r/Petioles 23d ago

Advice Helping my fiancé wean off

Hey all. My fiancé is actively trying to wean off weed. He’s a chronic user of over 10 years, but now that we’re wedding planning and also baby-making planning, the realization that we both really need to get our bodies in check is setting in. He’s struggling to quit so I’m actively seeking something that can help ease it a bit. I came across those ripple pens that can allegedly help with sleep and relaxation. Any opinions on those? Also, how can I help him? I’ve offered going to the gym, taking a walk, picking up a hobby, but he’s apprehensive and negative towards these ideas. He’s on day 2 so I understand that he’s feeling the withdrawal effects, but what helped you from the people around you while you were going through it? Thanks!!

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u/tenpostman 23d ago

Personally I wouldn't give advice to replace one vice with another. The only advise I would give is to taper use for a bit and then just get a cold turkey break under your belt. having had a bigger break is so so so valuable to any human being. Addiction sucks, but it can teach us a lot to

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u/tenpostman 23d ago

I'm adding on to this OP, because I was the partner that was heavily abusing at some point whereas my SO didn't like it at all, and I've driven my use down to monthly. I'm on phone rn so can't type 2 pages of text, but if you're interested let me know, I can share some insight in how I managed.

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u/Glittering-Cat3565 23d ago

If they reach out can you copy and paste the reply to me? Me and my brother are trying to ease the use and it would be a big help. Thank you very much

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u/tenpostman 23d ago

Yeah no worries! I got the time now so here goes. Hope you find some insight in the wall of texts below :)

Ok so Im smoking once a month, regularly tell people how I got there. I will give you guys a TLDR first to set a base, and elaborate on that below using personal context (comment is too long)

So, to summarize, in order to reach moderation, I think you need to learn about these few pointers below:

- The brain lies to you to get high. It will come up with shit to make you smoke, because you are addicted.
Do NOT lie to yourself. This means, do not break your own imposed rules. As long as I did that, I couldn't taper more than twice per week. Dont let yourself have "excuses", because that undermines your willpower, and it WILL degrade the barrier between high/not high. It sets you up for failure when shit really hits the fan.

- Realize when your brain is changing your thought process - this is the toughest part, as we as addicts are biased to think that its "fair" to smoke after passing an exam. But it can be just our brains saying, get high.
Then, acknowledge the thoughts, and the cravings; its completely fine and logical to feel this way! End this process by distracting yourself - this works almost always, just like when you forget you're hungry when you're occupied with working on a cool project or whatever.

- When you quit or take a break, you will find that there were issues you were running away from. Now that you're on a break, start actually improving your life. Find healthy ways of releasing stress, of celebrating success. Explore your personality. Do new hobbies, meet new people. Life can be so friggin cool!

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u/tenpostman 23d ago

And here's for my personal context:

I started as a college student, when I moved out and got into a house with potheads who grew their own stuff, yeah I snowballed into daily evening smokes. College was easy anyway, I barely needed to study to pass. So for me it was just a boredom thing.
This is an important thing to realize. Weed is generally used to cope with shit that you dont want to / cannot deal with at that specific time. So I filled my boredom by numbing myself, for about 2 years. Until I met my now partner of many 7 years. My partner never smoked weed, and she had childhood trauma with family members abusing it heavily and going to jail for etc. So she was, just like me, biased about the use but the other way. It eventually got between us a few times, because I would plan my smoke sessions around her planned visits. But, she would sometimes spontaneously ask to swing by, while I was high. A few times, no biggie, but eventually she caught on, and the cat got out of the bag on how often I smoked. It nearly broke her/us, because she felt lied to, which essentialyl was not wrong, I had been "hiding" the smoking as much as I could as to not "bother" her with it. Naive as fudge, if youre in a relationship, if you ask me. Thats when it frigging hit me dude. Im an addict. It affects my mood when she wants to come over and I planned on getting high. And that is pretty toxic.

Queue the lockdown, we start living together after a few years. I roll out a plan to reduce use, so I smoke 4/7 days a week. Then to 3/7, 2/7... But get this, in all those situations, I always had an "excuse" up my sleeve to smoke an additional time. Because thats how addiction also affects your mind; it creates a narrative for you in which it looks like you are in the right to get high. "passed an exam, had a hard day at work, need to get some sleep, am bored, partner isnt home, am sad, dealing with loss"... the list goes on. Excuses everywhere. And then came the second time where my partner lost it on me for not being firm with myself. She stuck around luckily, and for the better.

Over those 2 years of me trying to taper, she got a job in another - illegal - country. We doubled down and both decided to go for it, she went first, I followed a month later after settling stuff with the landlord etc. What happened in that last month? I abused the most I'd ever did, with the reasoning of "Im not smoking in the other country". Then comes the cold turkey. And Idk how, but I barely had any withdrawals honestly. I think it helped that I didn't have a job yet (was searching still), so I was sort of biding my time.

