Not Your 70s Weed — What Today’s THC Levels Mean

 In this episode of Doc Jacques: Your Addiction Lifeguard, Doc breaks down the real “THC then vs. THC now” problem—because what people call “just weed” today often looks more like rocket fuel than a 1970s joint. We talk concentrates, vapes, and edibles, why potency (and the THC/CBD ratio) changes the risk for panic and even psychosis—especially for teens—and what families can watch for before a “simple high” turns into an ER visit. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Time again for Dr. Addiction Lifeguard Podcast. I am Dr. Jockey Burke, a psychologist, licensed professional counselor, and addiction specialist. If you are suffering from addiction, misery, trauma, whatever it is, I'm here to help. If you're in search of help, try to get your life back together. Join me here at Doc Shock Your Addiction Life Guard, the Addiction Recovery Podcast. I wanted to be real clear about what this podcast is intended for. It is intended for entertainment and informational purposes, but not considered help. If you actually need real help and you're in need of help, please seek that out. If you're in dire need of help, you can go to your nearest emergency room, or you can check into a rehab center or call a counselor like me and talk about your problems and work through them. But don't rely on the podcast to be that form of help. It's not. It's just a podcast. It's for entertainment and information only. So let's keep it in that light, alright? Have a good time, learn something, and then get the real help that you need from a professional. You know, I get into a lot of conversations with my clients um around THC usage. And a lot of those conversations are confusing to people when I start talking to them about the seriousness or the changes that are in uh THC levels in what they're buying today. And I can't really blame my clients for that because uh traditionally they're pretty young and they don't have any concept of uh change when it comes to THC products because they've only known what they're exposed to, and over the last 15 years it's just been ever increasing. However, when I talk to parents uh and and loved ones, um, the parents have a different understanding of THC. So when I'm talking to them, if I'm talking to a client and the client is an addict or a younger person, they're under the age of 35, and I'm talking to them about THC levels, they they kind of look at me like I'm, you know, I don't understand what the point of this is. So they have no frame of reference of the changes. When I'm talking to the parents, they're still thinking it's the 60s, 70s, and 80s when they were growing up. And many of them use THC, they they smoke joints, and and that's what their experience was. So today I wanted to compare for you the THC then versus now, and explain the with the concentrates and what the concentrates and the edibles, how they've changed, and translate the research into practical, don't get swept out kind of guidance that happens. So if you're if you've been picturing a 70s joint, you're thinking about a different drug than what is sold today, and and truly it is a very different drug. Um, so we're gonna talk about THC, and I'm gonna get real technical at first because I think that um many people do not have any understanding of the the historical change in THC levels in what is being purchased today. And also, if you're a parent and you're listening to this or a loved one, and you have somebody younger, understand uh my generation, me, I'm I'm in my 60s, none of us had edibles. That was something that just didn't exist really in any form like it does today. So we didn't have any of the stuff that's used, we had just basically the actual plant, the marijuana plant, weed. And today that's not really what's being used uh predominantly. So let's talk about I'm gonna call this THC 101. All right, it's the main intoxicating cannab cannabinoid um and and the dose of that THC in whatever you're consuming, that drives the impairment level. So potency. Well, the this is why potency matters. Higher THC, which is the actual molecule that causes the hallucinogenic effect, it can it can mean faster onset, higher THC, can mean faster onset, especially when you're inhaling it, stronger intoxication per puff or serving, and harder um self-titration, meaning coming back, you know, we're decreasing the the dosage, um, especially for inexperienced users. So just just keep that in mind as we're talking. So introducing uh the what let me let me introduce to you what the products are. So let me so I'm introducing you to the idea. If you don't know, so you have the flour on the plant, right? Yeah, the concentrates, and by concentrates, what I'm talking about are commonly referred to as wax or shatter, rosins, oil, uh vaping, dubbing. Those are the things that are the the different ways of of ingesting it. Then you've got edibles and drinks, and then you've got high THC vapes. All right, so you've got these four categories of things that people are using now. It's not just buying a joint from some guy on the street. So let's talk about the then versus now, the potency numbers. And this is where kids today, and I'm saying kids, anybody under the age of 35, they have no concept of what this is, and they're not willing to um do the research to find out. So I'm gonna be your research for you. So here's what was common in the 70s and 80s. In the United States, the confiscated samples of marijuana, the