We Were Against It for 30 Years. Then We Tried It.

I need to say something upfront before we go any further.

Cannabis is legal in some states and not others. What I'm describing here is something my wife and I do in a state where recreational use is legal, and we did it carefully, intentionally, and after doing real research. I'm not recommending this for you. I'm telling you what happened for us. What works for two people in one marriage may not work for yours. Talk to your doctor if you have health concerns. Know your local laws. Make your own decisions.

That said, here's our story. 

One Bong Rip and Thirty Years of Guilt

The first time I tried cannabis I was in college, living in a fraternity house. Most of my frat brothers were regular smokers. I took one bong rip, got the munchies so badly that I downed an entire jug of apple juice and a box of vanilla wafers, and spent the rest of the night sick. But honestly the upset stomach wasn't the real issue. The real issue was the guilt. I had gone against everything I had been taught, everything that had been wired into me about who I was supposed to be and what good people did. The stomach recovered in a night. The guilt stuck around a lot longer. That's why I stayed away from it for thirty years, not because of one bad physical experience, but because of what trying it in the first place said about me, or at least what I believed it said about me at the time.

My wife had tried it too, back before we met. Neither of us came from families or communities where it was normalized. We were programmed against it the way a lot of people our age were programmed against it, quietly, thoroughly, and early. The illegality reinforced the message for decades. Good people didn't do that. We were good people.

So for thirty years, we didn't. 

Something Wasn't Working

About five years ago, as we were sorting through some of our intimacy issues, it brought to mind something that had been present for most of our marriage. My wife at times struggled to stay present during our intimate time together. It was a combination of anxiety, being mentally somewhere else, and some of the shame and programming around her own sexuality that I wrote about in What I Never Told My Wife. She would be physically there but caught somewhere in her head that had nothing to do with us. And if I'm being honest, I had my own version of the same problem. I was too intense, too much in my head, not as relaxed as I could be. Sex felt rushed. We weren't taking the time to transition out of the day and into each other. Both of us struggling to fully arrive meant we weren't getting to the kind of connection we were both after. We needed something to help us get into the right headspace. We just hadn't found it yet.

I started researching. That's what I do when something matters. I read, listened to podcasts, followed threads wherever they led. And that's when cannabis came back across my radar, not as the thing that made me sick in college, but as something researchers and practitioners were just starting to discuss seriously in the context of intimacy, anxiety, and presence. 

Then I Found Ashley Manta

Ashley Manta is a sex educator and the creator of the term "cannasexual." She speaks and writes about the use of cannabis to enhance intimacy, not to get high and fumble around, but to use it thoughtfully, at the right dose, in the right context, to reduce anxiety and increase presence. I heard her on The Sex and Psychology Podcast with Dr. Justin Lehmiller, the episode is called "How Cannabis Affects Sex" and is worth searching out. Something clicked. She was describing exactly what my wife was experiencing and offering a way of thinking about it I hadn't considered.

I brought it to my wife.

We talked about it the way we talk about everything that matters, carefully, openly, over more than one conversation. We talked about our programming around it. We talked about the research. We talked about the fact that we lived in a state where recreational use is legal, and that we could approach this like adults making a considered decision rather than doing something shameful in the dark.

She was open. She has always been willing to meet me halfway on things we haven't tried before. That willingness, to experiment together, to say yes to the unknown when we've done our homework, has made more difference in this marriage than almost anything else I can name.

We agreed to try it.

I drove to a local dispensary and I will be honest with you: walking in felt a lot like the first time I walked into a sex shop, which if you read the story of the anniversary gift that changed our marriage, you know was its own adventure. I was completely out of my element, convinced I was going to be judged, and certain I was going to be the oldest person in the building. Boy was I wrong on all counts.

What I found was a room full of people who looked exactly like me. Older couples. Professionals. People from every walk of life. Whatever I had imagined a dispensary would look like, this wasn't it. The staff were knowledgeable, unhurried, and completely nonjudgmental. I told them what we were looking for, something low dose, something that might help with anxiety and presence during intimacy, and they pointed us toward edibles.

We started with 5mg THC gummies. Low and slow. 

What Actually Happened

The first time we tried it together we were cautious and a little giddy. There's something about doing something genuinely new with your spouse that feels like an adventure regardless of what it is. We waited for the effects to kick in, chilled out on the couch and watched a movie, didn't rush anything.

What happened for me was a deep relaxation. Not impairment. Not disconnection. A settling. Like the background noise of the day got quieter and what was right in front of me got more interesting. The intensity that usually drove me softened into something more focused. I became locked in on my wife's pleasure, more connected, more erotic. Less in my head and more in the room with her.

What happened for my wife was more significant. The anxiety she carries into intimacy, that low-level hum of self-consciousness and mental chatter that pulled her out of her body, it quieted. She became more connected with herself in a way that had been hard to reach. Her body opened up. Erogenous zones that had been closed off for years, places I had quietly stopped trying, became available again. She was more in touch with her own feminine energy, more sensitive to my touch, more responsive in ways I hadn't expected. Orgasms became more frequent and stronger. She was present in a way that changed what was possible between us.

Five years later it's a regular part of our intimacy routine. Not every time. Not as a crutch. A choice we make on purpose when it feels right.

My wife has settled on Wyld Pomegranate gummies, a 1:1 CBD:THC hybrid that gives her a calm, grounded feeling without anything overwhelming. Half a gummy, about 5mg, forty-five minutes before. The combination works well for her. She stays clear-headed and present while the anxiety lifts and her body relaxes and responds more fully.

I've moved toward vaporizer cartridges. I prefer sativas and hybrids. City Trees is a brand I've come back to consistently. The effect is faster and easier for me to calibrate. I use it to relax, to get out of my own head, to show up with more presence and less urgency than the end of a long day sometimes allows.

Neither of us is trying to get high. We're trying to get present. 

A Few Honest Caveats

I know what the objections are because I had most of them myself.

This is a substance. It affects judgment. It could become a dependency. It's not for everyone and I mean that genuinely. If you have a history of anxiety disorders, psychosis, or substance misuse, this conversation belongs with a doctor, not a blog post. If you're in a state where it's not legal, this isn't available to you the way it is to us.

But if you're a long-married couple in a legal state who has written this off because of thirty-year-old programming and one bad night with vanilla wafers, I'd gently suggest the research has moved on. And so can you.

Ashley Manta's work is a good place to start. She knows this territory better than almost anyone I've come across. Search for The Sex and Psychology Podcast with Dr. Justin Lehmiller, find the episode called "How Cannabis Affects Sex," and start there. She puts words to things we had only felt. 

What cannabis gave my wife and me wasn't a shortcut. It was a door.

Behind that door was more presence, more ease, more laughter, and more of each other. We walked through it together, carefully, the way we try to walk through most things. And we're glad we did. 

This post describes our personal experience with cannabis used legally in our state. It is not medical advice and is not a recommendation for anyone else. If you have health concerns, please consult a qualified medical professional before trying cannabis. Know the laws in your state before making any decisions.

If anything in this post resonated, I put my five most important insights about long-term intimacy into a free guide — including five action steps you can take right now to move the needle. It's short, honest, and written from 27 years of real marriage. No fluff. Just the things that actually worked for us. Download it free below.