No, really, no, really, they really don't really fans. It's David Google.
I'm Google.
I'm here with you today with a bonus edition of really No Really Now. In the most recent edition of the show, we had doctor Ryan Sultan, the assistant professor of clinical psychiatry at Columbia University. Now he came on to talk about people behaving badly, the Karens at the pool or the people going crazy on airport, right, and
so we were having that discussion. But during the taping, Peter admitted that he was coming could Turkey off of the use of marijuana that had gotten out of hand since COVID, so much so that when he went off of it, he was he was having a hard time. Well,
thankfully for us. Doctor Sultan is an expert in the areas of anxiety disorders depression ADHD, and substance abuse ketamine and cannabis youth, so he was the perfect person to talk to the research the new extensive research showing issues with heart issues with parts of the brain actually shrinking with extended cannabis youth.
So we wasn't.
Really part of the behaving Badly type of show that we were doing for you, but we felt that it was an important, helpful conversation that we wanted to share with you. So without further ado, let's go to Jason and Peter for really, no, really, it's.
Starting because the oscars happened recently and.
You got through them without smoking.
Leave. That's really I've given up. So I gave up.
I could do a medical podcast and we just did a report. Just literate the latest report. I'm having a tough time even talking today.
So what should I call renegade Parana and get it back over.
Boot roller blood.
So in the report, and this is not a small sampling, this is like over four hundred thousand people now that's been not legalized for all, they found the stroke risk is.
Through the roof.
The lord caught smoking for smoking even for edibles. The lung cancer risk is through the roof. And I went out the other night, and you know, I've been smoking heavily. Heavily, Oh I know. Yeah, And I'm not proud of it because I started using it to go to sleep, and I was using it to eat dinner, and then I was using it to have.
Cereal, right, So and it was so easy to do.
I sprinkle it knowing that I'm not going to go dumpster diving and throw it out. And it's been three days and I've quit before, but this time has been really difficult. My cold turkey cold turkey, and I can feel it. I can really feel it because the stroke. When I read those statistics, it was incredible. But as far as the oscar, I'm the same way with sugar.
I've been off sugar now for twenty three twenty four days.
And congratulationships down and wait your cholesterols down. My cholesterol fell one hundred points.
So today's lesson is if you lose weight, your cholesterol goes down down, and if you stop pot you're ready to kill the guy whose cholesterol has gone down. So joining us now is doctor Ryan Sultan, Assistant Professor of Clinical Psychiatry in the Department of Psychiatry at Columbia University and the Irving Medical Center in New York State Psychiatric Institute. He's an expert in the area's ADHD and cannabis use. Will talk about that. Welcome well, but I wanted to
ask you something really important. We had opened this by talking about cannabis, and I'm very candid about my cannabis use that I got really out of hand during COVID.
Oh boy, yeah, and a lot of people's did well.
And I didn't even realize it started for bed that The story I told myself was I needed to go to sleep because I don't sleep well, and then I needed to eat dinner and I needed to get up, and I needed this.
Because my kids are going through this stuff.
You specialize in cannabis use ADHD and especially with antipsychotic treatment and teen if you had to give us an umbrella, because as I said, to start this, the cannabis you is, they just found out with one of the bigger tests ever that they've done that increases the risk of stroke tremendously and lung disease, et cetera. So I threw it out and this is day three and I can feel it. I can feel that I'm a different guy. I'm a
bit scattered, and I'll come coming down. Do I also noticed that when I was using it, the more and more I used it, the more I got edgy, the more I got shaky, and I knew that rationally, Buddy didn't stop. So if you can address that, so.
Many things going on with cannabis right now, you know one of the main things that has come up is that we had this pendulum shift from cannabis is the worst thing ever to it's a totally natural, benign tennessee. And like both of those things are wrong, actually right, Like those are those are extreme examples. And and so there's this idea that that cannabis has no negative side effects,
which is just incorrect. Another thing that's important about cannabis is the cannabis that you have access to now is not the cannabis you had access to when you were a teenager. It is substantially stronger by design. By design, it is substantially stronger than the stuff that you had before.
And when you think about like whenever we've done that before, right, like morphine versus fentanyl, Like fentyl is like one hundred times stronger than morphine, like and we didn't have an opioid crisis when we only had fentanyl, when we only had a morphine, right like it was when we created
this much stronger version. So like the cannabis of today, it's it's you know, you got natural cannabinoids in your in your body that we all just have that are binding to the cabina receptors, and like you know the weed of probably my parents' generation. You put a little bit in a joint, you take one hit, like it would bind to that, it would feel nice. The weed now is much stronger, is binding to that receptor and
is clinging on to it so much. And then now that it's binding to it so much, your body says, oh, oh, I don't need as many cannabina receptors, so they make well less caannabino receptors. We can see that on a function MRI that you have reduction of the cannabinoid receptors.
So now when you stop, you feel awful.
You feel awful because there isn't enough naturally circulating cannabinoids to compensate, and you don't have the the receptors that you had before because it's down regular and the more potent is the stronger it is, the more that phenomenon is going to happen.
