You people have been feeding me a pack of old (stoner) wives' tales!

[Bicoastal]

Ok, I'll stop the "friend" BS--sure, it's me. I smoked 2 bowls of pot exactly 2 weeks ago, and even though I'm only an occasional user--once every 3 or 4 months, if that--I was worried that traces of THC would show up in my urine during my drug test tomorrow. And that is where our story begins...

So after checking around online--including here--and hearing the same old "30 day dry period" rumor (even here), and getting nice and agitated, I decided to do some research of my own. The following was a scientific report done in 2005 by the National Drug Court Institue in Alexandria, Virginia. You might want to scroll down to page 23 and start reading. You'll quickly learn, as I did, that I have nothing to gain or benefit from filling a condom up with someone else's urine and smuggling into the lab under my scrotum. For the fact in the matter is, we're all waaaaay too paranoid.

very useful!

Too small? Go to the following page and click on "view as html"

here!

So if you get through any of that, you will eventually find in black and white, by several smart people with medical degrees, the following words on page 42:

"Based upon recent scientific evidence, at the 50 ng/mL cutoff concentration for the detection of cannabinoids in urine (using the currently available laboratory-based screening methods) it would be unlikely for an individual to produce a positive urine drug test result for longer than 10 days after the last smoking episode. Although there are no scientific cannabinoid elimination studies on chronic users using non-instrumented testing devices, one would assume that if the on-site devices are properly calibrated at the 50 ng/mL cutoff level the detection guidance would be the same. At the 20 ng/mL cutoff concentration for the detection of cannabinoids in urine (using the currently available laboratory-based screening methods) it would be uncommon for an individual to produce a positive urine drug test result longer than 21 days after the last smoking episode."

"For occasional marijuana use (or single event usage), at the 50 ng/mL cutoff level, it would be unusual for the detection of cannabinoids in urine to extend beyond 3-4 days following the smoking episode (using the currently available laboratory-based screening methods or the currently available on-site THC detection devices). At the 20 ng/mL cutoff for cannabinoids, positive urine drug test results for the single event marijuana use would not be expected to be longer than 7 days."

WHEW!

[WindRavenX]

1. Q...

...I just stoped smoking, after daily use, in anticipation of tests 2.5 months from now.

Am I safe? Some sites say yes, some say 3 months is possible.

[Bicoastal]

4. Read the whole thing...

But according to this, you only need an ABSOLUTE MAXIMUM of about 21 days of abstaining before you'll test as negative. That's only urine, though--hair is a different story.

And many of the sites you're reading that "3 months" stuff on probably want you to buy their "preventive" tonics and other crap. One of the most notorious, Ipassedmydrugtest.com, is even mentioned by name in this study, and called out for deliberately spreading misleading information.

This, on the other hand, came from a 2005 study published exclusively in a journal for "drug court practitioners." Why would they lie?

[WindRavenX]

6. Yeah, I read it

I'm just very very worried about this because I'm a chubby woman with very slow metabolism who's smoke for *years* daily instead of an occasional toke every now and then. Plus, I'll be moving to a very conservative area.

I dunno. I'm just worried--but I appreciate the link.

[NMMNG]

2. I knew that thanks to research I did online

Which is why I felt free to partake when I went on vacation in '05. :smoke:

[John Q. Citizen]

3. This is true. I have a friend who is subject to random drug testing

2 or 3 times a week.

She is clean and sober, but the person at the testing lab told her that infrequent smoking of cannibis is usually undetectible after a few days.

Drink lots of water, this can't hurt and will dilute the urine.

[Bicoastal]

5. 2 or 3 times a week?!

Who does she work for--Howard Hughes?

[TheBaldyMan]

7. 2-3 times a week, is that legal?

unless she's a urine 'donor' for drug tests, I'd hire a lawyer. Cruel and unusual.

[John Q. Citizen]

13. She got into a little trouble and it's part of the terms of getting out of trouble.

[deadmessengers]

11. Very dangerous advice there

Drinking lots of water can not only hurt you, it can also kill you:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyponatremia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jennifer_Strange

[John Q. Citizen]

12. I drink lots of water, and yet, I can still type this. Amazing!

Oh, you mean like drink gallons of water at once?

Well that's just dumb.

A couple of quarts or so a day is fine, though.

[IntravenousDemilo]

8. Leaving aside the notion that it should be considered a gross violation of the Fourth Amendment

as it refers to the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, a condom filled with someone else's urine would be pretty suspicious because it wouldn't be at body temperature when you hand over the sample. That's a major reason why you wouldn't benefit to do the condom thing.

