Tuesday, December 21, 2010
Pro-Legalization Protesters bomb police station with cart full of burning cannabis
Police in the New Zealand capital of Wellington were weighing charges Friday against a group of pro-cannabis protesters who invaded the cop-shop with a cart full of burning marijuana, according to a report from the scene.
The activists had been demonstrating on parliament grounds by smoking marijuana openly in front of police and security, as party of an ongoing campaign of civil disobedience.
Amid the noisy scene, with a rowdy crowd shouting and cheering in approval, one of the protest organizers declared that he was "proud as hell" to have been a part of the demonstration, telling a reporter that they had "declared war" on their country's drug laws.
"Free the weed! Free the weed!" the crowd chanted as police rushed in with fire extinguishers and handcuffs.
Dakta Green, briefly interviewed by 3 News in New Zealand, is a marijuana activist who has been leading a campaign of "peace" between tokers and police, calling his cause the "Armistice Tour." The main goal, apart from the outright legalization and regulation of cannabis, is to convince police to let sports fans smoke during the rugby World Cup next year.
New Zealanders have a history of violence when it comes to losing rugby matches, and much of the rage, many locals portend, is due to copious alcohol consumption. The marijuana campaigners suggest that allowing fans to smoke marijuana instead would be safer.
Meanwhile, traveling around the country in a big, green bus -- apparently nicknamed "Mary Jane the Cannabus," according to their website -- the group is hoping to encourage other marijuana consumers to "live like it's legal."
Video posted to an 'Armistice' campaign website showed a group of people laughing and talking while smoking on the lawn in front of parliament. Green later delivered an "Armistice Agreement," allegedly bearing the signatures of 4,500 people, to New Zealand Green MP Gareth Hughes.
The New Zealand Herald called it "one of the happiest protests the political precinct had seen in a long time."
Their protest inside the police station would seem to have been a bit more eventful.
Police said they were examining a shopping cart, which reportedly contained a heap of flaming marijuana. The brazen act of defiance was allegedly committed on camera, but authorities have not yet released the footage.
This video is from 3 News in New Zealand, broadcast Nov. 12, 2010.
Monday, December 20, 2010
A Jury of One's Peers
http://missoulian.com/news/local/article_464bdc0a-0b36-11e0-a594-001cc4c03286.html
also
http://www.fija.org
A Celestial Blue Diamond Event Tonight
| By: wendydavis |
Lunar eclipse in 2004 over Hayward, Calif. (source: Mactographer via Wikipedia)
and:“An otherwise seemingly unexceptionable year in recorded history, the darkened moon happened during a bleak year for Tudor England.
Lady Jane Grey was beheaded for treason that year, while Princess Elizabeth was imprisoned in the Tower of London. Mary of Guise — the mother of Mary, Queen of Scots — became regent of Scotland.”
What do you believe this Cosmic Blue Diamond might portend or herald? ;o)“It’s a ritual of transformation from darkness into light,” says Nicole Cooper, a high priestess at Toronto’s Wiccan Church of Canada. “It’s the idea that when things seem really bleak, (it) is often our biggest opportunity for personal transformation.
“The idea that the sun and the moon are almost at their darkest at this point in time really only further goes to hammer that home.”
Cooper said Wiccans also see great significance in the unique coupling of the masculine energy of the sun and the feminine energy of the moon — transformative energies that she plans to incorporate into the church’s winter-solstice rituals.”
[Ed. note: According to SkyAndTelescope.com, the eclipse begins at 1:33 a.m. EST with full eclipse beginning at 2:41 a.m. EST. Set your alarm before you go to bed tonight to catch this once-in-several-lifetimes event .]
Truth Or D.A.R.E.?
> Teen marijuana use rises; 'mixed messages' blamed
>
>
> By Anna Edney and Molly Peterson
>
> Bloomberg News
>
> Marijuana use rose this year among eighth, 10th, and 12th graders, and is
> now more common than cigarette smoking with high school seniors, a
> government survey found.
>
> Daily marijuana use among seniors climbed to 6.1 percent in 2010 from 5.2
> percent in 2009, sophomore use increased to 3.3 percent from 2.8 percent,
> and eighth-grade use reached 1.2 percent from 1 percent, according to the
> poll from the National Institutes of Health.
That's great news!
>
> Efforts to legalize marijuana for medical purposes have sent "mixed
> messages" to youths and made it harder for parents to discourage drug use,
> said Gil Kerlikowske, director of the separate White House Office of
> National Drug Control Policy.
>
> "Calling smoked marijuana 'medicine' is absolutely incorrect and it sends a
> terrible message," he told reporters Tuesday in Washington.
Young people get all kinds of mixed messages from us adults.
"Stay in school and you'll get a good job... But don't be an egg head know-it-all. .. nobody likes a guy who uses big words and thinks too much...If you work hard and tow the line, you'll be rewarded in the end... but the company just downsized again so oops, slaves in Asia work harder and longer hours for cheaper than Americans ever would, so no more job security here in America."
"Sex can kill you and love stinks but there's nothing more important than how physically attractive and popular you are (or aren't)."
"Drugs are bad and you should never do illegal drugs but here, take your ritalin right now, you'll be late for school. And don't even try to talk back to me before I've had my coffee and my valium! I'll give you something to cry about! And here's your prozac..."
Any kid can google up dozens of websites that publish the latest news about the medical marijuana movement, including the growing body of scientific research studies demonstating marijuana's medicinal efficacy for various serious and debilitating conditions.. . But it's still defined federally as schedule one and this is still what young people are being taught in school, in the DARE programs; the unfounded fallacy that there is no possible medical use for smoked marijuana.
Calling smoked marijuana medicine is absolutely correct in the light of medical research. Even the staid AMA has officiallyconceded that their long held prejudice against marijuana as medicine was unfounded.
Lying to young people about marijuana, or anything else they can look into and readily find the truth about, can call into question anything further you try to teach them or convince them to believe. As long as DARE programs continue to teach deliberately deceptive propaganda instead of the latest good science about the plant, kids will see through the hypocricy and look askance at adult pronouncements in general. Can you blame them?
