22 Real People Explain How Cannabis Helps Them Mentally, Physically, & Emotionally

The word is out that marijuana can have some pretty incredible health benefits. While reading the studies on cannabis and health can be informative, we thought it would be better to ask our community how cannabis helps them. So, we took to Instagram to find out how our followers are using marijuana to help them heal. Here are their real answers.

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1. Slows down the mind

“Keeps my thoughts at a pace I can actually hear and understand them.”

2. Every day functioning

“It helps me function everyday… makes my back pain bearable… also helps with my depression and PTSD… I also suffer from road anxiety so it also helps me stay calm on a long car ride! I love cannabis!!!”

3. Keeps the peace

“Helps me be at peace, see things from a different perspective and to relieve tensions in my body and mind.”

4. To beat addiction

“It helps me with my anxiety PTSD and depression. Has also made it possible for me to be clean off of meth and alcohol for 9 months.”

5. For Postpartum Psychosis

“I went through some serious Postpartum Psychosis. It helped me more than any of the medication that the doctors prescribed. It is the reason I’m still alive and able to take care of my daughter.”

6. To let go of the drama

“Helps me sleep and helps me make it through the day dealing with everyone else’s drama and unnecessary meanness.”

7. To stay off opioids

“I have chronic pain from a genetic autoimmune disease. It keeps me off opioids.”

8. To help heal pain

“Helps decrease my pain, inflammation and anxiety. Makes life enjoyable again.”

9. To decrease the side effects of prescription steroids

“Weed helps me get through my day by being my aid that takes the edge off the steroids I have to take to stay alive allowing me to stabilize my mood, something pharmaceutical drugs couldn’t do in nearly 3 years.”

10. It helps with everything

“Improves my mood, sleep, diet, & productivity! I’m so much more creative & open to receiving new ideas. Takes my guard down & opens my heart up.”

11. Eases severe anxiety and depression

“Helps with my ongoing severe stomach pains that has been unsolved since I was 4, my diagnosed severe anxiety, diagnosed bipolar 1, depression, and doctors that don’t agree on me being on the autism spectrum. Marijuana takes my pain away and calms my never ending and negative thoughts that go in a million different directions.”

12. To relax muscle tension

“Helps with my muscle tension, anxiety, moods, and sleep. also to see perspectives differently and analyze how they’ll benefit somehow someway.”

13.To get off anti-depressants

“Weed helped me quit taking anti depressants! It works 100000x better and I sleep like a baby. I dealt with insomnia for my entire life and was clinically diagnosed with anxiety disorder and weed is the only medication that has helped me get better.”

14. To ease the pain from major operations

“Cannabis helps ease my chronic pain from 3 organ transplants.”

15. To eliminate negative thoughts

“Cannabis has definitely helped me quiet my mind and eliminate negative thoughts. Because of this I feel prepared to deal with the stressors of life.”

16. For an improved quality of life

“Helps with just about everything you have to deal with on a day-to-day basis in this thing we call life. From depression, anxiety, pain from my PsA, sleeping (I sleep so good)…Simply put, my quality of life is just so much better with cannabis in it.”

17. To help with an overactive bladder

“I have an over active bladder (OAB) and despite being on one of the most advertised OAB medicines, I still get up 4-6 times a night to pee. Smoking before bedtime helps me sleep through the entire night and no, I don’t have any accidents.”

18. To manage pain from a broken back

“I broke my back (sacrum, 5 bones fused together, the last bone in the spine, the top of the tailbone and both sides of the pelvis) in a 2010 sledding accident. I have a very addictive personality and hate opioids, so I dealt with the every day pain for a while before finding cannabis in a new way. Using topicals, eating edibles and even smoking the right strains take my pain and swelling right away. Cannabis has helped me more than any other pharmaceutical and I am so thankful.”

19. For getting life back when dealing with chronic pain

“Weed helps me with my chronic pain syndrome, I am extremely allergic to all pain medications but weed saved me. I can walk my dog now, cook meals (carefully) and most importantly I can paint again. Weed gave me back my life.”

20. To help with severe mental health issues

“Cannabis has been the best thing in my life in regards to medication. I suffer from PTSD, extreme anxiety, depression, bipolar disorder, stomach issues, and nausea. It’s a lot. I start my day off with a wake and bake and I smoke before and after each meal and before bed. Without cannabis I would not be able to function at all. I would be in the bathroom getting sick or having a panic attack or going days without eating anything. Cannabis takes most of that away. I’d hate to see myself without it.”

21. To improve quality of life

“Cannabis helps me in so many different ways. I once believed the propaganda nonsense and was anti-cannabis. I believed it to be just as bad or worse, because it was illegal, as tobacco. Until I decided to try it after some educated people enlightened me. The stigma just flew away with the smoke. I understood. Cannabis helps me alleviate pain and enhance my appetite. I use it to heal from my post partum depression. It helps me keep my patience longer and be calm for my daughter. It allows me to reconnect to myself and nature. It continues to be a part of my life and although I’ve been scared of being completely open about my cannabis use, for fear of CPS getting involved, I want to be apart of ending the stigma. By hiding I’ve only added to it, like it’s shameful, and it’s absolutely isn’t.”

22. To help the pain of endometriosis

“I have stage 4 endometriosis and major depression and anxiety. Cannabis relaxes my nerves, puts me in a better mood and helps relieve all of the horrible symptoms I deal with with my endo…it’s a miracle.”

Cannabis is helping people in more ways than you can imagine. When you see someone who uses cannabis, you don’t always know their reasoning, which is why it’s important for everyone to be a little more understanding. People are out there using cannabis to heal, create a better life for themselves, and take back power over their body and mental health.

RELATED: Why I Moved To Another State To Use Cannabis For Health & Wellness