Can smoking pot make you a better parent?

Sep, 10, 2012 | AUTHOR: Starcasm Staff; | Related : Controversy, News, Parenting

Art dealer Mark Wolfe makes the argument in a New York Times opinion piece that his medical marijuana use makes him a better parent.

At 44, Mark had long-term back pain, stress, anxiety, and insomnia. He got his cannabis card around the same time his youngest daughter was born.

He says before he started the marijuana treatment, he was a dutiful parent, but the every day stresses left him burnt out.

Before beginning treatment, I was a dutiful if not particularly enthusiastic father. Workaday parental obligations were a necessary, unfortunate chore. I was so stressed out by the end of the day that bedtime, with its interminable pleas for more stories, songs, sips of water and potty breaks, felt like a labor to be endured and dispatched as quickly as possible.

Now he says’s he’s ready to not only be there for his kids at night, but really engage with them.

I swear I am a more loving, attentive and patient father when I take my medication as prescribed.Perhaps this isn’t surprising. As anyone who inhaled during college can attest, cannabis enhances the ability to perceive beauty, complexity and novelty in otherwise mundane things (grout patterns in your bathroom floor, the Grateful Dead, Doritos), while simultaneously locking you into a prolonged state of rapt attention. You not only notice the subtle color variations in your cat’s fur, you stare at them in loving awe for 20 solid minutes.

He knows he’ll get con criticism for this conclusion, but says that being part of a family with two working parents with modest incomes in an expensive city, it’s impossible to try more time-consuming things like yoga or meditation to try to deal with his stress and anxiety. He also points out that in most states marijuana is an illegal option.

But for me, at least, the benefits clearly outweigh the risks. I find the time I spend with my children to be qualitatively different and simply more fun when I take my medicine (always in private, never in front of them, never too much). I am able to become a kid again, to see things through my daughters’ eyes and experience, if I’m lucky, the wonder of each new game, each new object and sound, as they do.

With increasing numbers of people on medical marijuana, this is a compelling observation, especially considering the reality that so many parents self-medicate with alcohol or other drugs to “get them through the day.”

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Piper

This has to be a rhetorical Q?
UhmWhatever

Everyday stress burns a lot of people out but they don’t smoke weed because of it. It’s called being a parent and adult in general. Some people become totally useless when they smoke pot so this isn’t a cure-all by any means.
- Jenn
  
  If you smoke a lot of weed yes you become lazy, not if you take a puff or two.
Limma

He obviously feel like he is a better parent now.. he went from a lot of pain, and very little tolerance (caused by the pain) to a laid back joyful parent. This does not apply to pot head parents who sell their children’s belongings just to satisfy their selfish need.
YeaRight

You must have been high when u wrote this !! Marijuana is a drug legal or not. I know one thing Iwouldnt never let anyone smoking pot around my kids much less watch them.
- me
  
  ummm did the article even say that this parent smoked pot around their children? NO! I think if they are good parents they would know not to do that. duh. amazes me the idiots and their stupid comments on here. I literally laugh out loud!
  - disqus_FJWIxfZG4R
    
    Thank u!
- disqus_FJWIxfZG4R
  
  Im sure u drink in front of your kids
alexstorm

I have MS and I’m in the middle of menopause, so I can turn into a monster at the drop of a hat, pot stops that, it rids me of a lot of pain , makes me feel like participating w/the rest of the world, helps w/my walking, calms queasiness, it takes the edge off. Its not used like recreational pot, you smoke just a bit, and its enough, I can’t drink because of the medication I am on, not interested in taking any more medication, pot works for me!
http://twitter.com/AnitaNM79 Anita Salazar

I had this exact conversation with a coworker just the other day. We both agree. I have been saying this for years.
http://www.facebook.com/andrea.e.bishop Andrea Elaine Bishop

I smoked pot in high school and actually did find that it made me alot slower to anger however, I also laughed at nothing, danced naked on a dining room table, ate everything in sight and slept almost constantly…not good things for parents to be doing lol.
me

I totally agree with this.. self medicating is safer, smarter, & makes more sense. You looks at all of these pill popping, opiate abusing & alcoholics and they are a mess. Ive never met a person that is doped up because of weed. As Kat Williams says.. it makes you happy, hungry, & sleepy. I think I would rather relax with a joint then a whiskey drink or pain pill & be addicted.
herp

Some people will never understand how hard it is to live with chronic pain or anxiety with little help from conventional medications. Must be nice to be that naive.