Saturday, December 18, 2010
Re: Massachusetts medical Marijuana Act Questions & comments Part-44(b)
HOUSE DOCKET, NO. 3216 FILED ON: 1/12/2009 AMENDED HOUSE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . No. 2160
I've tried to keep my questions and comments brief, since I was all over the first part of the bill I reviewed thusly;
http://mamamojournal.blogspot.com/2010/12/notes-from-underground-part-44.html
but here are the concerns that came up as per this reading for me;
Q* Sliding scale inc fee waiver for low income OP?
Q* Feeling concern, as I read along and take in all these numbers, the fees and fines and the time frames allowed the dept of public health, especially the way it is empowered to be making up regulations after the fact of the bill's enactment into law. I would like to see a lot of the open ended factors addressed in detail sooner, before the passage of the law, not be left so late to be determined, not all at the discretion of the Dept. Isn't it better to get more specific and plan for the eventuality of the law's passage so that sick and especially dying patients don't have to persist without safe legal access for months or years after the law passes, waiting for the dept to figure out what it's doing?
Q*what if QP works at a school or correctional facility, or lives on a college campus, or is incarcerated and seriously ill or debilitated by pain?
* Would like to see good 2 tiered research study involving replacing conventional methadone treatment with MMJ, not addictive, least harm done to the system, legal if medically recommended, anecdotally reported efficacious for helping people stay off harder stuff. Cannabis also reported helpful interrupting PTSD thinking patterns, even severe cases like veterans.. some people need to forget what they were just thinking about!
To other activists currently reviewing the language of this bill;
What if any concerns do you have about this bill which I have not addressed in my questions and comments?
If we may only make a few changes in the language before the bill gets reintroduced, which three or four changes do you consider most important to ensure, and what are your reasons for prioritizing the changes you chose?
Friday, December 17, 2010
Kathryn's Notes (with some edits from Rachel) From the 12/12/10 Amherst Meeting
This is like raw footage-- unedited clips from our meeting, but as you follow along you will see our thinking as a group is essentially similar to the Avon group's. Thanks to Scott Mortimer, citizen lobbyist extraordinaire, for attending both meetings and helping us understand the context in which we now take action.
I'm glad we are all on the same page!
Here follow the notes:
AGENDA
intros
we each give our names and *special powers*, ie skills we bring or work we can do for the group effort
included are PR, organizing events, citizen lobbying, education, writing, performance art, canvassing and common sense.
Soundbytes
can't kill you, opposite--good for you
from Matt's talking points--"If this is a *war on drugs* let's take the sick and wounded off the battlefield."
botanical remedies not scheduled (?)
contact our state reps
raise their awareness of the issue
develop personal relationships with reps, get to know them as people
when invited to meet with rep,
Keep meeting cordial, dress conservatively, be on point, stick to same talking points as they will hear from others on the key issues and leave a good fact sheet; don't sidetrack into other concerns,
listen carefully to objections and be prepared to counter those objections
patients tell your personal story
doctors effective allies
visit statehouse on lobby days
Rachel has tentative appointments to meet with staffers in Gov Patrick's and Jeffrey Sanchez' offices in January after bill is filed, will want MPAA support and group entourage, esp representative patients with very good raps, would help... Latino MMJ supporters might help overcome Sanchez bias that MMJ isn't legit, he believes mj use is part of poverty-crime syndrome among poor people of latino descent or of color (so show AMA support, other prestigious medical endorsements of MJ efficacy as medicine, argue that more legit ways for patients to access posses and or grow will cut crime rates?)
Some discussion of history of MMJ activism here in Mass, who were the movers and shakers, who supported it, who objected and why, criticisms of the top-down model of activism.
affirm we are a grassroots patient advocacy group and collective in spirit, and overall pro legalization across the board, but willing to focus for practical purposes now on MMJ and our patients' rights
ideas re where we may garner support now, ie from MPAA if we agree to work with Matt on MPAA campaign, and by becoming ASA chapter we can benefit from ASA's experience, their legal advisors, their activist trainings, funding and so on
shall we
convene an organization,board of directors, staff, lobbyist(s)
raise
$10,000 to rent an office
$500 to hire a PR firm
Prop 19 people still together, will do CA and CO again. adding MA would add another 10% to overall cost of a national campaign
Peter Lewis, Soros, Nadelman...
speakers' bureau
Looking at the MMJ Bill
Debilitating, chronic (questions)
add= as per doctor's recommendation
eliminate manditory registration
no designating only one dispensary (competition)
delete the disqualification re felony conviction
delete non profit(?)
homegrown cottage industry- not just medical, food, fuel, industrial
buyers club
cooperative
community gardens
tithing 10% growers yield or leaf for free bubble hash
charity
no cap to licenses for dispensaries
insurance covers prescription
distance from schools
more than 12 plants & 4 oz per patient?
enclosed locked space can be outdoor or greenhouse as well as under lights indoor
allow use for patients at workplaces and anywhere tobacco is permitted
(albeit I wouldnt want to have to be around cig smokers when taking my medicine break!)
assert doc patient decision as the authorization for patient to access MJ from dispensary, limit beaurocacy
Name for group?
Contact reps and report to MPAA list what happens
WE MEET AGAIN Sun Dec 26th, at One PM
RSVP medicinesocks@ yahoo.com for location and directions
Hope to see you at the next meeting!
The South Shore Meeting's Notes
December 15, 2010
Agenda:
Dispensaries in RI – MA current bill is exactly like RI
Bill – MPAA and ASA wants to make changes, but it is all up to Smizick, State Rep for Brookline, Lead Sponsor. Filed Jan 19th. About a dozen co-sponsors:
Changes to the bill:
List of diseases, condition: better to have an open ended prescription,
Number of plants per patients: It is hard to regulate with perpetual cycles, at least 6 ounces per patient and 24 plants
Number of dispensaries: compare to pharmacies
No limit for number of licensed caregivers in state, and they can grow up to 99 plants total
Allowed to go to any dispensaries: competition, quality, capitalist model
Research opportunities for patient and doctors and diversity of plants to support
Ideal: No ID cards, not tied to Dispensaries, broad limit, 6 ounces per patient
Section 6a needs to change! Cannot be so tied to a certain medical treatment center
Can we? Systematic assignment of a treatment center to grow 12 plants per licensed patient but the patient can buy wherever he wants or even grow himself or find a caretaker to grow for him.
