Many cannabis consumers report that cannabis helps them with sleep issues, or that consumption of high-THC cannabis makes them sleepy. Many chronic consumers of high-THC cannabis report sleep disturbances and especially vivid dreams for some time upon abstention (taking a “THC break”). Many anecdotes, patient surveys, and studies indicate that cannabis seems to influence sleep and dreaming, but there are many factors involved: dose, frequency of consumption, tolerance, age, sex, etc.
Biology is complicated.
What do we specifically know about how cannabis influences sleep and dreaming?
Because high-THC products dominate the commercial marketplace and THC has the clearest connection to sleep among the cannabinoids, we will focus on what some of the latest scientific studies are revealing about THC’s influence on sleep. Before doing that, we will get a basic understanding about the biological functions of sleep, sleep architecture. From there, we will be in a good position to understand what is known about how THC impacts sleep.