I am sorry to say that the exact same thing happened to my precious son. He went off to college and started smoking marijuana his freshman year. We have no history of SZ in our family. He was a very outgoing, extremely smart, handsome guy who did not exhibit any unusual behavior before smoking pot. By sophomore year he was experiencing significant psychosis and by junior year, we had to get him into rehab and away from marijuana before he was diagnosed with sz. It has been 5 years and he is now 24. He has been sober for almost 2 years and on Clozapine for over a year. Getting him away from and off of marijuana was a nightmare and we 100% attribute the development of this illness to his use of marijuana. He is much better now. He works a full time job and is going to start taking classes again soon. However, the damage is done and this is something he (and we) will have to stay on top of for the rest of his life.
@rosie94, how did you get your son away from and off of marijuana? We’re still struggling with that. Nightmare about sums it up.
He went to four residential treatment programs, the last of which was for a year. A year of therapy, treatment, sobriety & clozapine finally seemed to have formed a fragile alliance that seems to keep getting stronger as he continues to keep getting better. Getting him to go to these programs was not easy and we had to convince him that we would not support him financially if he continued smoking pot. As long as he does as we ask, we support him. So now he has an apartment with a sober roommate, has his car, has a full time job, takes his meds, has a great therapist, case manager and doctor and he keeps up with it all. He pays for his gas and groceries and we pay for the rest. It was very difficult getting to this point but we are very grateful he is doing so well.
Marijuana can definitely bring on schizophrenia if person is predisposed to it. Also, if smoked by someone diagnosed with schizophrenia , it will make them worse.
Can you name the program he was at for a year? Not sure we can do that here. Otherwise please private message me.