Districts:
Who is your rep? Need to know your congressional, senate in general court, rep in general court – where do they stand? We made a spreadsheet for all in attendance. Need to find out more about our official reps.
Talking points: Need to have the same fact sheet that everyone goes to their elected official with. Tell your personal story.
Hearing: as soon as March or maybe as late as October. Need to practice our stories so they are the most effective. Should the training for hearing separate than training to talk to our officials in their office? Can we have 100 people rally for the hearing? YES WE CAN!
Return to the bills co-sponsor
Talk to Smizik: make sure we have a good team
Words to use (email / phone / meeting)
Your personal story
Medicinal Cannabis / Marijuana
Medicine
Leave copy of fact sheet in the office, your personal story written down, endorsements,
next steps for MPAA: Talk to Matt we want a small meeting to delegate responsibility for next stepp of MPAA. We want MPAA to be a part of ASA.
We will call a meeting for 10 people and call it an ASA meeting. We meaning the Massachusetts Shore Meeting Group - Contact Stefanie from ASA: we want to join, how can you support us? Can people name appear in different chapters?
Next Meeting: January 11th, 7:30, Fuji, Quincy Center. Open to public and will be a chapter ASA meeting. Meeting next month to educate ourselves on the final wording of the Bill and to strategize which official we need to meet. Setting up a framework for a grass works organization.
Thursday, December 16, 2010
Marijuana Has Rocked the West Coast, And Now New England Is the Next Frontier for Reform
Thursday, December 16, 2010 10:26 AM
From:
"Clifford Thornton", written by Steven Wishnia
Marijuana Has Rocked the West Coast, And Now New England Is the Next Frontier for Reform
December 16, 2010 |
New England may be the next frontier for reforming the nation's marijuana laws.
Maine and Rhode Island are moving toward creating a dispensary system for medical marijuana, and Massachusetts decriminalized marijuana in 2008. In Connecticut and Vermont, incoming governors are expected to be much more sympathetic to similar moves than their predecessors were. New Hampshire's legislature passed a medical-marijuana bill this year, but its upper house failed to override a veto by Gov. John Lynch.
In contrast, the other Northeastern states are moving much more slowly. New Jersey's new medical-marijuana law is the most restrictive in the nation, as it limits patients to four state-licensed clinics. Maryland and Washington, DC, are expected to pass or implement similar policies next year. And New York, despite its liberal reputation, continues to have the most petty pot busts in the country.
"The East Coast is going to be a little slow," says Neill Franklin, head of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition. "New England is the area to watch."
Last October, a Gallup poll found that 47 percent of Northeasterners supported legalization, the second highest regional level in the nation after the West's 58 percent. More than 60 percent of liberals and people under 30 backed it, but only around 30 percent of Republicans, conservatives, and people over 65 did.
New England
In Massachusetts, where voters in 2008 reduced the penalty for marijuana possession to a $100 fine, "the prospects are so bright we've got to wear shades," says Bill Downing of MASS CANN, the state affiliate of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws. Last November, voters in nine legislative districts endorsed "public policy questions" advising their representatives to support legal, taxed, and regulated cannabis sales. The questions that specified regulations similar to those for alcohol all won more than 60 percent. Nine districts also endorsed legalizing medical marijuana, with a high of 72 percent in the Jamaica Plain section of Boston. The medical referenda were put on the ballot in districts where the 2008 decriminalization initiative, Question 2, did not do well, Downing says.
Whether this will translate into legislation is another story. Bills to legalize medical marijuana will be refiled in the state legislature next year, but a measure to put regular marijuana sales under regulations similar to those for alcohol and tobacco doesn't have a sponsor, says Downing. Still, he predicts that Massachusetts "will be the first state in the U.S. to legalize marijuana"--although if it paralleled the Bay State's liquor laws, you couldn't buy any on Sundays.
Whitney Taylor of the Massachusetts Civil Liberties Union, which is backing the medical-marijuana bill, is less optimistic. Public policy questions, she says, "have a wonderful history of passing by great margins and a very poor history of influencing legislators. I've had legislators look me in the eye and say, 'I don't care.'" Lawmakers will also very likely face a campaign by the state's prosecutors to restrict or dismantle the decriminalization law, she adds.
"The Question 2 battle is not over," she warns.
Rhode Island, meanwhile, is on its way to becoming the first East Coast state with medical-marijuana dispensaries. The state government has licensed four "compassion centers," and patients who don't want to go through that system can still grow their own, says Caren Woodson, government affairs director of Americans for Safe Access. She praises the state for having "managed to figure out how to evolve the law while focusing on patient individuality."
With Gov. Donald Carcieri, who vetoed the medical-marijuana bill, now out of office, the stage may be set for "a serious legislative push" starting with decrim and eventually full legalization, says Paul Armentano of NORML.
Maine is also in the process of setting up a dispensary system, but the situation there is more complex. Medical marijuana has been legal there since a 1999 initiative, with patients either growing their own or having caregivers do it for them. In 2009, another initiative allowed nonprofit dispensaries. However, regulations added by the state legislature have drawn criticisms from patients and activists.
The new system is good for patients who can't grow their own and don't know anyone who can, says Becky DeKeuster, head of the Northeast Patients Group, which will operate four of the eight regional dispensaries permitted. In addition, "physicians may be more comfortable" working with a more regulated environment.
Those dispensaries will have to pay a $15,000 annual fee, be open to unannounced state inspections, and have stricter security than regular pharmacies. They will be limited to six plants per patient, and cannot provide patients more than 2.5 ounces every 15 days.
