Cannabis induced psychosis.

STW has long proven to be the source of exeperience. This may be a challenge too far.

My sister stays in rural France, she is Bi Polar and in the middle of cannabis induced psychosis. Totally out there.

A few years a doctor described a 1-10 scale where patients who exceeded a number ‘never came back’, I can’t remember the threshold number, but she was already beyond it.

She has been on a semi even keel for the last few years, but last year she took to taking cannabis again despite warnings from doctors and family that the psychosis would escalate.

She has a thirteen year old daughter who is currently away on a ten day school trip to Germany.

December 2013 she admitted herself to a French hospital then discharged herself. After a lot of to and froing we brought her back to Scotland, eventually she had to admit herself to hospital here while we relocated her daughter in school.

She recovered enough to get back to France.

My sister is infatuated with a guy in Shetland who she is adamant is sending her messages via a drone on the internet. She is adamant that she is leaving France for Shetland when her daughter gets back from her trip.

She unbeknown to us has been taking cannabis again in huge volumes, and there appears to be no rationality in her thinking. We fear she has crossed the ‘never come back’ line for good.

My mother is in her mid seventies and at her wits end. We are proposing going to France next week in a bid to try and do something positive. But in reality we have little idea where to start.

My sister turns 50 this year.

Any advice or experience would be welcome.

Pretty heavy shit. By brother’s ex wife starting having paranoid psychosis and eventually ended up being detailed and social services took their son off her and gave him to my brother, so I can relate somewhat to the complications. To further add to the complications she is a GP (God help her patients as she’s managed to hide it all from the authorities so far).

I think you will have to go there and see how she is for yourself and then try and seek professional help on her behalf either in France or back in the UK. Obviously getting her off the weed would be a good first step….

Hi Mate, thats sounds like a fairly tough circumstance although you are right in that you seem to placing the needs of your niece in the centre of things, she will be in need of your help. Going to France is the best thing I can say (from such a remote view of things) as being closer to what is actually going on will help as to exactly what to do. All I have to offer is, trust yourself and perhaps try to track down French Social Services, maybe the school can help? Good luck.

Is she definitely using cannabis or is she using synthetic cannaboids? Huge difference in the consequences you discuss ime. I would establish what is being used and speak to a medical professional re advice.
Could you assist her back to the UK and have her assessed by a doctor whilst en-route?

Jeez, should she still be working [as a GP] in a state like that ?

<soz for derail>

As much as I hate to say it, there is nothing you can do, obviously things will only get better when she stops the weed. Only she will do that when/if she sees it as an issue.
I’ve been through this and out the other side, you just don’t see that it’s causing the problems. Email in profile if you want any questions answered.

Is she definitely using cannabis or is she using synthetic cannaboids?

As I understand it, I think it is cannabis. She has been eating it as well as smoking it.

Our worst fear is for the welfare of my niece. I have an aunt and uncle in France who are about an hours drive away. They have been helpful but they are at a loss too.

Were my niece to be taken into care in France things are going to escalate beyond measure.

My brother suffered from Cannabis induced psychosis when he was around 16 years old. He was sectioned at 18 years old, spent 4 years in hospital and came out a registered schitzophrenic. He is now 41 years old, bought his first car last weekend and is too scared to drive it on his own.
It will never go away for him. He is still single, never had a job and is a constant bloody worry.

I know none of this will help you but if you need to chat any further about experiences or whatever, my email is in my profile.

This is a horrible terrifying illness that encourages totally irrational thoughts and fears.
Before he was sectioned the voice in my brother head would constantly scream at him telling he was a “right c***” and that he was worthless and and berated every little thing he did, even changing the TV channel would generate a torrent of abuse from the voice in his head. “What are you doing, you useless piece of s***, look at you, you are a right W******” etc. Terrifying. He was only able to talk to me about it for the first time around 8 years ago.

Heartbreaking stuff. I hope you guys geta better resolution out of it. I would say that as she is clearly not a youngster you have a better chance. My brother got affected before his brain fully developed so it is now part of the foundation of who he is.

