Parents who grow

[liberiamom]

I imagine there are a number of ways to address it; I would love to hear other people's experiences with this. A some of you know, my husband and I plan to adopt a few kids and we both smoke and would like to continue. I have depressive illness and use marijuana to relieve that. I have tried many other pharmecuetical remedies, but they have numerous side effects. The worst side effect I get from smoking is the munchies.

I also understand that what I do is illegal. I believe the laws against the use of marijuana are unfair. BTW, I have smoked pot with police officers- but that's another story. Prohibition of this sort harms people - can you imagine if alcohol or nicotine possession was a criminal offense? I'm not going to go into the talking points here. Suffice it to say, a harmful law should not be enabled to exist.

I have smoked pot for 37 years, though I took a nine year break. I do not abuse marijuana. I do not drink alcohol; I do not smoke cigarettes - I have seen first hand the negative effects of those drugs. My husband likes his Sam Adams. We watch the HGTV network. We are asleep by 11pm every night. We are middle-aged people who smoke pot instead of swig Jack Daniels. We want to grow enough so we do not have to have anymore dealings with drug dealers, because those people don't just deal weed and that puts myself or my husband in harm's way.

I have had an indoor garden for years now, in a grow room in the basement, where I grow tomatoes and basil and dill and eggplant andpeppers (I have an incredible variety of hot pepper seeds if anyone want to swap) and swiss chard,...it goes on and on, so a couple cannabis plants aren't going to stand out- they are just another herb. When it warms up here in New England, I put my flowers and vegetables out - I hope to have a greenhouse within the next few years.

We won't smoke in front of the children, and we will use our vaporizer in the privacy of our bedroom, which will have a lock.

When the children are old enough, or should it ever just come up, there is a book I would share with them called "It's Just a Plant." I plan tell them that once they are adults, they can make their own choices about all drugs, including alcohol, but before that they are in my care, and must not use those drugs. I am really hoping that by the time the kids are old enough to want to smoke, it will be decriminalized. I don't know for certain how old our kids will be, but they will be between 5 and 10 years old. So our approach will be contingent on that-

I am sure that I will smoke less when I have kids, because I simply won't have a moment to myself until the very end of the day. But at the end of the day, I intend to have my smoke break. Will that be deceptive- yes it will be, and how I wish that my use of marijuana was not a moral issue, just like my friend's fondness for red wine? I think parents have adult issues that the children do not need to know everything about. I'm an old hippy inside. How bad is that?

Any parents out there who can share their wisdom on how to be a "growing" parent?

liberiamom Reviewed by liberiamom on 12-13-2006. Parents who grow I imagine there are a number of ways to address it; I would love to hear other people's experiences with this. A some of you know, my husband and I plan to adopt a few kids and we both smoke and would like to continue. I have depressive illness and use marijuana to relieve that. I have tried many other pharmecuetical remedies, but they have numerous side effects. The worst side effect I get from smoking is the munchies. I also understand that what I do is illegal. I believe the laws against Rating: 5

[VOYAGER]

Sounds like you have covered everything. The only thing i'd be worried about is when my kids get to the grade levels where they are too young to know, but still have drug awareness days where they show pics and stuff of drugs and ask if they have ever seen things like this( rolled joint, bag of grass, etc...) before and don't know how to answer. (hopefully i wont ever get caught by the kids, but shit happens, so i guess only time will tell. Also why wait till the end of the day? I enjoy sneaking off to the bathroom taking a toke and sitting down with my kids and play as if i was a peer to them, its a nice relaxed enjoyable time, almost like a fountain of youth in a bowl. As far as a moral issue there are a lot more common people that do more things wrong in the eye of the lord than a herb user. I have yet to find anywhere in the bible where it says "thou shall not smoketh the pot", but i can spot many things in todays society that are purely against the rules that i live by. Oh well i could probably ramble about all kinds of things as i get further off the point. To simply answer your concerns, i think you have it covered already. Just be smart about it.

[CCIE]

Are you planning to adopt through a private agency or from the state care system?

Private adoption experiences vary so I can't speak about those, but the state will assign a social worker who will check on you. That person getting wind of your grow would be bad in ways we can both imagine, and I fear that the danger of discovery is higher than you've estimated. I don't want to sound discouraging - adopting is awesome! I have experience with the process by proxy after watching a relative go through it, and analyzing the situation makes me worry that the logistics of your grow might need to be altered if you are adopting kids out of state custody:

The problem is the fact that you will not be able to hide what you are doing from the kids for long if it takes place in the house or yard. I know you intend to educate them, but 5-10 year olds are unpredictable and all it takes is one mention or hint of MJ in a checkup interview to start a firestorm.
If a kid catches you smoking/harvesting/etc, you could:

1. Act as though it's not something significant. "It's my medicine, hon." "Oh, ok."
This runs the risk that the kid will innocently blurt it to the caseworker, babysitter, etc. Caseworkers are trained to keep their antennae up for things like this.

2. Make the kid aware that, while not bad, it's something that needs not to be discussed publically (follow up with the book and explanation)
If the caseworker drops by on the day you confiscated the kid's favorite action figure, he might tell your 'secret' to spite you. Even the nicest kids have their 'moments,' and they don't grasp legal consequences.

