There really isn’t much of a recipe for a broken heart. We all find our own tools, our own strategies, on a path that’s rarely straightforward… or easy. “Heartbreak is a life experience that you have to go through, no matter what,” says Florencia Alcaráz, journalist and columnist for ElDiario.ar, whose ongoing work about relationships, sexuality, and love in a post-feminist era will soon be published on paper. In that sense, can weed assist heartbreak? Could it pull us out of the doldrums of love? When we light up, is there life beyond love?
“I suppose a good way to survive heartbreak is to survive, right?” says Iván Chausovsky, a psychology graduate from the University of Buenos Aires and author of Aforrismos: A un click del amor (Aphorisms: Love a Click Away) and Amar es arder en preguntas (To Love Is To Burn With Questions).
“If you’re not seriously unwell, you get through it. They’re inevitable moments in life and, dare I say, essential. Analysts work a lot with angst. First, there’s the material issue, the loss of the other person. And then, grief moves: what did I mean to the other person? What did I lose? Did I lose something of myself? To me, in some way, grief is wonderful. But when we’re down bad, it’s really bad,” Chausovsky continues.
In that sense, the use of psychoactive substances isn’t always advisable. “I wouldn’t go so far as to say weed is a reliable ally in heartbreak. I find that vague, inaccurate, and dangerous. You have to think about the person, and the type of cannabis,” Chausovsky warns. “Weed doesn’t give you anything you don’t already have. It doesn’t make you better, it doesn’t pull something out of you, and sometimes it can even enhance things. The same thing happens with working with psilocybin. It can make you more sensitive. You have to check what suits each person,” he continues.
Recently, Alcaráz has been researching connections, affections, and subjectivities influenced by contemporary technologies, and believes that “one of the biggest difficulties in wading through love today lies in the emotional surveillance posed by social media and those identities we construct through screens, the possibility of losing contact with another person and having that person continue to exist on social media. Before, a person could disconnect from another person and never hear from them again for a very long time. Now there’s the digital footprint.”
And there, among the fringes of the web, the likes, and the DMs, how does weed operate? “I think marijuana can be a great companion in moments of leisure and to create a pleasant, relaxed atmosphere. It can also help you leave intrusive thoughts behind. In times of grief or heartbreak, it can be a great supplement, and a great companion,” Alcaráz adds.
Personally, Chausovsky considers himself a frequent cannabis user and admits to using it when he’s grieving (and yes, obviously, also when he’s not). “I like to say that you have to live through the grief process. Some of us need different types of sedatives and downers, and weed can be one of them. Or not. You have to be wary of narratives that pretend that grief is the same for everyone,” he explains. “Be careful of the grief police, those who tell others what to do”.
So, at what times of grief is it advisable to add cannabis to the mix? “I don’t know,” Chausovsky answers with honesty. And he concludes firmly: “We don’t all grieve the same way. I like weed in the morning; it makes me more lucid. But I don’t know if I would always recommend the ‘transgression’ of weed. It’s different for everyone. If you’re a heavy user, maybe smoking a little less can help. And if you’re a bit square, maybe it’s a good time to light one up.”