If you are going to France with the idea of a possible intervention type of thing, them maybe someone like Nar Anon could advise you. They are friends and relatives of people who use or have troubles with drugs of all types and all levels.
From the Bi Polar point of view, I presume she has either stopped taking medication if she was on any, or is self-medicating with cannabis. Does she have a crisis team or psychiatrist? I would have thought she would need to see a psychiatrist who could assess her and possibly prescribe something to try and bring her out of the psychosis.
I’m not sure of the “point of no return”, bit, but I have been told by a few psychiatrists that Bi Polar can be progressive. The more “blips” you have the more frequent they might become or longer lasting.

Were my niece to be taken into care in France things are going to escalate beyond measure.

Just a thought, and more concerned with your niece rather than your sister, but would you be able to have her (your niece) taken into care here – rather than France..? Or even move in with you?

Jef, that is a desperate and familiar story.

My sister started using cannabis at about sixteen too. We knew nothing of it then.

She has been sectioned several times and spent months in psychiatric hospitals.

She has never been a wholly rational person and has always teetered on the edge. Miraculously the birth of her daughter brought a degree of responsibility which she responded to. But the spectre has always been in the background.

The second she went back to taking cannabis the paranoia and psychosis returned. Worse than before.

EDIT

HH, I think we will have to bring my niece home as a priority to stay with us. Thing is they are joined at the hip, but sister is so toxic, I cant bear to think about the effect it is having on my niece.

Where to start,
I grew up in the 80s and nineties and was a heavy user of cannibis, ecstasy, LSD. Coke starting from a very early age.
Twelve years ago In my very late twenties I was diagnosed with drug induced phychosis after having completely lost the plot for probably over a year or so.
I was admitted to a psychiatric hospital for two weeks while they found which medication worked best for me.
After two weeks the medication was working helping me get control of my thoughts and I was allowed home.
After eight months of medication and hard thinking (any situation where my brain offered up an alternative reality I chose to reject it for what was the far more boring reality) I was passed fit and taken off the meds.

My psychiatrist stressed I was a very lucky boy, not only to have recovered but to also to have done it with my personality relatively unscathed, as you can come out damaged.

I had to change my life completely as most of my friends took drugs, Infact most of my friends were drug dealers.
So I had to extricate my self from my old life and circle of friends and have nothing to do with drugs or people who use them.

I think your sister needs professional help, if medication helped her before hopefully it will help her again.
But she needs to knock drugs on the head and only she can do that and maybe once she is in a better place mentally she may realise that.

If you hope to bring her home go to your GP now and ask for the help for when you bring her back.
Hopefully they can refer her to a psychiatrist if your sister is willing to go.

From experience, even a low level on the ‘psychosis 1-10’ scale is unnerving, fear-inducing and potentially life-changing. All these cannabis is harmless campaigners would do well to look further into it’s effects on the brain.

Unfortunately I can’t offer much advice for your specific situation, but I hope you manage to sort things out, if for no-one else’s sake other than your niece’s.

Chip, thanks for that.

My sister has so far refused to take prescribed medication on her own. While she was last in hospital she did take it, that calmed her down sufficiently for her to see sense. But once out of their care she eventually reverted back.

We have a few days to make plans.

Thanks for all your experiences so far folks.

From the Bi Polar point of view, I presume she has either stopped taking medication if she was on any, or is self-medicating with cannabis. Does she have a crisis team or psychiatrist? I would have thought she would need to see a psychiatrist who could assess her and possibly prescribe something to try and bring her out of the psychosis.

She refuses to take any medication for either condition. She’s so perverse she won’t even use soap in the bath, let alone use prescribed medication or seek the help of a physician. Yet she’ll poison herself with weed.

Sorry to hear of your story mcmoonter.
BIL is bi-polar and has a history of heavy drug use including cannabis, he was sectioned due to an schizophrenic episode and whilst on medication in the secure unit complained he no longer had the voices in his head. It seems he’d grown used to them and found comfort from them. He later discharged himself against most peoples opinion before his course of meds had finished and now uses ‘legal’ highs which still contribute to his general mental instability. It is sad to see my wife and his ex-wife and daughter have to deal with the fall out from his compulsions, all you can do is the best you can – to offer support and help. The sad thing is that help is not often accepted.