3. Explicitly explain the legal consequences. Warn the kid that if he tells about what he sees, the government will take him away.
Possibly effective, but EVIL!! :vader1:

Smoking discreetly shouldn't be much of a problem, but I truly suggest that you move the grow op somewhere away from the house. If you sit on a large plot of land, a locked, insulated shed in a corner of the property might work, as might the house of a trusted friend who wouldn't mind making it a tandem effort. In time (years), when caseworker oversight has lessened and you've grown into a family it'll be far less of an issue, but for now, healthy paranoia!

[Storm Crow]

Darlin', you gotta move to California! The laws around here are halfway sane! I'm in rural northern Cali and it is a good place to raise kids! My county is starting a FREE after-school day care for up to 8th grade in ALL of the schools (2 to 6 pm)! A well lit skateboard park was just put in about a half mile from the school. Crime is low, rent is reasonable (for California, anyway) and there are few sirens in the night. I do hear the occational gun shot- usually the cattle rancher down the road after a coyote'! And sunrise over the snow covered mountain can't be touched!-- The move would solve your problem! As a legal medical user, you would have nothing to hide from the children. And I'd love to have you as a neighbor!

I didn't grow when my kids were little, but I did smoke in front of them. My husband also smokes tobacco. We didn't treat it as anything mysterious or forbidden. We did explain that smoking was a grown-up thing and when they were 18, if they wanted to they could. I was lucky with the kids I got, both were smart enough to understand explainations. They knew that their lungs had to be all grown up or the smoke would really hurt their lungs. They knew that there were family things that we didn't talk about outside the family or close friends. Like we didn't discuss how one of my sons would..... (well, we just won't discuss it- too embarassing, now that he's grown! lol) or that Mom and Dad smoke cigarettes (husband rolled his own, so no big difference there) or that Grandma sometimes drank too much and got really silly. It was just family stuff. The whole thing was low key. The furtiveness, and the dishonesty of hiding medical use seems somehow absurd to me when there are 11 states where you could be at least semi-legal. - Granny

[kush07]

I was 13 years old. I went down to the basement for something, saw a bright light from behind this black tarp, it was way up on this hill behind the hot water heater and everything. I didn't have a clue what it was so I went up to investigate. I pulled back the tarp and it was like, "HAWWWW!" with bright lights and foil and seeing live cannabis plants for the time and the smell it was like a spirtual experience. Three plants long and scraggly with pop corn buds, I remember back then you know the symbol for Cannabis is the leaf so I thought thats what you smoked to get high, I remember getting a few of the dead leaves off the bottom of the room and trying to roll a joint with present tissue paper! lol good times!

[kush07]

Sounds like your making all the right decisions, God bless ya!

[Dutch Pimp]

..after we finish covering this subject..AthruZ...can we hear about.. "that's another story"...you know...about smoking with fuzz...???...

..I'm too stoned for the other thing now..

[partyguy420]

...Also why wait till the end of the day? I enjoy sneaking off to the bathroom taking a toke and sitting down with my kids and play as if i was a peer to them, its a nice relaxed enjoyable time, almost like a fountain of youth in a bowl....

see... as much as i in joy smoking... and as much as i think smoking a joint after a hard day of work... or sitting in the bar with a few buddies passing around a joint... i do not agree with sneaking off to smoke a joint, and then coming out and playing with you kids... if you went and asked my dad one of the to tell you some of the memories about me and him... he will either not be able to rember one... or he will tell you one, that everyone in my family talks about... theres not one memory, that he has of just me and him, that no one else knows...and also... he has had to ask me for the past 3 or 4 years when my birth day was...(im his first born child... by 2 years there should be at least one good memory of us... and he should be able to rember what day i was born because... i know it was my moms happiest day of her life... and i think it was one of his happiest days for him self to)

anyways... to the girl who planes to adopt a child...well... my mom had a few mis-cariges before i was born, and was planing on just adopoting, and then she relised that she couldnt do that because the state(i think the welfare office) has to do random home viseits so im not sure if growing right away is going to be such a great idea... and thats the whole reason why my parents didnt ever adopt a child....

just my 2 cents:twocents:

[stinkyattic]

It's an interesting question. I think you should consider moving somewhere where the laws are less draconian. MA is one of the harshest. Look at VT if you want to stay in NE; the laws are still there but in general the state is more progressive and they seem to care more about using their small number of officers to address violent crime. Well, and write speeding tickets to skiers who are never going to be able to get time off work to drive all the way up from Jersey to fight them, lol!
The problem with growing with kids is the trust/honesty/secrecy thing. You can be open with them, but you know how kids are, trying to be all 'cool' in school... it's only a matter of time before the cool mom comes up. Again, better to grow within the law so they're like, yeah, so what? It's legal.
Anyhoo.... just my 2 cents.
Liberiamom, I still think we should chill sometime!

[stinkyattic]

Oh hey, how can I get in touch with you? Do you actually have koi? I used to breed fighting fish [bettas] and just for hahas I put some in my parents' koi pond to eat mosquito larvae... they got fat and sassy and the skeeters disappeared completely! You should try it.