THC levels reported were uh 1.5% in 1980. Then it rose. This is when these samples were were uh confiscated and they were being tested. In in 1983 and 84, they were rising to 3.3%. Then it hovered around 3% through much of the late 80s into the early 90s, just stayed kind of constant. So what happened what started happening is in the 1990s, things changed. So the the feds, when they would confiscate uh seized cannabis um products, they were showing a 4% THC level in 1995. That was average. And there was a steady rise over time. So we went from 1.5 to 3, 3.5, and then it stayed at about 3 through the 80s, into the 90s, and by the 90s it was starting to go up to 4%. So uh they would publish DEA would publish seizure uh data sets for you know what was being confiscated between 1995 and 2022. It's it's very clean, citable data, and and in that data it showed this slow increase over time. So by the to 2025, the JAMA reported um the summer the the shift, there was a shift, and it was about a four-time increase in THC concentration in C samples between 95 and 2022. So somewhere along the line, they started figuring out, you know, if we start increasing the THC levels, we're gonna get a better high or a or a higher high. So somebody learned uh i in in the 80s that a few percentage of THC um that was fine. But today, even average flour commonly lands in the teens, so between 12, you know, 13, 14, 15, 16, and that's before you you're talking about concentrations of of levels in the concentrates, so like the edibles and the waxes and the shatters, things like that. So just the flour itself is in the teens, which is way higher than it was in the 70s and the 80s, when it was 1.5% or 3.5%. So the game changer really today is in the concentrates. So concentrates are commonly described to be in the 60 to 90 percent THC range. That's waxes, shatter, hash oil, rosin. Think about that. The concentrates are being described in the 60 to 90 percent THC range. The research uh review discussing the concentrates uses notes of examples of 70 percent to 90 percent of THC in these products. That is uh exponentially and substantially higher than it was back in the day, back in my day. And also within the the uh the flower itself, so the plant, so the the concentrate within the flour itself from the plant. So when you're extracting the THC, you're getting higher levels in these in these concentrates. So what does this mean in real life? Um the dosing has changed, but the behavior hasn't. So the same number of hits no longer equals the same dose. All right, think of it this way. If I go drink a beer, I'm getting five percent alcohol. If I'm drinking Jaegermeister, I'm getting a hundred percent uh uh alcohol concentrate levels, you know? So we went from beer to Jaegermeister, and then there's some other alcohol that's got the highest level of of uh grain uh uh ethanol in it. But the fasker uh the faster escalation happens, so the higher the THC, it can intensify the intoxication. But with that comes panic reactions, especially if somebody is anxious or they're they're trying they're a trauma-loaded person. And many of the children today, children being anybody under the age of 18, they have a lot of trauma. Uh what's happened. So if you if you have that, if you if you've been a trauma-loaded, anxious, loaded person and you got that personality, and you're getting these intense levels of THC, you're gonna have these panic attacks. And the idea of like, I'm gonna start low and I'm gonna go slow, that doesn't happen. And that's why it's harder to regulate this. And the titration being, I'm gonna regulate how much I'm using, either up or down, that's hard to do with concentrates. And so um there's another factor in all of this, and this gets a little technical, but the THC CBD ratio within the products. Many modern uh concentrates of products, um the plants are bred, and the the extraction of of the THC leans towards higher THC levels with relatively low C B D levels, changing the psychoactive balance within the plant. So it's uh the CBD levels and the THC levels, there's a balance that's naturally within the plant as it is in its natural state, without all these br you know, cross-breeding and pollination attempts that you uh uh have with people who are growing THC products in the plants. So um, for example, the biological psychiatry papers, uh 95 to 2014, they reported THC re uh uh levels rising and C B D falling in C samples, which increases the THC to C B D ratio. Uh mental health is affected by this, by the the concentration level change and that that ratio balance of C T H C to C B D. Um cognition and mental health, they're two different things. But uh there's some very um specific data point uh conditions here that are that are uh uh important to keep in mind. High potency use is associated with in in multiple studies is associated with higher psychosis rates and the related risk and symptom severity of it. When when people come into my office, I've had parents come into my office who have children who are teenagers who have a severe psychotic break and they end up going to the emergency room, and the only thing they've used is THC. And by severe psychotic, I mean full-on psychosis. Um and it's and and if not that, then they have an extreme high level of panic attack, panic disorder that requires hospitalization. So the risk for this is incredibly high, and the severity is incredibly high. Frequent use, daily use of high potency products contributes to