XPost: alt.fan.rush-limbaugh, alt.politics.republicans, sac.politics   
   XPost: talk.politics.guns   
   From: wimps@latimes.com   
      
   On 06 Dec 2021, Iobaties  posted some   
   news:solq56$le7$10@news.dns-netz.com:   
      
   > Vance wrote   
   >   
   >> Give them some fentanyl and they will stop using marijuana!   
      
   The text from her son Randy that Heather Bacchus received at at 1:26 AM on   
   July 17, 2021, seemed like good news.   
      
   “I’m quitting weed for good and want to surround myself with healthy and   
   happy people,” he wrote. “This has been too much for me and for you guys.”   
      
   Less than an hour later, at 2:09 AM, a second text arrived.   
      
   “I love you and am sorry for everything. I love dad and the same to him. I   
   wish I would have been a better person.”   
      
   It was his suicide note. That night, Randy killed himself.   
      
   His death followed a months-long struggle with psychotic episodes and   
   paranoid delusions — something his parents, Heather and Randy Sr., say was   
   triggered by years of heavy cannabis use.   
      
   Now research suggests they were right: a study published by the National   
   Institutes of Health warns that cannabis use is implicated in 30% of cases   
   of schizophrenia among men aged 18 to 30.   
      
   The study links schizophrenia to cannabis use disorder: the inability to   
   stop using cannabis despite the negative impacts it is having on the   
   user’s life. And separately, the Centers for Disease Control say a third   
   of pot-smokers are plagued by the disorder.   
      
   Randy’s mother says his upbringing with his parents and three sisters in   
   St. Paul was very happy, healthy, and normal.   
   At the same time an NIH-supported study last year found young adult   
   cannabis use is at a historic high, with 43% of 19- to 30-year-olds using   
   within the previous year.   
      
   The findings add to a growing body of research about the link between   
   schizophrenic symptoms and cannabis — but many parents are woefully   
   unaware of the danger. Those numbers included Heather.   
      
   “We didn’t know that marijuana could cause that,” the St. Paul, Minnesota   
   resident told The Post.   
      
   Randy’s parents received these harrowing texts on the night their son took   
   his own life.   
   Randy’s upbringing was happy. “We were a normal, healthy family. We did   
   family dinners. We went to church regularly,” Heather said of life for him   
   and his three sisters.   
      
   But he began casually using marijuana aged 15. Randy was diagnosed with   
   cannabis use disorder within a year, then struggled with compulsive use   
   through high school.   
      
   After graduation Randy, who his mother described as “an independent soul,”   
   moved to Denver, Colo., where he got a job as a property manager.   
      
   But then, he started experiencing psychotic states: He heard music and   
   voices, made grandiose plans for the future, believing he would be a   
   famous rap star, and even landed in the hospital for frostbite after   
   running barefoot in a snowstorm.   
      
   The telltale signs of cannabis-induced psychosis are severe paranoia and   
   delusions, paired with compulsive marijuana use.   
      
   He met all the symptoms. Paranoid, he was fired for accusing employer of   
   being in the mob and evicted after threatening a roommate he thought was   
   watching him.   
      
   Randy’s parents tried desperately to get him help and checked into   
   treatment, but things only continued to devolve until his final days.   
      
   Now, his parents — Heather and husband Randy Sr.— want to stop history   
   from repeating itself.   
      
   “It’s just heartbreaking, Heather said. “People who are going through it   
   don’t even know it. People need to wake up. It doesn’t have to be that   
   way.”   
      
   Randy’s parents are far from alone. They’ve found solace in the non-profit   
   Johnny’s Ambassadors, which provides information and support groups for   
   parents of children struggling with cannabis-induced psychosis and   
   schizophrenia.   
      
   The organization was founded by Laura Stack, whose son Johnny also was   
   derailed by schizoaffective disorder from severe THC abuse.   
      
   Over the course of high school, Johnny transformed from a loving teen with   
   a 4.0 GPA to a verbally abusive and delusional person.   
      
   Just before Thanksgiving 2019, 19-year-old Johnny had dinner with his   
   parents. He turned to his mother and said, “I just want you to know you   
   were right about the marijuana. You told me it would hurt my brain, and it   
   has ruined my mind and my life. I’m sorry, I love you.”   
      
   Three days later, Johnny jumped off a parking garage and died.   
      
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)