Written By, Andrea F.

(Note: This was written 4 1/2 months into my sobriety)

Dear Marijuana,

This is my letter to you from when I first gave you up 4 1/2 months into my sobriety. As I’m coming up on my 4 year anniversary on August 23rd, 2025, I’m looking back at all the reasons why I left you.

You were a piece of me for so many years and defined a corner of my identity. I kept you in the corner, so as to not garner attention. I kept you my little secret from most people. I believe that as time went by, you also wanted it to be a secret as you tempted me with your amazing smell and great feeling. You did it just for me, I was the center of your universe and you were mine. You were great until you were not.

You then made me paranoid, unable to take care of my child, my lungs and throat inflamed. You proved to be an all around bad influence for everything in my life, my job, my relationship, and my sanity. Now MJ, I am changing my identity and you’re not a part of my new identity. It’s more than just that, you’re not going to be a part of my life anymore. I’m ready now to really let you go. For the past 4 ½ months I have kept you out of my life, holding the door closed, but now I want to get you out of my mind. The healthiest way to do this is to write this letter, so I don’t need to hold the door closed anymore and I can be free of you.

To give you credit, we did have some really good times together. Through thick and thin, you were there for me. In my car driving back and forth from college, later on the way to work with you as a vape right before I got on the ferry and before I went home. My best friend and I loved you, you made our friendship grow in ways that can’t be explained until the lights came on the next morning and we couldn’t face the day.

I took a break from you and felt great while I was pregnant but I didn’t see it as a break and that was part of my discovery about you. I felt better without you. My sister commented that I was more present. Then after my daughter was born, you became legal in NY State and regardless of the positive aspects of not using, you came barrelling back into my life like a freight train. But you’re just a natural herb, found in the garden, I think not!

It seemed safe and the doctors at the dispensary said it would help with my anxiety. What could be wrong with that, MJ? It wasn’t till your insidious claws grabbed hold of my brain, made me want to sleep all day and be unproductive and cough up phlegm from vaping too much. How about finding out that vaping is very dangerous but the doctors at the dispensary were still claiming you were safe in vape pen form? So I continued convincing myself that everything was ok, even though I would skip lunch at work to rush over to 28th street to pick up more and more of you. Together we were an unstoppable duo.

But MJ, even after feeling headachy from coming down from you, I would just take an Advil and start the whole process again. Each time feeling less and less high, and just chasing you all around during the day hoping you would be better. You’re not better, you never were. I needed to rewire my brain in these past four plus months to see that. At the end I was smoking joint after joint of you, through coughing fits and it went from two puffs to half a joint to almost the whole joint and these were spliffs, no less.

You really didn’t get better though, worse and worse every time! How could I have not seen what was going on? It was my decision to smoke and ingest you, but how could such an addictive drug like you be stuck in a normal, functional woman’s life with a baby and a husband? I know better, yet you kept showing up at my door.

Now I realize I am an addict and I have turned my care over to a higher power who has helped me understand this more. Also my sponsor understands me and understands you MJ. She’s not messing around so don’t think walking back into my life by smelling you on the street or at a friend’s house is going to make me change my mind about you.

Now, why didn’t I see that you were disgusting? You created ash, and bongs made this thick smelly bong water and black tar that I then ingested on each bong hit. I guess your smell gave me nostalgic feelings and made me keep coming back. You hit all the places where I was vulnerable and needed to look back. I could go high into my parents house and stare at all the nostalgia items from my childhood for ten minutes at a time, Then think about my age and life, and being a total failure. Actually why would I want to do that when I can be in my life, living life on life’s terms, and making new memories with my family and my 3 year old toddler? This is life now, it’s beautiful, exciting, and full of wonder. It’s fine to look back at the past, but I don’t need you to do that. In fact, I don’t need you to write music either, I can do it all without you!

It’s officially over MJ! I can’t have you in my life in any shape, form, quantity, or even peripherally be around you. It’s that time that I have been excited for, for the past 4 months. The time when I can officially get you OUT OF MY LIFE. Please don’t come back, and if you do, it’s my responsibility to either leave or know I’m fine saying no. I take full responsibility for that. A wild 24 years with you, and not even one last good feeling from you because you took everything from me in the end… my sense of self and identity, my health, my mental faculties and my sanity.

It’s over and I swiftly will say goodbye MJ, your time is up!

Published in A New Leaf – October 2025