That raises both botanical and medical issues. "I haven't yet figured out how to get one plant to yield precisely that much, says DeKeuster, a former high-school teacher who joined the medical-marijuana movement after her father died of lung cancer. Patients with terminal cancer, she adds, often need massive amounts of the drug, optimally as a cannabis-extract tincture.
The law also requires patients to register with the state. Alyssa Melnick of the Maine Civil Liberties Union calls that "unwarranted government scrutiny" that implies medical-marijuana users are criminals. She says she's gotten calls from many patients worried that their medical conditions, such as HIV-positive status, will be in a database accessible to government officials without a warrant and impossible to keep secure. "It just doesn't make sense," she says; people obtaining OxyContin to get high wreak a lot more havoc in Maine than medical-marijuana diversion.
DeKeuster is more optimistic. "This is definitely a law in progress," she says. Legislators seem cooperative, with the attitude that "this is what the citizens have voted for, so we want to do it right." She hopes that "clear regulations and high standards" will keep the federal government from interfering.
New Hampshire saw a medical-marijuana bill vetoed last year by Governor John Lynch, even after it was rewritten to meet his objection to cultivation by state-regulated dispensaries. The state House overrode the veto, but the Senate didn't. The Senate also rejected a bill to reduce the penalty for ?-ounce or less to a $200 fine after Lynch said he would veto it.
Activists plan to reintroduce the medical bill again next year, says Matt Simon of the New Hampshire Coalition for Common Sense Marijuana Policy. They hope to assuage the governor's concerns and "have him meet patients." Though the Republicans gained massive majorities in both houses in November, Simon says the bills had significant support from both parties.
In Connecticut and Vermont, new governors are likely to help legislation advance. Connecticut's outgoing governor, Jodi Rell, vetoed a medical-marijuana bill, but Governor-elect Dan Malloy has publicly supported both decriminalization and medical-marijuana measures, and is already meeting with activists, says Cliff Thornton of Efficacy.
In Vermont, Peter Shumlin sponsored a decrim bill while he was in the state legislature. Activists' main priorities there, says Vidda Crochetta of Marijuana Resolved, are decrim, to "soften the impact" of criminal penalties, and improving the state's "toothless" medical law, which has no provisions for dispensaries and requires patients to grow indoors. He cites the case of Sue Thayer, a 65-year-old woman from East Wallingford, who is facing felony cultivation charges because, as an experienced gardener, she grew medical herb for her critically ill son outside her house.
Ultimately, Crochetta says, he wants to see full legalization, but as of now, "even in Vermont, the state legislature is not going to legalize marijuana."
Middle Atlantic
In New York, a medical-marijuana bill has passed the state Assembly several times without a problem, says a spokesperson for Assemblymember Richard Gottfried, its sponsor, but has only once found a sponsor in the state Senate. As the Republicans have regained a majority there, that problem remains. Governor-elect Andrew Cuomo opposes it on the grounds that he doesn't want New York to have the same problems as California and Colorado, notes Nicholas Eyle of Reconsider, a Syracuse-based antiprohibition group.
Meanwhile, police in New York City continue to arrest more than 40,000 people a year for marijuana possession. Although the state decriminalized pot in 1977, reducing the penalty for less than 25 grams to a $100 ticket, possession "in public view" is a misdemeanor--and a top priority for the administration of pothead-turned-plutocrat Mayor Michael Bloomberg. About 80 percent of those popped are either black or Latino, and a similar proportion are under 25.
Pennsylvania is one of the region's more conservative states, but earlier this year, Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams agreed to de facto decriminalization, making pot possession city law enforcement's lowest priority and setting up a drug-diversion court that imposes $200 fines. The rate of marijuana arrests there is not as high as in New York City, but the racial disparities are even more extreme. Of 6,400 people charged with marijuana offenses in Philadelphia in 2009, 80 percent were black.
The biggest recent development in the Middle Atlantic states has been the enactment of a medical-marijuana law in New Jersey last January. The law was the result of a five-year campaign by patients, says Roseanne Scotti of the state Drug Policy Alliance chapter, but it is "the most restrictive law in the country."
New Jersey is the only one of the 15 states with legal medical marijuana that does not let patients grow their own. The state health department has proposed limiting the number of dispensaries permitted to four, with a $20,000 annual license fee. Only two of them would be allowed to grow cannabis, and its THC content could not exceed 10 percent.
"That clearly isn't going to be enough for a state of eight million people," says Scotti. "It's clearly not a medical model. We're wondering if this is even going to be workable." On Dec. 10, Gov. Chris Christie announced a compromise deal that would increase the number of dispensaries allowed to six, but three days later, the state Senate voted to order him to rewrite the proposed regulations. "The administration has tried painstakingly to make the medical marijuana regulations as prohibitive as possible for patients," state Sen. Nicholas Scutari, the original bill's sponsor, told the Atlantic City Weekly.
The law restricts patients to two ounces a month. That may seem like a lot, says Caren Woodson, but some HIV patients can go through five grams a day to sustain an appetite and avert nausea. It also bars dispensaries from providing "edibles" such as cannabis cookies, which are safer than smoking and deliver a stronger, longer-lasting dose.
New Jersey has "set a clear trend away from anything that looks like compassionate patient access," says Allen St. Pierre. Maryland is expected to pass a medical-marijuana law next year that will also prohibit patients from growing their own. Washington, DC's medical-marijuana law, the result of a 1998 initiative that was blocked by Congress for several years, will go into effect this month. It too will contain similar restrictions, and patients will need approval from two doctors.
The Medical Marijuana Strategy
The New Jersey law is giving some people in the legalization movement second thoughts about the strategy of focusing on medical marijuana, their main priority for the past 15 years. There were both moral and pragmatic grounds for that strategy--if it is wrong to arrest people for smoking pot to get high, then it is unconscionable to arrest people who use cannabis as medicine, and winning allowances for medical marijuana was a lot more politically possible than full legalization. Also, "any time legislators get in the business of regulating medical marijuana, it shows them you can control marijuana," says Bill Piper, head of national affairs at the Drug Policy Alliance.