But anyway, my understanding is that it remains stored in your body fat for much longer than 30 days -- more like six months. This is why cannabis isn't "addictive" in the same way heroin or cocaine or nicotine is. The body metabolizes those drugs quickly and you need another fix pronto or you get withdrawal symptoms. Marijuana stays with you longer, so you don't undergo withdrawal. And unless one has a psychological dependency -- which I'm sure you don't if you only toke up every three or four months -- one should be able to stop without any ill effects.

"It's better to be safe than sorry" is a good rule of thumb for most things, this included, because if you refuse the test on Fourth Amendment grounds, you might win your case, but it would take a long time and you probably wouldn't get the job (if you're applying for it), or else if you already had the job, you might be laid off pending a decision from the courts, which would be a hardship. Unless you feel like doing battle, the best idea -- if your company has drug testing -- is not to toke, or just find another job.

[Bicoastal]

9. Agreed. But just becuase it remains in your body...

....doesn't mean that it'll show up in your urine for all of those six months--more like a tiny fraction of that time. Or so say the authors of this survey.

Which makes sense. LOTS of things remain in your body for 6 months at a time, in rapidly diminishing quantities. Somewhere in your body, at this very moment, are probably a few molecules of a chemical in a soda you drank a few months ago. Of course, short of a full body autopsy (and even then it's pretty unlikely), no scientific test known to science or man would ever find any traces of that chemical.

Marijuana isn't the magical substance we think it is. Like other chemicals, it does its work on the body, and then erodes away gradually in exponentially shrinking quantities. Medical tests can't do the impossible--and thank God!

[scarletwoman]

10. My personal experience of passing 2 drug tests after having recently smoked pot.

The first time was a urine test a few years ago. I work in a place where random, unannounced drug testing is the rule.

Although I used to be a quite regular user of marijuana since 1967, I had gone through a period in my life where I only had the opportunity to get stoned maybe 3-4 times a year. After many months of abstinence, one evening some good friends shared a joint with me.

Naturally, the very next morning at work, my number came up (so to speak). I was totally freaked, of course. At the time, the rules were that we had to show up for testing by 10 am -- my workday started at 7am. So from 7am (I was informed I had to submit to testing as soon as I showed up for work), until just before 10am, I drank COPIOUS amounts of water. I also took some Sudafed (hoping that adding an explainable legal chemical to my system would possibly skew the results), cough syrup and vitamin C.

I had to sweat it out for a couple days, but my test came back negative. Mostly, I think that was due to the fact that it had been so long since I smoked, that the one night of toking on a shared joint just wasn't enough to show any buildup of THC in my system.

Last summer, my number came up again. This time I HAD been smoking pot daily up until about 3 weeks before the test, and had just smoked a considerable amount at a party 2 nights before. And this time it was a cheek swab test and I was required to report for the test IMMEDIATELY upon arriving to work. I still managed to delay long enough to gulp down 16 oz. of water, and take some Sudafed, cough syrup and vitamins again. (no idea if any of those things helped, but I wanted to do *something*...)

Anyway, I passed again. (*whew*) I'd say, if it's been 2 weeks since you smoked, and you haven't been building it up in your system regularily, you're probably safe.

In any case, drug testing sucks. Unreasonable search and seizure. As long as I'm doing my job, leave my body chemistry alone!

sw
:smoke:

[cannabis_flower]

14. Here's my experience...

A number of years ago I applied for a job, passed the performance testing for customer service that the employment agency gave me after spending all day there from 8 in the morning to about 1pm. At that time I was told that I would be hired as long as I passed the drug test. At the time I had been smoking regularly for years but for the last few months before the test had only been smoking about once a week.

Since I had been looking for a job I had asked a fellow pot smoker and Registered Nurse friend of mine for advice. He suggested that since the THC was stored in the fat tissue it would be helpful to be storing fat and not using those energy resources and then minimal THC would be released. He also suggested a prescription diuretic, such as Lasix if available or caffeine if it was not available and plenty of water.

So I asked the woman who told me this if it was ok if ate lunch first. She said fine as long as I got there before 5pm when the testing facility closed. I went to the nearest Taqueria and ate as much greasy mexican food as I could and drank about 2 huge glasses of ice tea. I then went to the convenience store and bought a liter bottle of diet coke and drank it. Then I stopped near the testing site, filled the liter bottle and drank it too. I also took a multivitamin to make my urine darker. They made me wait for about 30 minutes in the waiting room and I thought I was going to pop - but I passed and got the job.

[bamacrat]

15. Daily smoker for the past three years, have to quit for a while to get a job since I just graduated.