this because again, it's a fat soluble, I didn't say this in the first place, but it's a fat-soluble chemical, so it sits in your fat cells. You're not peeing it out, it's sitting in the fat cells, and it gets expressed slowly uh once it's there. So if you're using high levels of concentrated THC products on a daily basis, and you use it today, it is still in your system 30 days later. It is not going anywhere. Um, it's just staying in your body. The the JAMA pediatric uh publication pieces are commonly cite, the potency levels rise as a concern during adolescent brain development. It's a fact, and we have this data now because we've been able to research this stuff legally when the you know we weren't able to do this before because it was a schedule three narcotic, so couldn't couldn't study it. Um CDC uh has additional notes additional risks with concentrates, and they warn that that strength concentration level change can increase uh all kinds of health risks, especially with vaping and and dabbing. Dabbing um is uh vaping and dabbing are inhalants, but they're in a different form, right? Um, so a dab pen is where you're taking a wax and you're heating it super hot and you're inhaling the smoke from that, and a vape is a vape, as you already know what it is. And that's a you know, with a high level concentration and a quick um um ingestion of it, that that's a problem. So I want to make sure I'm clear about this though. Not everybody that uses high levels of uh uh or who not high levels, but uses cannabis, so they're they're gonna develop psychosis. It means that the risk profile changes when you're using this and when the dose and the potency changes, your risk profile changes, especially for teens or heavy users or people with certain vulnerabilities, um, mental health issues. It's a huge problem. All right, so now let's move on to the next subset of category of usage is edibles. So edibles are problematic for an a seemingly obvious reason, obvious to me, but a lot of people don't get this. It's really easy to have an accidental overconsumption when you're using edibles because you have the stacking effect. So you're eating an edible and it's hitting, it's not, you're not inhaling it, so it's not going directly into the bloodstream like it does in your lungs. You're eating it, it has to be broken down in the digestive system. So when people are stacking, they're taking more before the first dose hits. So you and I've this is where psychosis comes. I've had a couple of clients this happen too. They were young kids and they were eating, they were they were using edibles that again, extremely high, like probably 70, 80 percent concentration levels, they're eating it, nothing happens, 10 minutes goes by, no effect, and they think, oh, that wasn't enough. So then they eat some more, and they eat some more, and two of my clients ended up in the hospital with psychosis because of ingesting edibles. So if you're look again, if you're listening to this and you're a family member of somebody, the relevance is that you have this unexpected impairment. You end up in the ER, you have panic, you have paranoia, you have risky driving decisions because they're your kids are probably out there driving uh to get this stuff and they're using it, but they don't realize that it hits much later than if they're dabbing it or if they're smoking it or vaping it. Um that's just kind of what happens. So I just want to use that as a framework for an understanding about the shift and in what what's going on today. That again, many of my clients just refuse to engage in this conversation. They just brush it off like it's not a big deal. For them, it's ancient history. If I bring up the 70s and the 80s, that's a million years ago to them. Um, if you were born in t in uh 2005, you're not listening to anything, like somebody says when they're talking from the 70s and 80s. That's ancient history. For me, that's the equivalent of my parents talking about World War II in the 70s. Uh, it's like, come on, man, that was like 30, 40 years ago. To me, it was something you read in a history book. They lived it, I didn't. So I'm I lived through the time of, you know, smoke a joint and get a little high, cheech and chong style, and that just doesn't happen today. So there there are some red flags that potency is part of the problem. And here they are: sudden paranoia and panic, memory, attention drop, complete fog, spacey. It's not like they demonstrate, like if you watch that that TV show, that 70 show, they show that in the kind of dopey. I smoked a joint, I'm a little dopey. That's not what is seeing with these high potency problems, memory and attention drop, the fog, it is severe, right? The paranoia, sudden paranoia and panic, it is severe. Escalating tolerance happens because these stronger products cause this uh ability to tolerate, and you have to have more and more and more stronger products. Increased ability uh sorry, increased irritability is a huge problem. Um and here's the big one withdrawal symptoms when not using. Well, that's because you're going through withdrawal. They're they're they're withdrawal-like symptoms, but you're not, you know, you're not it's not like uh heroin addiction or other drugs where you're vomiting and you're but you're going through withdrawal. And it's it's funny because the the people that come into my office who are my clients who go through this, they're describing it sweating, shaking, nervousness, can't sleep, irritability. Um