However, the California model, in which alternative weeklies are full of dispensary ads touting $20 eighths and offering free joints to first-time patients, and the strip of dispensaries and related businesses in downtown Oakland calls itself "Oaksterdam," has created "unbelievable blowback," says NORML director Allen St. Pierre.
The New Jersey law essentially treats medical marijuana like methadone--a dangerous drug whose users are considered likely to divert it to get high. Legislators in states that are beginning to look at the issue prefer that approach to California's, says St. Pierre.
The backlash to the California system is "uninformed," says Caren Woodson. "For all its faults, it's like a pharmacy. Once you get a recommendation from a physician, you can get your medicine in 24 hours," she says. Though Los Angeles was "out of control," she explains, other cities, such as Oakland, San Francisco, and Santa Barbara, have reasonable, effective regulations.
In contrast, she says, the more restrictive state laws are based on politics, not science.
ASA says its main concern is with medical-marijuana patients, so it does not take a position on overall legalization; its election guide in California this year said the Proposition 19 legalization initiative did not affect patients. That is sort of like being an AIDS group that avoids the issue of gay rights.
On the other hand, one of the biggest internecine conflicts of the early AIDS era was when AIDS activists in New York and San Francisco supported the closing of gay sex clubs; many gay-rights activists denounced that as government sexual repression. Woodson sees a similar dynamic here; she says "patients have been used" by those who see medical marijuana as a stepping stone to legalization. California's law allows medical marijuana for any condition that a physician thinks it might help. That is often perceived as a vehicle for people to use any medical condition they have to get high-quality marijuana legally. States that wish to avoid that allow medical marijuana only for specific severe illnesses, such as cancer and AIDS--but that often excludes conditions such as migraine headaches or chronic pain. That could be resolved, says Woodson, if we "just reschedule marijuana. It doesn't require legalization." Federal law has marijuana in Schedule I, along with heroin, as a drug with no valid medical use. OxyContin and cocaine are in Schedule II, and codeine in Schedule III.
Clifford Thornton also calls the focus on medical marijuana a strategic mistake. "The movement will take anything that's pro-reform, but they're digging a hole," he says. Ultimately, he believes, only full legalization will eliminate the illegal market and the crime and violence that go with it.
Changing Landscapes
Why has the Northeast been so different from the West? Why is New England different from New York or Maryland?
Activists and analysts almost universally point to initiatives. "Voters are ahead of the politicians," says Bill Piper. "The biggest difference is that the Western states almost all have initiatives." If New York and New Hampshire residents could vote on the issue, he adds, they'd already have medical marijuana.
Of the 10 Western states that have legalized medical marijuana, all but New Mexico and Hawaii did it by initiative instead of legislatively. In the East, only Massachusetts, Maine, and Washington, DC have initiatives, and Congress can nullify local DC laws. National drug-policy groups are considering running "tax and regulate" initiatives in California, Colorado, Oregon, and Washington in 2012. The odds are slimmer they will happen in Massachusetts and Maine.
On no other issue is there as wide a gap between legislators and popular opinion, activists say. The October Gallup poll found 46 percent of respondents nationally supporting legalization, but the number of members of Congress who do fell well below the number of anti-Obama "birthers" even before the 2010 elections.
Another factor, says Allen St. Pierre, is that the East Coast lacks the well-developed "cannabis culture" of California. California had its first legalization initiative in 1972, he notes, so they've been debating the issue for 40 years. The success of medical marijuana there has meant the public in the entire Western region is more educated about the issue, he adds.
The quirks of local politics also matter. Massachusetts and Maine have probably the best-organized legalization groups in the region; MASS CANN for several years drew tens of thousands of people to rallies on Boston Common. In contrast, the Middle Atlantic states have much weaker groups. New York is regionally divided, with the almost 3 million people on Long Island a ten-hour drive away from Buffalo.
Activists in Vermont, New Hampshire, and Rhode Island benefit from their states being small enough for personal contact with legislators. "We've really been able to put a face on things, says Vidda Crochetta. New Hampshire is the most conservative state in New England, but its Republicans have a strong libertarian streak. With lower-house members there representing districts of barely 3,000 people, "grass-roots efforts can have a lot more effect," says Matt Simon.
St. Pierre, a Massachusetts native, says another reason decriminalization progressed there was that the massive pedophile-priest scandal weakened the power of the Catholic Church hierarchy, which was "absolutely behind-the-scenes opposed." But one reason medical marijuana failed this year, says Whitney Taylor, was that the legislature was also considering a gambling bill, and "nobody wanted to support both casino gambling and medical marijuana at the same time."
Perhaps the most important aspect of East Coast drug politics, however, is that the marijuana issue is intertwined with the racially charged questions of drug-related crime and the violent ghetto drug traffic. The Christian right is weaker here than in any other part of the country; right-wing politicians who have succeeded here, most notoriously former New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani, have done so by exploiting the race-colored reaction to crime.
"Heroin is more an East Coast thing," says Neill Franklin, who formerly headed drug task forces and a domestic-violence unit for the Maryland State Police. Washington, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Newark, New York, and Boston are all "feeling the brunt of organized drug gangs." Heroin is also "running rampant" in the deindustrialized smaller cities of southern New England, says Thornton. Still, Franklin adds, marijuana is the number-one product on the illegal market.
Yet the black and Latino people most affected by both drug arrests and drug-related crime are "overwhelmingly missing from this fight," Franklin says. "They haven't yet separated the issues of drug use and drug abuse from drug prohibition. It's very difficult when they see the effect of drug use in their communities. We tell them, 'If you end prohibition, you won't have that. You won't have to walk by the gangs on the corner fighting for market share.'"
Franklin says his experiences in law enforcement--including the murder of a close friend on the force--taught him that prohibition has failed, and that police should "stop being parents" and focus on violent crimes, such as processing the nation's backlog of more than 400,000 untested rape kits. Marijuana legalization is coming, he says, so it's "irresponsible not to start working on policy for regulations, standards, and control."
