Does Smoking Weed Make You Lose Weight?

The Study of The American Journal of Epidemiology

This journal tackled the question: does weed make you lose weight? The answer might be surprising. The study found that 22% of Americans who did not use weed were obese, compared with 14% of those who did smoke it. Even when the rates were adjusted for other factors, such as sex, age and tobacco use, the results remained the same. What’s more, those who used marijuana had lower rates of diabetes. Ironically, smoking weed makes you hungrier, but it seems that there are chemicals in the weed that prevent you from gaining weight even if you are eating more.

The National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey

This study went further with the link between lower diabetes rates and smoking weed. One of the theories is that those who smoke marijuana have a higher metabolism than those who do not, leading their bodies to burn more calories. This means that even if they eat more, they are gaining less. Fasting insulin levels of those who use the herb on a regular basis were 16% lower than that of those who do not, and that could be linked to the lesser risk of diabetes later in life. Marijuana also seemed to boost good cholesterol levels and kept users slimmer.

So does smoking weed make you lose weight? The answer seems to be positive. But it is important to remember that these studies were not controlled, so there could be other factors at play for those who were losing weight while smoking cannabis.

“When I was 16, I started smoking pot. I weighed about 140 pounds. But 6 months later I had dropped to 120 pounds – that’s 20 pounds in 6 months! I didn’t do anything different other than smoking weed. But then I stopped doing it for a while, and my weight went right up to 160 pounds or so. Now I am back to smoking weed and losing weight every week. When you ask me, does smoking weed make you lose weight? I tell you it does!”

“It’s strange how weed works. It makes me very hungry and then I eat more, but I seem to lose weight even though I am eating everything in the house. My weight started at 156 and now I weigh about 150 and I have been doing this for a year now. But I'm not very satisfied. Simple dieting would make me lose much more weight.”

“The thin people I know who smoke pot tend to have other problems, like not enough money for good food. They aren’t losing weight because they smoke weed. They are losing weight because they are spending too much money on weed!”

The question "does smoking weed make you lose weight" is not answer clearly. But there is more and more researches tend to give a positive answer. Now here comes a bigger question: what other things smoking weed can do to your body.

Marijuana contains about 60 chemicals, all of which can cause some side effects. These might include increased appetite, dry mouth, bloodshot eyes, trouble with concentration and memory, a fast heart rate and slower coordination. Those who want to use weed to lose weight should look carefully at all the side effects in order to decide if trying it is really worth it.