they they they can't they they can't concentrate. They come in. And I tell I say, that's because you're going through withdrawal. They look at me like I've got three heads. Like they can't believe that that's what was why? Because the 420s out there have been telling them all this time it's not addictive. There's no problem. It's a plan. It's natural. Yeah, well, you know what? So is hash, so is heroin, so is cocaine. Tell me that's fine. You know, you go through withdrawal with that too. So I'm not this, I want to be clear. I'm not debating about legalization. I mean, I got my views on that. If you're gonna smoke smoke, I mean it's not illegal uh in many parts of this country. Okay, I'm not gonna debate that. But what I'm talking about is the impact on you and caused by the strength and potency issues. What you're using today isn't what people mean when they say it's just weed. That's that's an old thing that you know my parents would have said to me. Um so there's there's issues around this, and it's about potency and frequency. Um if you're gonna use a legal drug, it doesn't mean it's party time, it means responsible time, right? Don't drive and use high-risk tasks are a problem, getting on heavy equipment. I mean, we're saying this for a reason. If you have a psychosis-like symptom that appears, you gotta treat treat it as an urgent medical condition. And it's a health concern because you can actually get hurt or killed because of stupidity, because you're in doing something dumb, because you think you can fly, because you're seeing your arms as wings. I mean, this is what psychosis is. I don't know how many people have actually seen true psychosis. I'm I imagine we're gonna see more and more of that with people having experience with that, but um, that's a problem, and you're gonna you're gonna realize it. But treating psychosis is a serious health risk, and medical condition needs immediate medical care. So go into the emergency room, take your loved one, take your kid, take your wife, take your husband, whatever, to the emergency room. It's needed. If you're using daily high potency, you gotta have an evaluation for cannabis use disorder, and I'm gonna say and co-occurring anxiety and uh issues because you're gonna have them. So if you're using every day, trust me, my friend, you are an addict, and you need to be evaluated for that because there's a there's a there's a real problem for you, and it's gonna get worse. You know, I have mixed feelings about um legalization of marijuana. It's like, okay, well, it'll keep some people out of jail that probably shouldn't be there, um, but it's disabling our young and they're being fed a load of garbage about what it really is happening, and that it's okay on them as a human being, as a as a uh biological being, and it's having no effect, and that's ridiculous. You you wouldn't give the same speech about alcohol and think it's not having it's having zero effect on you. No, it's not, it's having severe effect. So I'm encouraging you to think about what's going on. And we legalized it, the president signed a bill that that took it off the federal uh illegal drug scheduling. I disagree with that myself. I think it's terrible. Um, it's gonna do terrible things. On the other hand, you know, I guess professionally I'm gonna be busy for a very long time as a counselor. Um, because I know there are gonna be people coming to see me because they're using these sixty to ninety percent THC range products, and it's gonna be a problem for them, and I'm here to help. So the think about what you're doing. Stop fooling yourself, stop being uh naive, very poorly trained or not trained scientists. You're not. Look at real data, look at real information, look at the facts. Don't look at what you want things to be. You need to look at what they really are. Because I don't I don't want you getting sick, and I don't want you dying, and I don't want you having uh, you know, some permanent psychological issues, some mental health issues because you used high levels of concentrates and your brain is scrambled now for life. That would be terrible. But get help. And understand that marijuana is addictive, and we know it. And the facts and the data support that. And don't don't think it's not happening. It is happening. I see it every day in my practice. Um be responsible. You know, I ride motorcycles, and impaired driving is a life-threatening uh condition for me, uh, because people tend to hit motorcycles when they're impaired, and when they do, somebody gets severely hurt or dies. So I'd rather you be responsible. And if you're using, don't drive. And if you need help, get help. And like I've always said, you can reach out to me for help if you want. I'm always here. Well, that's this episode of Doc Shock, your addiction lifeguard. I hope you've enjoyed this episode. If you have, please uh like and subscribe. And uh, as I've said for a while now, uh look forward to the publication of my new book coming out very soon. And um, if you need help, you can reach out to me. Uh if you need help and not me or you're in a different country, doesn't any of my website are, but man, put resources out there. Go to meetings, go to rehab, go see some professional that can help you, but don't give up your life trying to just preserve your addiction that's crazy, and don't feel like you're failing or happy. You're not. You're just helping us. So until next time, this is Doc Jack, your addiction lifeguard. See ya.