420 POSTS! Which Means This Post Is About Weed

Several years ago, I went to one of my neighbors apartments and asked if I could join them for New Years Eve, because I was alone and I didn’t really feel like being alone. We had a full blown conversation about how I should switch from drinking to weed, and looking back now I remember him saying “you aren’t ready yet.” He was right.

I absolutely wasn’t ready for all the changes that marijuana would provide in my life. I absolutely wasn’t ready to deal with twenty-plus years worth of trauma, and abuse.

I feel like we use the word “trauma” too much, when I say the word I mean things that are difficult to overcome. I am talking about emotional pain so deep, so convoluted, so deeply rooted, that re-experiencing it all so you can actual deal with it, feels a bit like losing a limb. It feels like having your body, mind, and soul, ripped a part, and then watching from the outside as your body stiches itself back together again.

Now that I am in this place of almost two years of smoking weed, I can honestly say that it’s had affects I didn’t expect. I have opened myself more to telling my version of the truth of what happened. Things definitely did not get better right away, and I still wouldn’t say that they are “perfectly fixed”, but I would say that after I started smoking weed, things definitely changed for me.

My friend Necole is always talking about how she’s going through a spiritual awakening, and I definitely feel the effects of that myself. I definitely feel as if the universe is absolutely fucking with me, by forcing me to face things that I would much rather forget. I keep thinking of my future, and the future that I want for Loud Mouth Brown Girl, and I get really frustrated because I am afraid of the future.

I am afraid of being a failure for sure, but I am even more afraid of being a success, because the more successful you are, the more people want to know about you, and I still have plenty of secrets that I haven’t shared yet. A lot of torture and pain in my life was caused by men, and I definitely have developed a deep seeded fear of becoming like my abusers.

There are men in my past who were boys when the abuse started, and they escalated into being abusers themselves, which is why I have been spending most of this year on focusing on becoming the very best version of myself. To me that means being the healthiest version of myself, and to be honest with you I don’t think I would have gotten here without the marijuana.

A couple of nights this past week I got absolutely wrecked with alcohol, not really thinking anything of it, until all the emotions and resentments started coming up and I realized just how much I hate the people in my past for not knowing what was going on. I know it’s not their fault, but if anyone had seen what was happening to me, and just tried to intervene, things might have turned out differently. I am going to be working on those bitterments and resentments for a very long time, and I know this for a fact, but marijuana has also made me a lot kinder.

It’s forced me to actualize what I am thinking by putting it on the page, and by putting it on the page I am remembering that what I say here matters, that when I am holding myself accountable by writing about the moments that I don’t behave so well, or by sharing the days when I don’t feel so hot, I am helping other people too.

It is a lot easier on this side of things then it was on the other side, because when I was on the other side of this herb, I never felt like I belonged, I always felt like I was playing a part, going to sleep, eating, drinking, partying, were all a part of the mask that I was building for myself, and the more the abuse continued the more that abuse began to break apart.

Now that the people in my every day life know what happened to me, I no longer care what they think of me. It was absolutely humiliating sharing my story, there are parts of those days that I will never look at because I was legitimately out of my mind with grief and embarrassment. There are other parts of those few hours, days, months, and weeks, that I don’t remember and will probably not get back for a very long time.

The point is that I wouldn’t have gotten to the place where I could start my first clothing line, where I could start a brand new podcast, where I could start to heal from my past by writing a book about it, if I had been drinking throughout this year. I wouldn’t have been able to function, and I knew that back in 2019, which is why I chose to start smoking weed, instead of drinking myself into a stupor.

I will say that being drunk feels great, until it’s over, that blood boiling buzz you get from drinking, you cannot replicate with getting high, at least I can’t, not unless I am in the shower and super, super high. But then the next morning, reality hits, and you start to realize you don’t remember all the things you said and did, and you start to wonder what kind of person you are presenting to the world.

I don’t want to be falling over and drunk, I don’t want to numb away my problems because they’re too hard to handle, I would like very much to have the strength to continue living my life on my terms.

I don’t care who people thought I would become, and that’s huge for me. I don’t care who people think that I should be. I want to be the person that I was meant to be, which is someone who is worthy of the name Loud Mouth Brown Girl. Without all the drama that comes with guns, gangs, and guys.

Without all the running for my life through the shadows of the forest knowing that there is some escapable darkness following me around like a never relenting black cloud from hell.

Marijuana has helped me come into my own, and while I know that I will advocate for it, I am not certain that it is something that I will use forever. Like all medications Cannabis has an expiration date, at a certain time I am going to have to start living sober, and being more productive then I have been this last year.

But until that date comes, smoke em if you got em, and make sure that if you are using marijuana you are keeping a record of your experiences so that you know what works for you and what doesn’t. Check in with a reputable dispensary because even though they aren’t allowed to talk about doses and usage, they will be able to point you towards the correct strains for different effects.

Also make sure you are checking in with a Doctor if you can, because a Doctor’s advice is absolutely imperative, when you are mixing medications. Not everyone will be able to accept cannabis into their systems, and some people will have adverse reactions, so I highly recommend that you do as much research as you can before you decide to use cannabis.

I don’t regret that I waited to use cannabis, because I know that I started using it was exactly the right time so that I could start making the changes that I needed to make to get better, but I am equally frustrated with how long it took me to open myself back up to the sensations that once caused me so much pain.

They still cause me pain, this connection that I feel to the universe is absolutely not accidental, but that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t take a lot out of me to do what I need to do to heal. I am just saying that thanks to marijuana I am ready to move on and into the next chapter of my life. Whatever that might bring.

For me personally, cannabis and this year, have opened me up to connecting with women in a way I was desperately searching for. It’s opened my eyes to so many majickal wonderful scary frightful things about this world that we live in. I don’t think I’d be here without it, but that’s just me. You have to do what is right for you, and for you cannabis might not work, but it’s something to think about, isn’t it?

As I said, Smoke em if you Got em,

Sending all my love,

Devon J Hall