Main thing is to get her off the weed, and get it out the system. This won’t be easy as although everyone says it isn’t addictive it certainly is psychologically addictive and it is really tough to break the cycle when in heavy use.

If she is smoking it with tobacco then by smoking a roll up instead you still have some kind of a ‘reward’ and can act out the process of making something to smoke, sounds silly but it will help. It is very hard to stop smoking weed when you are a heavy smoker, trust me, you become reliant on being stoned and the rituals of getting stoned. It only takes a few days to break the routine though, but if she still has access to weed then it is unlikely to happen.

I’ve no idea how it works in France but it sounds like it is beyond the usual ‘getting the fear’ stage and proper psychological intervention is needed to protect everyone concerned. Good luck

Also as well as causing it’s own problems she may be using dope to control or numb other problems, it is a powerful sedative drug in large quantities and she may feel she needs it to lessen some other feeling or thought process, I’ve known people that feel they have to smoke to be able to engage socially or to be less mentally and physically hyperactive. If you can establish if that is the case a less damaging prescription drug may exist perhaps, beta blockers for anxiety etc

Sounds shitty, I’m not sure how you get someone sectioned in France but this sounds like you will need professional help with or else the moment you go home and something stressful happens she could revert back to old habits.

Worst case, could you offer to drive her to Shetland and go via a GP and get her sectioned?

I suffered drug induced psychosis in my late teens and early 20s (20 years ago when the first sinsemilla [skunk] strains became readily available in the UK) I’m not convinced about cannabis psychosis as a stand alone condition but I’m certain it can exacerbate other underlying mental health issues.
As chip above, I complicated things massively with other drugs..
At the pinnacle of things I underwent a number of enforced stays on psychiatric wards with enforced medications..
I didn’t accept the situation until I was into my late 20s when I stopped using cannabis, but I remained extremely paranoid and confused about reality until a number of years later when I underwent a highly illegal and controversial year of intensive LSD therapy offered gratis by a back street shaman type, who was mostly treating me for his own amusement but it worked a bloody treat..

I digress, the upshot is that I’ve remained incredibly sensitive to the negative effects of cannabis since those first episodes in my youth and I have to avoid contact with it..
I now have a very nervous disposition and chronic anxiety disorder, but this is undoubtedly due to prolonged abuse of a variety of chemicals..
If this woman is fairly convinced of her delusions and experiencing a strong psychosis due to heavy use, I would suggest that even after cessation she will take longer than you might imagine to become stable..

I would certainly recommend getting her sectioned (or seen to by a dodgy LSD merchant)

This happened to a close friend of mine when he was 20, he did recover through medication and close observation, and now leads a normal life, some sad stories here, hope it works out.

What an incredibly sad situation and how tough it must be for you and the rest of your family. My only suggestion would be for your sister to have a thyroid function test as this can sometimes be linked with bipolar. It’s quite common on the UK thyroid forum I use.

WOW no real advise

A friend went through this. Turned up at her parents and said can you pay the taxi. Turned out she’d come miles and miles not just from the station

I don’t know the full story but huge stress and massive use seemed to have contributed

Years and years of therapy and continued medication means that she is now a functional person

scary stuff. no advice but all the best

i too would feel that getting her sectioned is the best hope. my teenage son has had a hellish few years after misusing drugs. cannabis, legal highs and injecting plant feed has left him with paranoid schizophrenia and psychosis. its heartbreaking. he too had delusions where he thought people were out to kill him, and the prime minister was involved in a plot to poison him for instance. he still hears voices and thinks bad things will happen to him if he cleans his teeth (theyre now manky) or takes his cap off.
theres not a chance he would have taken any medication prescribed, so hes had to be under a section for a couple of years now. and…….hes improving. its been tough, but he can now stay with us for a couple of days at a time, and hes about to be released to a halfway house.
hes a long way from being ‘normal’, but theres hope now where once i feared hed kill himself.
its heart wrenching having someone close sectioned, but you just have to rely on the professionals to get the treatment right. my lads been on a few different medications over this time and only now has he become stable. you just have to make tough decisions, knowing that if they end up dead, youve done everything you can for the best reasons, and your conscience is clear. might sound a bit odd that, but thats how we felt a lot of the time. heart-breaking decisions but if we hadnt made them and it ended badly we wouldve been left blaming ourselves for not trying harder.

just do whatever you can, never give up, and hope for the best.

best of luck mate.

