Gemma Speck

Like full-on solitude and full-on a bit of a personal loneliness crisis.

And this makes a lot of sense.

It makes a lot of sense.

We can amplify certain emotions that we can feel very self-conscious of in front of people.

in front of other people, but it can also make us feel better about other emotions that we feel individually.

So therefore, it can become something that we only do by ourselves because we want the feeling.

We don't want to see or be around other people while we have the feeling, but the feeling in itself is still there.

Good.

And that can mean that the more we really just enjoy that solitary time, smoking alone, consuming alone, the more of a comforting ritual it becomes, the more of a habit, the more that it can be a replacement for connection.

If someone, maybe it's you right now, starts to use weed mainly in a solitary manner or to manage a broader sense of loneliness...

That is dangerous territory because it becomes harder and harder to come back from and harder and harder to, you know, feel okay with being around people.

But again, people are different.

Like for some people, it's a purely social activity.

It can actually be a really fun source of memories.

It just depends on your response and it depends on everybody's response.

So I think the thing we can't do when we talk about weed is make broad stroke statements that weed is bad.

Every weed user is lonely and depressed because it's just not true.

It's just something to be aware of about how, you know, there is a deep correlation between solitary usage and depression.

extended loneliness, meaning that, yes, loneliness initially might cause somebody to smoke weed by themselves because they don't have anybody to smoke or consume with, but that it can make it worse and it can be a mediating factor that continues to escalate the pattern.

Okay, that was so intense.