My story of quit smoking cannabis in Amsterdam

Dear Steemians,

I would like to share a personal story about my dependency or addiction of cannabis. I started smoking pot when I was 16 and smoked almost daily ever since. After 16 years it was time for me to quit. As I live for 12 years in the city center of Amsterdam with 25 coffeeshops within a 5 minute walk, it was not so easy for me to quit smoking. Even on my travels to Asia and the Middle East I continued smoking. I actually smoked pot in all the countries I visited. In some it was more easy to find as in others, but my experience is that people smoke pot everywhere. To name a few: China, India, Thailand, Israel, Egypt, Malaysia, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam to Indonesia. After a while you know the places where there are more pot smokers, like Koh Phayam in Thailand, the Gili's in Indonesia or Himachal Pradesh in India.

I was mentally prepared to quit, but with all the coffeeshops in my neighbourhood I just couldn't. The withdrawal symptoms of THC can be bad as well, especially the first weeks. Severe insomnia is one of the worst. So I decided to take a vacation to Indonesia for a month (and not go to the Gili's or Lembogan), but stay in Bali and Jakarta and drive around on a motorbike. That's something I really like to do anyway. The penalties of smoking pot are serious in Indonesia, so generally, you don't want to take this risks. It really isn't worth it and I had been caught in Thailand with pot once, paid some huge fines, was released and just continued smoking anyway. Indonesia is much more serious though. So I spend a month in Indonesia, had severe insomnia and stomach problems for the whole holiday, but i managed.

Now I'm back in Amsterdam for two weeks and continued to stop smoking pot. The insomnia is finally gone, but now i sleep like 9 to 10 hours a day. I guess it will take a while for my body to adapt to the new circumstances. Luckily I feel great and kind of liberated.

My father smokes pot for 50 years now and I have no problems sitting next to him and see him smoke. He still smokes like 1,5 to 2 grams a day. Similar as I did. In the Netherlands people think very lightly about consuming cannabis. It's addictive, but you won't hear this. I believe in the freedom of the individual and it's for you to decide to use drugs or not. Real freedom though, is to be free from dependencies like caffeine, nicotine or thc.