Sadexpunk
one of my best friends was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia when he was sixteen and was sectioned only after attacking his pregnant mother.
He would be sectioned, given his meds by injection then once well enough to be discharged would start smoking weed and endup back at square one.

It was through my long association with him from being a normal kid to watching him become unwell to the man he became and through my many years of friendship that gave me the insight into mental illness that I beleive saved me when I became ill and then finally broke.

I lived my life believing every person i passed on the street was one of “them” and i could be killed at any time.
One of the things my friends found hilarious when I told them afterwards was I hadn’t had a dump in my own toilet in months due to beleiving cameras had been installed.
So I started going to my local petrol station when I needed to go, then I thought “they” had installed cameras there too.
So I had to go further a field, before long I was driving for miles trying to find a new garage everytime i needed a dump untill i realised there was not one in twenty miles i have not used.

Also talking to myself,I did when ever I was alone.
It was not part of a two way conversation with the voices , they were not that coherent. More of providing a running commentary of your thoughts for those who were listening ( there was no one listening).

I did not go around a round about once but several times, all the time looking in the mirrors for some one to break cover.
The list is endless I was grade a batshit.
a despite living a life I believed was froight with danger that would make 007 want his mummy, I was not scared, more angry with a constant “lets **** have it” attitude.
But the thought now of being unwell again does scare me, as I tell my GP, being unwell is not nice.

I wish your boy all the best

thanks mate, your experiences sound much like my lads. we had to do many things which made us sad, as the social services were awful and didnt want to know. i think because we’d said we’d always be there for him and never give up they didnt rate the situation top of the list, and left us to go through the violence and threats in the home on our own. every day was a procession of police and social workers to the house. eventually we had to ‘pretend’ to lock both kids out the house in the winter, telling the ss that they were now homeless. (both lads were doing the legal highs at this point, youngest lad seems to have come out of it unscathed but is still smoking weed). and when the ss came we had to bundle them outside quickly and then have to put up with the accusations of not caring for your kids, how can you leave them freezing outside etc etc. well, if youd help a bit more we wouldnt have to!! really sad times, and even tho hes doing better now, its been at some cost to us all. its broken the family up. i work away and so my wife was left to deal with it alone half the time, shes had depression since, neither lad live with us now, we had to move to my works town so she wasnt dealing with it herself, so now live in a sh*tty fire service house in a sh*t town instead of our lovely house in a quiet village overlooking fields. no wonder shes down :-/

but, going back to my lad, yes, the paranoid situations he believed were true were just incredible, and it takes some getting your head round. i remember trying to reason with him, having this argument about david cameron and how it wasnt possible that he could be involved in this, but he was just convinced he was planted in his post just to kill him. obviously after a time you realise you cant win these arguments, and even after showing irrefutable proof that something isnt happening, he’d still believe it. so you just end up leaving the hospital in tears at how unwell he is.

now theyve found the right medication for him he can almost pass as ‘normal’ some days 😀 like i say tho, he doesnt look after himself at all, and when he leaves us the bedroom smells, theres mess everywhere, and it does cause the odd argument. but as i mentioned before, if we told him hes not coming again unless he shapes up, and then he ended up killing himself through being lonely or something, we’d never forgive ourselves. so everything we do is to try and ensure hes as happy as he can be, within reason of course, so if anything did go wrong, we wont be blaming ourselves cos we could have done more, and its only happened cos he was daft enough to **** his own life up with drugs.

sad innit :-/

thats why i think mcmoonter should try and ensure he does the best he can for his sister and niece, so hes never got to ask himself if he could have done more. i think the specialists need to ensure she gets the right medication, by force if necessary. hard decisions, but i think sectioning may have the best hope for both of them in the long run.

all the best mate.

