Usages of Medical Marijuana to Improve Mental Health Conditions

How Medical Marijuana Assists in Improving Mental Health Conditions

People who are suffering from diseases like multiple sclerosis in Savoy can experience a lot of benefits from using medical marijuana. However, it is not just people with physical diseases such as Crohn’s in Savoy that can benefit from medical marijuana. It has also been shown to have significant benefits for mental health conditions as well. Here are some of the various mental health issues that medical marijuana can help with and how exactly it benefits the individual using it. 

Schizophrenia

Someone who is suffering from schizophrenia is likely going to experience some pretty severe mental symptoms such as seeing hallucinations and having trouble speaking properly. This happens because the disease makes them lose a grip on reality and they begin to often experience psychotic events at seemingly random times. 

This can be pretty devastating for someone who either has a disease or is close to someone with the disease. Someone who is dealing with schizophrenia will often find it extremely hard to hold down a job or complete a lot of other simple daily activities. Luckily, medical marijuana is available for people with schizophrenia and it has been shown to have positive effects on these individuals. 

This is because marijuana has a massive impact on the entire nervous system, which is the area that is largely affected by schizophrenia. When cannabis is used, it begins to produce antipsychotic effects in the individual’s brain, which makes it less likely that someone will experience a schizophrenic episode where they lose their sense of reality. So while it will not cure the disease, it will make its devastating symptoms a little less common. 

Depression

Millions of Americans struggle with depression every year, which makes it one of the most serious mental conditions that there are. Unfortunately, trying to get rid of depression is often just as hard as trying to get rid of any other mental disease. With most people never being able to fully get rid of their depression, the best that they can hope to do is manage it to a point where it barely affects their life anymore. 

Thankfully, this is possible thanks to treatments like medical marijuana. When someone consumes cannabis, it is able to release endorphins within their system, which automatically makes them feel a little bit happier. However, releasing some endorphins is not going to be quite enough to get rid of something as serious as depression. 

Luckily, medical marijuana has also been shown to improve an individual’s cognitive abilities. This combined with the rise of endorphins when consuming marijuana makes it one of the best treatments available for people with depression. 

While other treatments such as various antidepressants might take a stronger effect than marijuana, they are also known to frequently cause unpleasant side effects. This can make someone less depressed about a certain element of their life but simultaneously cause them to become more depressed in a different part of their life. This is not really solving the problem but is instead just changing it. 

Plus, there is also the fact that taking too many antidepressants can actually harm someone and possibly even be fatal. This is not the case with marijuana, which not only makes it more effective at treating depression but safer as well. 

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder

Life is not always sunshine and bubblegum, with many people experiencing some pretty tragic events at some point in their life. When this happens, they can develop what is known as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). 

This mental disease makes the individual mentally relive the trauma that they were exposed to when certain stimulants arise. Depending on what the traumatic event was, these stimulants could be a variety of things. For example, someone who is suffering from PTSD as a result of being in a war zone may be set off by really loud noises. Therefore, if they went to something like a firework show, it is quite possible that they could experience a PTSD episode due to the fact that the fireworks sound similar to gunfire. 

These traumatic PTSD episodes will look different in every case but one of the defining characteristics of them is that the individual will no longer understand where they are or the situation they are in because their mind will be reliving the past event. 

Medical marijuana is able to assist in the treatment of PTSD thanks to its ability to increase the amount of serotonin that is present in the brain. This is something that is necessary for the treatment of PTSD and is able to lower both the severity and the frequency of any PTSD episodes. 

Marijuana is actually able to go even further than this to also reduce the occurrence of many by-product symptoms of PTSD. For example, someone who experiences frequent episodes is going to have trouble sleeping. This is something that marijuana has been repeatedly proven to help with as it is a very effective and often recommended treatment for insomnia. 

Anxiety and Stress

One of the only mental conditions that are more frequent than depression is anxiety. Pretty much everyone experiences anxiety at one point or another. However, for some people, it reaches a point where it gets so bad that they need to seek out treatment for it. This is usually done when the individual frequently experiences panic attacks as a result of high levels of anxiety or stress. 

While the most effective treatment would be to get rid of the sources of anxiety, this is often not an option for most people. Therefore, the next best thing would be to use medical marijuana in order to try and treat the symptoms of anxiety and stress. 

When someone experiences a panic attack, their body will have a high amount of cortisol within it. Marijuana works to fight this by generating other hormones within the body that counteract cortisol levels. It also helps individuals experience a healthy appetite as well as an intense feeling of calm. This often allows individuals to remain calm even in the most stressful situations.