THC Detox: What Can You Do To Aid The Process?

There are many reasons you may want to clear the THC out of your body. Perhaps you’ve decided it’s time for a break, or maybe you want to stop using cannabis entirely and are looking to clear your system.

Well, this will take time. A THC detox is a worthy goal, but don’t be fooled by the marketing content you might find online—there’s no quick fix. Rather, detoxification is a process your body is going through all the time, and all you can do is allow it to work properly through abstinence and healthy living.

Below, find out about detoxing from THC, and if you can aid the process.

What is THC?

Tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) is the active compound in cannabis that produces the famous high. It is what’s known as a cannabinoid, and over 100 are produced in cannabis plants. Among the cannabinoids, very few are psychotropic, and of those, THC is the only one that occurs in large enough quantities to exert its effects in any meaningful way.

THC interfaces with the body's CB1 receptors by mimicking anandamide, a naturally occurring endocannabinoid. However, its effects are more potent and longer lasting compared to anandamide, which accounts for the fact that it causes a substantial and sometimes overwhelming high.

When we consume THC, it leaves traces in our blood and urine. As our body processes these compounds, metabolites are created, such as 11-OH-THC.

How long does THC stay in your blood and body?

THC only remains in the blood for around 3–4 hours, after which it will be metabolised and passed out of the body. However, its traces can linger for longer in hair and urine.

In urine, THC is detectable for between 3 and 30 days. Several factors affect how long it remains, with the main ones being the quantity and frequency of use. If you smoke a single small joint, then you can expect it to be gone within days. If, however, you smoke every day, then it can take a lot longer for the traces to disappear. However, it may be that there are ways to speed up this process, which we will go into below. Though, if possible at all, the difference will be minimal.

In hair, traces of THC can remain for up to 90 days or more, and beyond cutting it all off, there’s not much you can do to speed up the detox process.

What is a detox?

A detox, or detoxification, is, medically speaking, a process whereby the body is allowed to remove harmful substances. Usually, there are two main reasons that someone would detox. One is to recover from drug addiction, and another is to remove a poisonous substance from the body.

Though many detox diets exist, detoxing is not so much of an active thing as it may first appear. It has less to do with what you do, and much more to do with what you don’t do. Because, really, your body is detoxifying itself all the time, and “going on a detox” ultimately just means that you stop putting in harmful substances so the body can clear itself out.

How do you get THC out of your system?

The true answer is that time and abstinence are the only ways to get THC out of your system. There’s no way to immediately flush your system, and if you continue to smoke, the signs will remain.

That being said, if you have stopped using THC and want to detox faster, there may be some steps you can take to speed up the process. But bear in mind that these aren’t certain, and definitely shouldn’t be relied upon to help you pass a drug test, for example.

Stop using cannabis

First, you need to stop using cannabis. You can’t hope to clear a substance from your body if you’re continually putting more of it in. So if you want your body to be empty of THC, you’ll have to stop consuming it!

Drink water

Water helps to keep things moving through your body, and helps to optimise organ function. So if you drink plenty of water, you’ll speed up your body’s metabolism and help the liver and kidneys go about their processes.

How much it helps is unclear. While drinking a healthy amount of water will help to optimise your metabolism, that’s not to say that you can just drink more and more water to flush everything out of your body—that’s not how it works.

So, really, the best you can do is drink a healthy amount of water to assist your body in maintaining normal processes as best it can.

Detox drinks

Many drinks claim to help you to detox, but what does this really mean?

In most (or all) cases, this is little more than marketing. While, as with water, the consumption of healthy fluids will help with metabolism, you can’t buy a drink that will somehow flush your body of all toxins and compounds. If you could, they’d be much more widely used!

Detox drinks, if all natural, may well be generally good for you and taste good at the same time, but they will probably not accelerate the processing of toxins in your body.

Zinc

Zinc is used by the liver, and the liver is crucial for detoxification. So, to allow your body to detoxify as it should, you need to be consuming enough zinc. But as with everything on this list, you must understand that it's really just about giving your body what it needs so that it can carry out its processes—it’s not about taking some magical pill that will clear everything out in one go.

Gobbling up zinc is not going to remove the THC from your system. And you should only take zinc supplements if you’re not getting enough in your normal diet.

Exercise

Exercise, as you probably already know, helps the body to stay healthy and speeds up the metabolism. Therefore, once again, it can help to get your body functioning as well as it can, which will speed up detoxification—up to a point.

Exercise is one of the easiest and most enjoyable ways to speed up some of your body’s internal processes, and it’s also a great way to aid the process of overcoming a substance use disorder. So, if you’ve stopped smoking cannabis after a long period of frequent use, exercising is going to make that process easier.

Practise a healthy diet

Finally, a healthy diet is yet another way to keep your body detoxing as it should. Eat a balanced array of different foods, especially nutrient-rich plants, and you should find that you begin to feel better.

Detox: A matter of time

As you can see, you can aid the detoxification that your body naturally goes through, but you can’t force the process.

If you want to help your body go through a period of detox, there are two crucial tenets. One—and this is the main one—is that you have to stop taking the substance you’re trying to clear out. In the case of THC, it’s never going to leave your body if you keep putting it in!

Second is that a healthy body can detox more efficiently than an unhealthy one. So hydration, exercise, and a healthy diet are essential to aiding this process.

Max Sargent

Max has been writing for over a decade, and has come into cannabis and psychedelic journalism in the last few years. Writing for companies such as Zamnesia, Royal Queen Seeds, Cannaconnection, Gorilla Seeds, MushMagic and more, he has experience in a broad spectrum of the industry.

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