First, a disclaimer. I don't use medical marijuana; I've never smoked the stuff at all, and never will. I don't like handing over the control of my brain to chemicals (I don't take opioids for the cancer thing, either).
That being said, I am aware of the benefits it can bring to some people, and am really appalled at the patchwork laws we have. In my state, medical and small amounts of recreational weed are legal, but the federales set up rolling checkpoints to interdict the product.
It's kinda nuts, guys. Make up your minds. Either accept it for medical use or ban it, but this wink-and-nod stuff is corrosive to the rule of law we need to share.
If you need medical weed and have (or choose) to travel, good luck. If you fly and TSA finds it, you're busted (though they don't specifically look for it).
In some states you may choose to visit, and medical marijuana is legal, you may be able to buy it directly with an authorizing card, or arrange up to thirty days ahead of time. In other states, you're out of luck.
Why the inconsistency? Part of it is undoubtedly cultural, that marijuana was seen as an outlaw drug, and a precursor to worse things.
But another reason may be found in the sonnet below. It doesn't necessarily reflect my opinion, but rather thoughts that I've seen expressed in online cancer forums.
And so, if you're with me to here...what would Jesus do? Wine mixed with myrrh was given Him on the Cross, presumably to control the pain, but what would He say about marijuana and opioids and the other things we turn to?
I honestly don't have a clue.
Temp'erture and dew point
and all their little friends.
It's too damp out to smoke a joint
before the night-time ends.
See, I've got a condition,
and weed settles me down.
Why should I need permission
from some suited DC clown?
But that's the way the whole thing goes,
no thinking 'bout the little guy,
for as most all people knows,
the fingers in Big Pharma pie
will close the door to cleaner care
because there is no profit there.
Sylvia worries about my having excessive pain, but figures that cuddles and ice cream will fix anything.
a dear dear relative of mine lived in awful pain for years. although medical marijuana is freely available here, the doctors refused to point us in the proper direction. looking back, i regret not working harder to find what she needed so that her final years weren't wracked with pain.
ReplyDeleteI don't like any medicine that gives me a fuzzy head. But if I had to choose between that and pain and nausea I don't know what I'd choose. That being said, I don't know enough about marijuana to have an opinion. But I've seen how big Pharma villanized vitamin D, sunshine, vitamin C, Ivermectin, and remedies that don't bring in the big bucks. And you can't patent nature's products.
ReplyDeleteI don't know enough to have an opinion about it.
ReplyDeleteAs others have said, I don't know enough about it to have an informed opinion. But if other addictive drugs (like morphine) can be dispensed with care, I don't know why this couldn't be--or at least looked into more carefully.
ReplyDeleteYears ago I contracted transverse myelitis, where a virus attacks the spinal column, triggering an autoimmune response where the body attacks not just the virus, but the myelin sheath surrounding the nerves. I was unable to walk on my own for several months and had a whole laundry list of symptoms. Each person's experience is different, because symptoms depend on where along the spine the attack takes place. I still have some numb areas almost 30 years later. All that to say, some TM patients are left with constant pain. I used to be on a site for TM patients, and some only found relief with marijuana. So I can see its use for that and cancer--but again, I don't know all the ramifications. I'd rather avoid it myself, but then I haven't had such pain that I'd consider it.