Thornton says this all means that activists in the East have to look at the full spectrum, "not just pot," and put together more comprehensive programs. For example, he says, "a lot of people depend on the underground economy--it supports many, many businesses." If you eliminate the illegal drug trade, he wonders, how are those people going to make a living?
He calls his concept "restorative justice," and envisions a "peace dividend" coming from the end of prohibition. State governments would no longer run up deficits spending massive amounts of money on drug enforcement and incarceration, and they'd also reap revenues from industrial hemp and cannabis "cottage industries."
"We've got to get that money back," he says. "I don't want to see that money lost like it was after the Cold War. We've got to have jobs for the people."
Cops, Activist and Clergy
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
MEDIA EMAIL LIST
Hi Rachel,
Here is the press list.
Figured it was better I typed it in, than you try to decode my handwriting.
As I said -- it is good to *some degree*
But I realized that this is a list of news editors to send press releases to. I think you are more interested in "letters - to - the - editor" At least this list gives you the names of the newspapers, so you can decide which ones to write to. Most such editorial page editor email addresses will probably begin with "letters@", "letter@", "editorial@" or the name of the editor.
MEDIA EMAIL LIST
TV
22 Springfield -- news@wwlp.com
40 Springfield -- assignmentdesk@wggb.com
3 Springfield (cable) -- news@cbs3springfield.com
4 Boston -- uses an online form at: http://wbztv.com/contact
5 Boston -- uses an online form at: http://www.thebostonchannel.com/station/index.html
New England Cable News -- tmelville@necn.com
RADIO
WMUA -- news@wmua.org
WFCR -- news@wfcr.org
WHMP -- collins@whmp.com
WBZ Boston -- wbzradionews@wbz1030.com
NEWSPAPERS
Amherst Bulletin -- amherst@gazettenet.com
Daily Hampshire Gazette -- newsroom@gazettenet.com
Springfield Republican -- news@repub.com
Valley Advocate -- editor@valleyadvocate.com
Greenfield Recorder -- newsinfo@recorder.com
Berkshire Eagle -- news@berkshireeagle.com
Worcester Telegram -- newstips@telegram.com
Boston Globe -- localnews@globe.com
Boston Herald -- newstips@bostonherald.com
Boston Phoenix -- letters@phx.com
Albany Times Union -- tucitydesk@timesunion.com
Brattleboro Reformer -- news@reformer.com
Providence Journal -- pjnews@projo.com
Hartford Courant -- ???
New York Times -- national@nytimes.com
Wall Street Journal -- darren.mcdermott@wsj.com
Washington Post -- national@washpost.com
Newsday -- news@newsday.com
USA Today -- ???
ONLINE
Drudge Report -- drudge@drudgereport.com
Huffington Post -- scoop@huffingtonpost.com (often doesn't work)
Tommy Devine's Blog -- baystateob@hotmail.com
COLLEGE NEWSPAPERS
UMass -- news@dailycollegian.com
Amherst -- astudent@amherst.edu
Smith -- sophian@email.smith.edu
Mount Holyoke -- ???
Hampshire -- ??? (their newspaper publishing is sporatic)
UMass Boston -- news@umassmedia.com
Harvard -- news@thecrimson.com
MIT -- news@tech.mit.edu
BU -- news@dailyfreepress.com
BC -- news@bcheights.com
Northeastern -- news@huntington-news.com
Tufts -- daily@tuftsdaily.com
Emerson -- berkeley_beacon@emerson.edu
Wellesley -- wellnews@wellesley.edu
Brandeis -- ???
Clark -- scarlet@clarku.edu
UConn -- news@dailycampus.com
Columbia -- news@columbiaspectator.com
URI -- cigar@etal.uri.edu
UVM -- cynicnews@gmail.com
Cornell -- news@cornellsun.com
SUNY Albany -- asp_news@hotmail.com
NYU -- etcetera@nyunews.com
That's all I got...
Terry
Season's Greetings From the Marijuana Policy Project
|
Happy Holidays from MPP.
I hope all your holiday dreams come true, and wish you a happy new year with no "gotchas."
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
From the Amherst Area Chamber of Commerce
As requested, here is a copy of the email you sent to Representative Ellen Story.
Dear Representative Story,
Thank you so much for signing on to the Massachusetts Medical
Marijuana Bill. I am a patient and a constituent in Amherst who is
glad you did, and proud of you for taking a stand to help people like
me.
Please encourage your colleagues to add their signatures to the bill and please
let me know who among them you think may be willing to help us.
Having a sense of who our allies are on Beacon Hill would be very helpful.
I've suffered for years, endured mindblowing pain, which eats away at my life and my self esteem.My
doctors and I have seen that the conventional palliative treatments available,each with its attendant risks and toxic consquences and side effects,are no longer helpful in my case.
Please help us legalize marijuana
for sick and suffering patients. Ask your colleagues what they think
might be worse for the health of someone who lives with a deadly or
chronic disease, marijuana to ease the pain and misery, or the trauma and disgrace of arrest and imprisonment?
Thanks again for your attention and support,
Rachel Neulander
395 State St
Amherst, MA 01002
Thank you so much for signing on to the Massachusetts Medical
Marijuana Bill. I am a patient and a constituent in Amherst who is
glad you did, and proud of you for taking a stand to help people like
me.
Please encourage your colleagues to add their signatures to the bill and please
let me know who among them you think may be willing to help us.
Having a sense of who our allies are on Beacon Hill would be very helpful.
I've suffered for years, endured mindblowing pain, which eats away at my life and my self esteem.My
doctors and I have seen that the conventional palliative treatments available,each with its attendant risks and toxic consquences and side effects,are no longer helpful in my case.
Please help us legalize marijuana
for sick and suffering patients. Ask your colleagues what they think
might be worse for the health of someone who lives with a deadly or
chronic disease, marijuana to ease the pain and misery, or the trauma and disgrace of arrest and imprisonment?
