shown to work only in a few narrow conditions. They are most commonly prescribed for pain relief.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Issues"","block_context":{"text":"Issues","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/issues\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61249","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=61249"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61249\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=61249"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=61249"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=61249"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}