Hi MC. It sounds like it is all going horribly wrong :(. No advice from here but if you want somewhere to stay on the way down or back then just shout. It might make it easier, I don’t know

And for the rest of the stories, this is partly what makes this place great. I have a friend here with a son in this situation and I think I understand a bit more now – especially what chip was saying. I recognise the ‘voices’ part but I can’t imagine what it would be like if you didn’t have the other part of your mind that was telling you it was nonsense 🙁

I can relate to all of that stuff..

There simply is no reasoning.. The brain is incredibly powerful once you start messing with it’s neural pathways and if it turns against you it’s a formidable enemy

We see it time and again on here when people with polarised opinions just become more and more entrenched in their position, and it’s very similar with delusions..
When your mind is primarily focussed with fear and paranoia it’s incredibly hard to turn it around to look at things from a different perspective.. I’m not sure that the medical experts are best placed to do this in some cases as with the best will in the world they simply don’t have any first hand experience..

I wouldn’t have made my way back out of the incomprehensible maze without a LOT of desensitisation.. The treatment I got seemed pretty harsh and cruel at the time, it took a long time to convince my deluded ego that I’m really really not important enough for anyone to bother constructing bizarre and intricate covert operations against me.. and at the same time I had to be made to feel that I was safe, that I had nothing to fear from authority and that I was among my peers
A lot of it stems from the fear of police and surveillance, smoking cannabis is an illegal activity and as a user the whole scene is furtive and paranoid.. The psychiatric wards are choc-a-block with kids suffering the exact same delusions.. The voices come from the loneliness and terror that arises when you stop trusting.. I wonder if ending prohibition would go some way to combating a lot of the fear

None of this seems particularly relevant to McMoonters case though, which sounds more like it’s associated with love and longing, which is another kind of crazy altogether! 🙂

I recognise the ‘voices’ part but I can’t imagine what it would be like if you didn’t have the other part of your mind that was telling you it was nonsense

thats what we find hard too, how on earth can you not think rationally and tell yourself that it doesnt make sense, so you can put it to the back of your mind??

doesnt work like that tho does it 🙂

Sorry to hear your story Mcm. No real advice from me. I packed in my use of weed about 20 years ago as I recognised the possible ill effects. I think you are right to try to get your niece and hopefully your sister back here. Best of luck in all you try to do.

McMoonter..

Having now spent some time thinking your problem over and recalling my own experiences I would like to offer some advice..
It may be beneficial to indulge her fantasies.. Go along with her, take her to meet this guy, be there to support her when she is confronted with the truth, and then help her with the root cause.. She is lonely and craving love and affection..
If it turns out that she’s wrong and there is no guy in Shetland, then take her out, be her friend for a year or two and help her meet some guys.. Be there for her, spend some time together

Make your next shedbuilding project a mission to help your sister find happiness

I think we have to remember that McMoonters sister is Bi Polar. She might be high and buzzing or in a mixed state of psychosis but as someone with Bi Polar she is also at a very great risk of plummeting too. She may be rapid cycling and going all over the place. We don’t know.
However, Bi Pilar has to be treated as Bi Polar, schizophrenia treated as schizophrenia etcetera. Providing the wrong treatment to an illness as serious as Bi Polar can make the condition much worse.
Sectioning, if she needs it, should put her in a safe enough place physically, while her mental health could be looked at more closely.

Hard story McM but very best wishes. Among the many great points above, yunki’s seems to stand out. I hope things work out better than you fear. Good luck.

McM,

I think you have to make a decision as to who is the priority to help. Your sister, who you obviously have a direct family love and loyalty to, or your niece, who is not such a close relative but is arguably at the greatest risk in all of this.

My gut feeling is that your niece should be your priority, even if it means that it’s to the detriment of your sister initally.

She is the innocent victim of this unfortunate situation and ensuring that her immediate situation is safe and stable where she can remain in France, at her school, with her friends around her and out of any harm or stress that her mother can bring to her is vital.

I assume there is no father on the scene that can pick up responsibility for her?