Thanks again for your attention and support,
Rachel Neulander
395 State St
Amherst, MA 01002
Notes From The Underground Part (44)
Section 1 Says sections 1 thru 10 comprise Massachusetts Medical Marijuana Act
Q* > this will indicate comments or questions I have.
Q* no federal supports threatened inc housing subsidies, section 8 etc?
Section 2 defines
(a) cardholder Q*fee?
(b) Medical Treatment Center Q*can a patient be his or her own MTC?
(c) debilitating medical condition
1. cancer, glaucoma, immunodeficiency+, AIDS, HIV, HepC, ALS, Crohn's,
agit of alz, nail patella, or treatment of
2. cachexia, wasting synd, severe pain, severe nausea, seizures i.e. epilepsy,
muscle spasms incl MS
3."Any Other"
Q*asthma, AS, fibromyalgia, spinal cord injury, depression, anxiety disorder, PTSD,thyroid, sleep disorders, OCD, ADD & ADHD (child and adult) autism, addiction treatment, harm reduction programs, autoimmune overactive diseases ie lupus? does every disease need to be approved by dept? what merits approval? clinical evidence of efficacy (doctor's observation?)? will anecdotal testimony of patient (reports relief) plus docs approval be deemed valid by dept or no?
(d) Dept means Dept of Public Health
(e) Enclosed Locked Facility
(f) Marijuana defined as per Chapter 94C Section 1
(g)Medical use defined
(h) Practitioner 94C Section 18
(i) Primary caregiver
Q* no violent crime record, don't sanction former felons for peaceful use, possession, sale or purchase of MJ or non violent civil disobedience
(j)Qualifying Patient
(k) Usable marijuana
(l) Visiting QP can use valid out of state card for first 30 days in MA
(l)? typo, is this part of (l) or is it (m) Written certification
Chapter 94E Section 3 Protections
Q* Concerns iterated by Norman:
Registering is tantamount to identifying as a federal felon, so fear of arrest and reluctance to be publicly stigmatized may prevent many qualifying patients from obtaining cards. Can these protections be trusted?
What if patient can't pay?
How will costs be set?
If patient has valid card from out of state why has to register here after 30 days?
(a)QP w/ registry card not subject to arrest etc.
QP may posses 12 plants & 4 oz usable MJ
(b) schools employers landlords
Q* including HUD, Section 8?
(c) Primary caregiver may posses 12 plants & 4 oz per up to 5 QP
Q* Can one be both a QP and a PC?
*What is the registration process?
(d) presumption that QP and PC are on the up & up
(1)possess cards
(2) within possession amt limits
(e) PC may receive reimbursment for costs
Q* How are costs determined?
(f) practitioner not subject to arrest for giving written or oral opinion to QP
that benefits may outweigh risks
(g) paraphenalia protected
(h) bystanders protected
(i) MDs RNs protected speech
(j) out of state cards, valid in MA for 30 days, after 30 days here need MA
card
(k) No Primary Caregiver or visiting QP other than a MTC shall posses more than 24 plants & 8 0z usable MJ
Q* apparently contradicts 94E Section 3C? or is this in ref only to visitors whose out of state cards certify possession of amts diff from MA limits? Language unclear!
(l)a registered cardholder or visiting QP may give MJ to another cardholder or a MTC they are not officially connected to thru dept's registration process only if no $ exchanged and if recipient does not exceed 94E Section 3(a) amount limits
(m) QP use of MJ not considered "illicit"
Chapter 94E Section 4 Dept to Issue Regulations
(a) not later than (90) days after the effective date of this chapter. Dept will promulgate Regs in which it shall consider petitions from the public to add more medical conditions. After hearing dept has 180 days to approve or deny petitions. If denied, petition goes for review in superior court. denied person may raise defense
Q* awful awful awful oppressive and awful. medical treatment decision must remain twixt patient and doctor, not at the mercy of dept or costly time consuming court system. awful. clean up earlier language to specify and protect that right of patient & doc and dont assume this much power belongs to the dept.
(b)not later than 90 days dept must show regs for how it'll register & bestow cards set fees... (fees?)
Q* can language of this bill specify these details so that things arent held up for 90 days plus after passage of law? what if we don't sit well w/ the way they do registration or disagree with fee rates? how long would these arbitrarily set regs take to contest?
fees generate revenues to offset the cost of registering people.
Q* so this is a program to generate the money to pay for itself? is there a simpler approach? cost cutting strategies? I'd like to see actual cost determined ahead of time and accountability assured for how the collected fees get spent. This delicate detail of the bill needs to be a model of accountability and transparency and fairness in govt. and not an excuse after law passes for beaurocratic bogdown.
Dept. "may" use sliding scale
Q* Dept had jolly well better use sliding scale, as well as free option for Mass health and Medicaid patients
Dept may take donations from private sources to reduce the fees
Q* again, must be accountable, maybe public website that publishes all this monetary info? Donor may choose to remain anonymous but may public know what revenues are generated, from what sources and and how they get used?
Would the Dept demonstrate ethical leadership and use this bill to innovate public access to its bookkeeping, to account openly and in good faith to the public for its MMJ revenues, improving MA citizens' assurance of govt agency revenue accountability ? Would they post revenue stats and donation figures to a public health website?
(Am I asking a lot? Too much? freedom of info? I'd really like to know how much money is generated by this system and have a means, right on the Dept website enabling MMJ card carriers to participate and vote on how the revenues generated get spent, as well as assurance that the money really gets to where it is allocated by this excercise of direct democracy. This would be taxation* with* representation, a fundamental Dan'l Shays style post-revolutionary era principle of American rights I believe I am iterating.)
Chapter 94E Sec 5
(a)dept will issue cards to QPs who submit
1.written cerification as per 94E Sec2(i)
2.Application or renewal fee
3.Name, address, DOB unless homeless, no addy req'd (cool!)
4.Name address & phone# of QP's practitioner
5. Name address DOB of each PC of the QP if any
(b) No card if under 18 unless
1.practitioner explains risks vs benefits to patient's parent or guardian
2.par or guar gives written consent to
(i)allow QP's use
(ii)serve as one of QP's PCs
(iii)control over patient's acquisition dosage etc...