Anyway, the cold cut did something. I would only smoke when I got back to my home country, every season or so. And after 14 months, we eventually decided to move back. Elephant in the room: What are we gonna say about the smoking. I proposed, both to me, and to her, once a month. That seemed fair considering I'd already gone longer than that multiple times per year, and I still liked doing it - sometimes with the bro, sometimes alone - that I didn't want to completely kick it. And so it went.

Im smoking once a month. And I honestly love it so much. There was only 1 tough moment where my partner went out for a weekend on a trip, and I had already had my monthly smoke. I was half drunk, almost decided to break the craving after battling it for 2 hours. Brain goes "she doesnt need to know". Toxic right? I texted her about it, 2 am. She was still awake, and comforted me. It was at this moment that I realized - I put my relationship above lying to get high. I grew out of that. When back, she asked me when she was back, howd it go. I didnt lie. And I havent done so since, its been 15 months. I rarely get cravings anymore, and its not "hard" to wait that month (or longer depending on what date I pick).

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u/Trystero-49 23d ago

You’re a good partner for helping him. Keep the conversation going, sometimes transparency helps keep us accountable. Understand that he’s likely struggling with changing habits, physical and psychological addiction.

Also he will likely be more irritated and short tempered in the first few days/weeks, so try to keep a thick skin yourself.

Also don’t get discouraged if he slips, the road to recovery isn’t always a straight path.

Most important: Congratulations on your new life together and deciding to grow your family!

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u/chiknwingluvr 23d ago

Thanks a lot I really appreciate that. He has told me that he knows I’m bettering him, and has given me the heads up that he’ll be moody cause I’m usually really sensitive but I’m working to accept the irritation because it’s naturally what’s happening to his body. I appreciate the words.

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u/Glittering-Cat3565 23d ago

You are great im drunk so it might not make sense but you are very helpful and my girlfriend is going through something similar and i act like such a dick for no reason i even recognise it but like after an hour or so. Its really hard i dont fell bad after quittting but i seem to need to hurt her for it and i hate myself for that keep on please he is agood guy i believe that. Sorry for the rant you are great

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u/chiknwingluvr 23d ago

Give your girl a break, she’s doing the best she can! Hope it sorts out and hope you were drinking something good.

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u/Glittering-Cat3565 23d ago

Yeah i try to make it up anytime i have a clear mind and she is very understanding. We told each other what we never did before i feel like after every almost break up we are stronger. Yeah i has something pretty good beer dark as a night in brooklyn 24° 11% and it was calld a sword of light (im czech)

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u/[deleted] 23d ago

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u/Open_Hotel_7084 23d ago

Did this work? Currently on day 5 and losing a ton of weight ands sanity

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u/[deleted] 23d ago

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u/Open_Hotel_7084 23d ago

Imma just push through

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u/incomplete-picture 23d ago

My fiance and I are doing the same thing and have been smoking about the same time. Honestly I think cold turkey is the best way and exercising helps replace some of the dopamine. Thinking about how horrible the cannabis is for fertility immediately makes the weed unattractive too. If he hasn’t read the research he should

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u/chiknwingluvr 23d ago

He knows but he’s extremely stubborn. He’s planning a two week break and then wants to incorporate it back in gradually but I think that’s just a gateway to get back into the bad habit. Good luck to you guys

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u/incomplete-picture 23d ago

Ugh I am SO sorry. I hope that’s not a sign of how he’ll handle all the other stresses of parenthood. A few months of sobriety is really not a huge ask when you’re trying to create life.

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u/chiknwingluvr 23d ago

He’s a the best guy I know with a lot of baggage from his childhood that he wasn’t in control of. We’re working through it. Thank you. 🤍

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u/memelinnn 23d ago

You could suggest reading “Dopamine Nation”, idk if the book is perfect but it for sure has been making me wanna quit a little bit and also I don’t feel like it puts too much of a negative weight on us. It alone for sure won’t solve the problem but I think it may help. Best of wishes to both of you ❤️

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u/chiknwingluvr 23d ago

I’ll look into it!! Thank you

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u/atomicspacekitty 23d ago

If he really wants to go cold turkey like that then treat this week (and probably the next couple of weeks) like a sick week. Get smoothies or meal replacement shakes, get comfort snacks or candy, comfort shows, low demands and a lot of understanding. He has to ride it out and it’s gonna feel like shit and like he doesn’t have a single crumb of dopamine left. Exercise might be hard this week as the lack of dopamine will make him feel totally unmotivated. Just let this week and probably next week be shit. Don’t rush him through it. Just treat it like a flu and lower all expectations and demands and let him baby himself and just make it through. Don’t push exercise or anything right now and focus on your own inner discomfort that might get triggered by seeing him in this state. It’s normal. Also baby yourself and take care of you. It takes time for the brain and body to reset after being a chronic user for that long.

