How does it help?

Marijuana has been used to relieve the symptoms of many, many ailments. Unfortunately for us, very little scientific study has been done on this plant as a medicine because of the irrational prohibition on the use of the plant in this country. This brief article is designed to introduce you to the potential benefits of medical marijuana.

Before that, though, please consider my personal experience. I went through CHOP-R chemotherapy, which in almost every case produces severe and uncomfortable side-effects in the patient. I was no exception. Nausea is the best known symptom and it hit me like a wall. I cannot begin to describe the misery. I was given two pharmaceuticals for nausea. They kept me from vomiting but I was still quite uncomfortable and the official listed side-effects of those medicines are horrifying. Google the side-effects of zofran and compazine next time you want to lose some sleep. I had done my research and was ready with pot. I breathed in one full breath of the vapor produced by passing 190 degree (C) air over ground marijuana flowers. Almost immediately my nausea began to retreat. Within a minute or two it was completely gone. One additional breath dulled the pain in my extremities (another chemo side effect) within 5 minutes. For 3 hours after this I was comfortable. Don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t having fun. I wasn’t ‘high’. But I wasn’t puking my small intestine onto the bathroom floor. And I call that a marked improvement. If you are going through chemo, you need to get access to marijuana. It’s night and day, my friends.

Here’s my attempt at a list of ailments that are frequently claimed to be helped by pot, many of which are beyond my personal experience but are worth investigating further:

• Nausea and vomiting
• Insomnia
• Lack of hunger (and resulting malnutrition)
• Chronic pain
• Muscle spasms

Specific diseases for which marijuana is commonly used as a treatment:

• Cancer
• Multiple Sclerosis
• Parkinson’s disease
• AIDS
• Epilepsy
• Anxiety and other mental disorders
• Glaucoma

It’s important to note that the list of things that people CLAIM marijuana does would dwarf this blog. I’m just distilling it down to what I’ve seen most commonly. I know for a fact that it turns misery into comfort for me when I’m getting ravaged by chemo. People I trust have given me similarly glowing reports of relief from other symptoms and from other diseases listed above. If we can legalize this plant and get more comprehensive research completed, imagine the wonderful possibilities. And I must add that all of this with a list of side effects that is miraculously low. Don’t drive! Your judgement is likely altered somewhat and your reflexes will be slower. You may find  yourself somewhat less motivated to produce, to work, to strive toward goals for a few hours while under the influence of marijuana. Depending on the strain of marijuana you choose, you may be sleepy. You may notice changes in perceptions, such as sounds being louder, or things seeming to move somewhat slowly. If you are not moderate in dosing yourself with this medicine, you may become somewhat paranoid and at very high doses may lose motor control.

It’s time to point out something very important. You cannot…absolutely CANNOT…overdose on marijuana. In the many thousands of years the plant has been used by humans, it’s never happened. What other medicine has that record? Exactly none, so far.

My rambling needs to come to an end, so I’ll summarize. Marijuana helps with many symptoms of many diseases, according to millions of people who have used it and told their stories. You can decide for yourself.