So when you talk about it, because I had done this on the radio years, this is why you.
Have this rebound anxiety. By the way, how long does that last?
By the way, Uh, you know, the fMRI data shows that you know, on a scan it looks pretty much normal after about thirty days of no use.
You're almost there, Pete, No not. But I got to push back anytime I talk about this on radio. And this was before I had to use that I do. Now you get to call from every stone in the world going that's because you're doing it wrong.
You got the wrong dude, you got the wrong strain. Yep.
So the point being, I always got the pushback people yelling everybody does podcast, you're doing it, You're doing it wrong, you got the wrong kind of pot. You have to this that. How do you even answer that? Because people on pod that are using a lot of it are going to be really resistant because, like I said, if you said it's thirty days of this, I'm in. I'm
in because I don't want have a stroke. But how do you tell somebody thirty years old who's taking it because they're convinced that it helps with their ADHD or it's helping me whatever they have.
And and and and it might actually it might help with their ADHD. There's a little bit of data that that that that some that strains, and we don't have this downright, meaning we can't replicate it in a medical way that it might it might do that. So I want to validate for them, it does reduce anxiety and it does improve mood symptoms. So everyone who says, hey, like, no,
it actually made me feel better, they're right. But but the thing that that they need to think about is the flip side of it, particularly with the anxiety and depression stuff, which is that you know, if you the more you're using it, it's probably making that condition.
Worse for you. I can feel it. I can feel and you don't realize that.
You don't realize it, and and and and and the cannabis is sneaky. It's really sneaky. It plays a trick on you. You're using it more and more. Eventually you get to a point where where if you you need it just to feel normal, uh, and and to just sort of function. I really I spend a lot of time
talking with people about that. And you know, one of the ways I start with is just like, let's let's just write down how often and like how much we think we're using Like you don't have to change anything, like just write it down, just record it, like no judgments, like because most of the time when we do that, it turns out it's it's more than we thought it was, right and same thing with drinking. You ask anyone how much they drink, almost everyone is going to underestimate.
And the amazing thing about the phenomena is aware of it. As I was, I'd be in my day and I'd be going, I feel pretty good, feel pretty good today, everything's going well on PERF doing whatever, and I go, but I'm still going and I know what it's doing that, but I'm still going to do I'm.
Still going to do it.
Of that, it wasn't I always will with sugar. And I realized that when I was in an acting class. My acting teacher said, you go out for an audition and you do a bad job.
What do you do?
I go get a Snickers bar? Right now? You go out for the audition, you do a great job. What are you doing?
I go out for I think as well, there you go.
Yeah, but just thing scared. This thing scared me, I mean it scared. This report was a pretty valid report.
And again I'm sure people are going to work and there are other aspects of it, so that one is is uh, in some ways not surprising because uh, you're you're the inhalation of any kind of smoke damage is going to damage your runks, right, I mean this is like you are burning something, okay, like so like you know, just like if you were in a fire, that wouldn't be good for you either. The other thing that I worry actually more about, because the lung thing is the obvious thing to be worried about.
The thing that I worry.
About is all this data that we have on the on the changes in the structure of your brain.
That's what I worry about.
So in kids, which by the way, is under twenty five, okay, under twenty five, is your brain is developing to lease till twenty five your ADHD it's probably even later than that, there's evidence of structural changes. And then in long term cannabis users, and you know in in Scandinavian countries, they you know, their socialized system, they monitor everyone, they have records and everyone, so they are to look at people for many years. Cannabis users, their hippo campus is smaller.
Your hippo campus is a big memory center. And one of the most acute effects of cannabis is the effect on memory. I mean, anyone who smokes pot is aware of this, and so like what does that what does that mean? I actually don't know the answer, right, like I don't. I don't know the answer. No one has the answer.
Thing.
But then you get the superstars, like I'm assuming based on what they themselves have said, superstars like Snoop Dogg or who are who are able to I mean, they seem to be completely functional. In fact, there seth Rogen's probably doing a hundred times more in a day that I'm.
Capable of do it.
And you know, the thing with with uh mind altering substances, and this was true for alcohol too, is that uh, we all don't respond the same to them. And also the situation that we're in the life, we're in, the environment we're in is going to affect that too. And and and yes, there are people that seem to be really heavy cannabis users and there does not appear to be any negative comment for them, but that's not gonna be everyone.
May I wrap this episode up by saying, in the words of your mother, don't worry so much about Snoop Dogg.
Worry about you, your mother, your mother, we should hear.
Sorry to wrap every episode, don't don't worry about seth Rog.
Seth Rogen jumps off of U right now as another episode of Really No Really comes to a close. Let's thank our guest, doctor Ryan Sultan. He's the director of Integrative psych as well as being director of Sultan Live at Columbia University. You can follow him on Instagram where he is at Our Sultan MD and on x where he is at Doctor Ryan Sultan. Our little show hangs out on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, and threads at Really No Really podcast And of course you can share your thoughts
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