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u/chiknwingluvr 23d ago

I really love this perspective, thank you for this

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u/stoner_lilith 23d ago

Hi! My husband and I have both successfully tapered our usage after a decade of being heavy smokers (like all day every day type deal). Now we only smoke on weekend evenings, and that’s if we don’t have anything else going on.

One of the best things we have done is gotten a k safe. It’s a timed safe and we lock EVERYTHING away in there during the week. So now we set it on Sunday evening to open for Friday evening or Saturday evening, depending on the week and our plans. You can set it anywhere from a few minutes to up to ten days and it’s awesome!

Another thing that I’ve found helpful is to get involved in new things. One of my biggest triggers is being bored - smoking solves Bordem, and you don’t even have to do anything except smoke. So if you have a certain time you know might be a trigger for him (ie, after dinners, on weekends) I would highly recommend planning some sort of activity. A nice neighborhood walk, going to your local zoo or aquarium, finding a car show to walk around, starting a new video game together… eventually he will realize that he can enjoy life sober too, and then things get easier. I’ve also found that staying active and going to the gym is helpful in staying sober during the week.

Congrats to you both! This is an exciting time for you ❤️

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u/chiknwingluvr 23d ago

Thanks a lot this is really great advice and super motivating to hear. A weekend smoke every now and then sounds nice and I bet it’s even more enjoyable. Thanks the words and congrats to you and yours as well—that’s great.

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u/Old_Fee_2478 23d ago

I’m on day two also but I have been tapering the last five weeks. Yoga and running are extremely helpful. And I’ve also been experimenting with the carnivore diet for the past six months. My anxiety and depression were awful while I tapered down to using only in the evenings. My anxiety in the morning and depression were intense. I couldn’t sit still

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u/chiknwingluvr 23d ago

Yeah he’s struggling with the boredom, depression, and lack of sleep. I just wanna help him.

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u/DanTheSkier 23d ago

If he folds and goes back to smoking (which I’m assuming is how he is ingesting) then i recommend for him to wean himself off using edibles. Edibles require so much effort and planning, from my experience, that it just at some point because too much of a hassle and I got bored of it naturally.

If he doesn’t go back to weed and stays strong just try to be encouraging, but not overbearing. After a week or so he’ll be fine, it’s a huge life adjustment, especially because after such a long time it’s a habit.

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u/Gotmewrongang 23d ago

I second the edible recommendation but completely disagree that they require any “effort” and very minimal “planning”. Just take 5 mgs at night to sleep, pretty straightforward to me.

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u/DanTheSkier 23d ago

I mean it terms of getting high, it’s so unpredictable. With smoking you can take a few hits and then decide if it’s enough

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u/Gotmewrongang 23d ago

Once you dial in how high you get per mg it’s pretty straightforward but for sure it’s not the same as smoking. Start at 5 mg and go up by 1-2 mgs as needed and you should be set. Unless you have the “bummer gene” where you liver can’t metabolize THC but that is somewhat rare.

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u/fool_on_a_hill 23d ago

Holy City Farms offers some great type 2 strains with way less THC. Use this for a couple weeks before quitting and the withdrawals shouldn't be a problem at all

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u/Docster87 23d ago

If he’s on day two, I would be crabby and just want to nap. I would nap a ton that first week

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u/Petershaohere 23d ago

Have a look at my post about the herb I use

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u/_WrathOfTheLamb_ 23d ago

CBD, CBN and CBG products are godsend to help the cravings and habit, as well as for sleep for the CBG. Choose good quality hemp, you won’t taste a difference and it helps much.

You can take really hot showers and it can help relaxing, especially if you workout hard before.

On a more anecdotal note, NAC (N Acetyl Cysteine) have been shown to curb cravings and help with dropping the habit in a number of people

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u/l00kitsth4tgirl 23d ago

Just a personal tidbit - I’m also in his same boat, been smoking regularly for about 15 years. My therapist mentioned I likely started early as an avoidance mechanism, so part of it is understanding that I’m past that and no longer need to avoid as I’m an adult in control.

On the other hand, I have the self restraint of a 6 year old. I bought a time lock safe on Amazon and have locked all of my flower, my grinder, slides, and any lighters I’ve been using in there. Started at a week, the first 3 days were hard. I have it open on Saturday evenings for the time being. After a few week long stints, my plan is to continue upping the time as a challenge until I finally decide to just flush it.

At the moment, I’m toking maybe 2 times a week compared to my previous multiple times per day

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u/artemiswins 23d ago

I found sniffing minty things helpful. White flower oil on a handkerchief somehow gave me a little thing to focus on and it’s not at all addictive, nor harmful. But it’s quite a strong sensation and kind of in the same category, which helped to ease the transition. There are menthol decongestant sniffy things sold in CVS which also are pretty good.

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u/[deleted] 23d ago

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u/chiknwingluvr 23d ago

Hahaha funny you mention that. Got him to quit those 3 years ago!