Once her situation is secure then you can focus on your sister. Having her daughter out of her care may make the situation worse initially but could possibly be something that shocks her into action. You will also have more options open to you (sectioning, bringing back to UK etc.) as the daughter is safe and out of the equation.

Rich.

Is the dx of bipolar an established one? Strange to have drug induced psychosis – could possibly be more schizoaffective disorder which would give the mood swings of the mood disorder as well as a psycosis. Is it just “weed” she smokes or synthecic cannibanoids? We see a huge amount of people with drug induced problems from smoking kronic or whatever the current brand of the moment is.

Sadexpunk – sorry to hear about your lad G. Hope everything is ticking along. Meds will sort the positive symptoms like voices but the negative things like not washing / poor self care and lack of motivation require lots of input from family and the MDT looking after him.

Best of luck to the OP. Happy to answer any questions if you want to email me. (mental health clinical nurse)

Mark

I’m just back from Ton’s touring weekend. I’ve reopened this thread and have been humbled and inspired by the experiences of those who have contributed. Thanks.

Chip, should you feel the need to dump and you are passing, you are more than welcome. Were have a camera free throne.

We are planning to go to France on Tuesday. My niece arrives back later in the week.

She is the innocent victim of this unfortunate situation and ensuring that her immediate situation is safe and stable where she can remain in France, at her school, with her friends around her and out of any harm or stress that her mother can bring to her is vital.

We think it’s crucial to maintain my nieces emotional and educational security in France. She has a huge network of friends, to isolate her from them would be a disaster and we feel the stigma will taint her.

My sister has been diagnosed with schizophrenia in the past. She has also referred herself to hospital and she has been sectioned on several occasions.

The guy in Shetland is recovering from some form of Leukemia and has a partner and two children. The last thing they want is my sister on their doorstep. We have discussed this with people who know them, they were going to discuss the situation with him. Seemingly my sister has been writing to him. If that correspondence is anything like anything she sends us, I’d imagine it would have been binned immediately.

Our plan is to get some professional help in France for her. There is no father in France. My mother and I will go and see to my niece to preserve continuity in her regime while her mother gets treatment. The poor girl has been there before we had to bring them both back to Scotland the last time. We will just have to see what we can do and make a plan when we have a better picture.

Thanks again for all your help on this. MC

OP if needed email in profile I have first hand experience of very similar situation involving my sister which ultimately ended with me now being the legal guardian to my niece.

Call your local gp and explain the situation, get her back in the UK and have her sectioned asap. it will take a good hospital stay and rehabilitation for her illness. Its not quite true that they can go past a point and not come back, they will come back but often with reduced cognitive function.
Poor compliance with medication is often due to disease insight and been unaware she is ill. When it comes to treatment your local mental health team will either be able to supervise her taking medicine or give an injection injection.

Hope some of that helps helps

Well, we tried…

I feel like I have been whacked in the guts with a virtual sledgehammer. Unlike my car upon which my sister used the real thing.

Heading back on a cross Channel ferry with an aching, bleeding heart.

The whole tale of the last few days is too long and traumatic to retell just now.

The end result is that my sister in a psychotic, manic and stoned condition is being permitted by the local GP and the Gendarmerie to remain as the custodian of a vulnerable thirteen year old child. They will only intervene when she is caught nude in public or is in an arrestable situation.

The Police despite a letter from the GP warning of her continued determination to drive whilst under the influence of Cannabis allowed her to collect and drive my niece from the custody of an independent adult. Promises from the Police to arrest her if she continued to drive have evaporated.

The situation looks bleak. Our presence simply inflamed the inferno. We are at our wits end and feel we have no other option than to leave for home.

I can sympathise with anyone who has ever been exposed to the selfish and destructive influence of addiction. I am utterly spent.

MM – that’s awful. So many people think smoking and eating that stuff is harmless but it sounds like you’re experiencing the real effect it can have – the saddest thing is that it’s affecting an innocent child, not just the drug user themselves. I hope and pray that the situation gets better. 🙁

Sorry to hear OP. I can only add that from our experience it’s only the courts and social services that can intervene regards your niece, not sure how it works in France though.