LEGAL NOTE: You must be of legal age, or have a signed doctor’s permission to use Cannabis or other mind-altering drugs in this country. If you or someone you know is struggling with substance abuse, please reach out, and I will personally help connect you to services you can access.
Drugs are not the crime. The Crime is Allowing Dirty Drugs To Kill Innocent People Who At Their Core, Are Just Looking For A Way To Deal With The A Life They Didn’t Choose & Can’t Escape. – Devon J Hall, Loud Mouth Brown Girl
I picked up smoking cigarettes at a very tender age. I was about nine or ten? Maybe I can’t fully remember most of my childhood, except for the parts where I was harmed. Those parts are crystal clear.
I started smoking cannabis full-time every day, all day, nine years ago this month.
Turns out smoking helps people with ADHD, who are otherwise neurodivergent. Not just tobacco, either, cannabis, and other “mind-altering drugs” that have non-neurodivergent people seeing through space and time, help those of us who *are* neurodivergent, to function. In ways other people would call “Normal.”
But normal, just like anything in the world, is a spectrum, and what’s normal for you ain’t so much for me.
I remember once telling a friend of mine that what is normal for her people is absolute chaos for me. For my brain to compartmentalize the stuff I need to, so that I can do my job, or even just get my house cleaned, I need cannabis.
That’s because over the last nine years, I’ve singlehandedly wired my brain to know that when we smoke cannabis, it’s time to get stuff done. Whether that means cleaning and organizing, or working on the website or the backend stuff.
But it’s also because cannabis helps calm my nervous system. In my previous life, working at the church, the worst drug I would use was alcohol, and that didn’t help me in any way, shape or form. It, in fact, became quite a problem for me to function after using alcohol.
I didn’t stop because alcohol was the problem; I stopped because cannabis made my life easier. I am no longer able to feel the deep inner rage that comes with knowing what adults are able and willing to do to children. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still angry as all get out, but I am no longer angry in the way that is a hindrance to me being able to live my life.
My depression is almost non-existent. Continued use of cannabis has removed my sadness; this isn’t to say that I don’t have moments of sadness, this isn’t to say that I am “cured.” It is to say that with cannabis, the sadness isn’t so overwhelming and all-consuming.
Beyond the anger, I am a much quieter person today than I ever have been, which is not as good as it sounds because I struggle with timing. I tend to overexplain who I am and why I am the way I am, not because I want to, but because my mouth speaks before my brain can stop me.
It’s something that I am working on in therapy, and that’s another thing. After finding out my last counsellor was an abuser in my past life, I honestly thought I’d never go back to counselling again. I’ve had such a terrible experience with medical professionals, specifically mental health professionals, that I am hesitant and will take any excuses not to go.
However, with that being said, because I rely so heavily on cannabis, not to alter my mind, but to focus, I am more cognizant of what it is I need in a counsellor.
For me, as an individual, cannabis, weed, Za, has changed the game.
Someone asked me recently, when I announced that I am going back to work after nine years off, “How did you do it?” The truth is, I didn’t “Do” anything.
I spent the last nine years vomiting my shit onto this blog, so I would feel less alone. And I built a community of people who see me, hear me, and respect my journey by sharing my stories with their own networks and communities.
And then when push came to shove, and it was “Get a job or be unhoused again,” I chose to step up and take the one job I knew I could do, in a place I genuinely love being in, that has absolutely nothing to do with church work.
I love my job. And I love the people I get to work with. It’s fun, interesting, and I meet different people from all over the world and the country every single day.
But I also love that at my job, I can use cannabis and know that I am not going to be judged for being “Stoned” at work. And here’s why: Cannabis users who use cannabis every day, all day, do not behave like cannabis users who use it once in a while.
I’ve seen cannabis users operate heavy machinery; I’ve seen them save lives. I’ve seen cannabis users – people you would never expect who might use – change the entire fucking world, while the world wandered in awe, “How did they do it?” Bitch they were high.
Cannabis users are actually safer to be around than most drug users, because while they might be “Stoned” they are not out of their mind, and more often than not, the only thing that makes them truly violent is you stealing the last bit of their favourite munchie for your amusement.
The friendships I have today are not based on “Oh we met at the club, we only meet at the club, and we only hang out after dark like fucking Vampires.”
They’re based on a true desire to be with the people I have chosen to be friends with. My entire life, like many of you, I spent a good deal of time wanting to be chosen, believing that would make my life easier.
Turns out, when you decide to choose for yourself, without caring what will make the other people in your life comfortable while you stay miserable, the universe decides to give you all the Push you need.
XOXO
Devon J Hall,
The Original Loud Mouth Brown Girl
Loud Mouth Brown Girl 
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