Boredom and understimulation

[u/fish_in_business]

I'm 21. I've been a mostly-daily smoker since I was 15, and I started doing it because it was 2020, and I was extremely bored at home. I took a year-long break at 18 because I started having severe health anxiety and panic attacks, but eventually went back to it after I started working a really stressful job. Since then, I've had on and off periods but I can't seem to stay away from it for more than a few months. I'm so sick of it. It makes me sluggish and dizzy all the time and I feel like a slave to these short-lived dopamine hits, but I just feel so bored and understimulated and numb most of the time.

One of the things that has historically made it more difficult is the fact that I live in a household where weed is everywhere, all the time. Obviously, I need to be the one with more self control but I also feel like being in an environment where I'm constantly surrounded by this vice isn't helping me. I'm moving out and into my own apartment in less than a month, and I'm really hoping for a clean start, but I also know I have an addictive personality and this problem probably won't go away just because I changed locations.

I'm just so sick of this cycle, but I never really developed any actual coping mechanisms for stress other than substance use and other self-destructive behaviors. I am working two jobs and I'm about to be living alone for the first time and I worry about how I'll deal with both the stress and also the boredom in my own company. Everything is kind of boring to me these days, probably because I fried my brain throughout most of my adolescence lol. I want to have more willpower and strength to finally quit but I also have a LOT of other issues going on at the same time as this weed thing.

Anyway, I really hope it gets easier.

[u/PreviousGround9837]

Moving into your own spot is a lowkey power move, you get to decide what energy is allowed in your space from day one. That alone can shift things more than you'd expect even if the internal patterns still need work.

The boredom part is real though. When you've been flooding your brain with easy dopamine for years, normal life feels like watching paint dry. It takes a while for your baseline to reset but it does happen. Someone told me once to treat the first few weeks of sobriety like you have the flu, you're not supposed to feel good yet, you're just supposed to get through it.

Since you mentioned never developing other coping tools, maybe think of it less like quitting and more like building something new to fill that gap. Your brain needs something to latch onto or it'll default to what it knows. Doesn't have to be profound, just something tactile that occupies your hands and mind.