Q* seems good but par or guar must understand dosage requirement may best be determined subjectively by patient's sense of well being.. should be no such thing as saying to a kid you haven't taken enough medicine or you have to wait if young patient feels need to medicate more than parent deems sufficient. seems like one for child rights advocates...
(c) dept will verify info approve or deny within 15 days.
(d) dept can register up to 2 caregivers per QP
(e) card must be issued within 5 days of approval expires in 2 yrs
Registry ID cards contain
(1)Date of issuance and expiration date
(2) Random Number
(3)photo if dept decides to require
Q*why? no photo on Mass Health or foodstamp EBT cards
(4) any addtl info required by regs or Dept
(f) card carrying QP must
(1)notify of changes within 10 days
(2) failure to notify punishable up to $150 if debilitating condition improves card null and void p becomes subject to penalties like non med user
Q* steep fine! too maybe not patient's job but physician's job to report significant improvement, also to determine whether patient may continue to benefit from use of MMJ upon improving, so fine doc if he or she is found to be underreporting cures , do not take away meds if patient's chronic condition is improved, would dept have the right to tell a depressive to stop medicating if anti depressants were working and fine him if he refused to quit?
(3)fines on card carriers who fail to give notice of changes
....continues.....
Monday, December 13, 2010
12/12/10 Meeting
notes Kathryn took at our meeting yesterday, but I just couldn't wait
to let everyone else on this list serve to know our first get together
was very encouraging, a great meeting of several bright and focused
minds. Watch this space for details!
We haven't settled on a name for the group, but we are, as you know,
the seed of a new patient led prohibition repeal advocacy group here
in Western Mass. We actually found that, as a group, what we really
want is the full repeal of the outdated and draconian prohibition laws
against marijuana. We also agreed, as we read into the MMJ bill, that
we want to work together on the language of the current MMJ bill to
make it more fair and more effective. We don't want to pass a bill
into law that bogs down in a morass of beaurocratic nonsense.
While our personal objectives do not stop at getting marijuana
legalized for patients like ourselves, we want at this time to focus
on the medical issue and work in concert and cooperation with medical
marijuana groups and campaigns, including of course on behalf of
Matt's MPAA but also most probably with with ASA, and DPFMA as well.
We'd like to participate in the ASA conference call and find out more
about becoming a Massachusetts chapter. The ASA citizen lobbyists'
training is also somethng we feel would be great for us to
undertake.
We agreed to each contact our state reps this coming week to encourage
them to support the passage of our medical marijuana bill, by signing
on if they haven't aleady, and, if they already have, we will ask them
to show support at this time by reaffirming their commitment to
protecting the rights of us patients, our doctors and care providers
here in Massachusetts.
My State Rep, Ellen Story, has already signed on to the Massachusetts
MMJ bill. I'm writing her again today, and here is what I'll say:
Dear Representative Story,
Thank you so much for signing on to the Massachusetts Medical
Marijuana Bill. I am a patient and a constituent in Amherst who is
glad you did, and proud of you for taking a stand to help people like
me.
Please encourage your colleagues to add their support to the bill and
let me know who among them may be willing to help us.
I've suffered for so long, endured so much mindblowing pain, and my
doctors and I have seen that the conventional treatments available,
each with its attendant risks and toxic consquences and side effects,
are no longer helpful in my case. Please help us legalize marijuana
for sick and suffering patients. Ask your colleagues what they think
might be worse for the health of someone who lives with a deadly or
chronic disease, a little puff of something gentle and nontoxic that
can quickly lift the pain and misery, or arrest and imprisonment?
Thanks again for your attention and support,
Rachel Neulander
Saturday, December 11, 2010
DPFMA Board of Advisors
Board of Advisors
Ann AwadSpringfield Southwest Community Health Center, Amherst Select Board
Leslie Beale, Ed.D.
Springfield College
Eric D. Blumenson, Esq.
Suffolk University Law
Police Lt. Jack A. Cole, ret.
Chair, Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP)
Judge James W. Dolan, ret.
Dorchester District Court
William H. Dwight
City Councilor, Northampton, MA
David Lenson, Ph.D.
UMass-Amherst, Author of On Drugs (1995)
Ellen Miller-Mack, N.P.
Brightwood Community Health Center
Eva S. Nilsen, Esq.
Boston University Law
Ronald Patenaude
UAW Local 2322, Holyoke
Jeffrey Scavron, MD
Medical Director,Brightwood Community Health Center, Springfield
John Templeton
SEIU Local 509, Amherst
Ros Winsor
Founded Criminal Justice Policy Coalition (1996)
My diagnoses: Depression Anxiety Panic Disorder PTSD Scoliosis Ankylosing Spondylitis Fibromyalgia
When I was six my family moved from Mexico to New York, a much anticipated move, joyously awaited because my mother, a native New Yorker,had wanted nothing more for many years than to return to her beloved city, to her family and friends. In New York my mother's happiness and relief to be "home" quickly dissipated, she found a changed city and a dispersed circle of people who were not as she remembered them, whose lives had moved on without her. She was angry and hypercritical of everything and everyone, especially my father, my sisters and me. I was very homesick for Mexico, lonely and a little lost as the new kid in school, because between first and fourth grade we moved several times to try to find a place my mother would be satisfied with and I went to four different schools.( All in all, with my parents moving every year, I went to 13 schools in 12 years.)
When I was seven years old my father had a fit of rage one spring evening, because I'd talked back to my mother who had been railing at me for hours. He kicked and beat me very severely for telling her, in a whisper, to shut up. I walked with a limp and could nor run or play sports at camp the summer after that.
When I was eight I was playing alone in Riverside Park in Manhattan near our home and I was grabbed by a stranger, pulled into the bushes and raped. I thought I would be killed but the man released me at last and I ran home. I threw my ruined and bloody pants down the building's trash incinerator chute and acted innocent when my mother wondered what had become of those pants. I didn't want her to know.
I was simply terrified of letting my parents know. I think this is when I fell into my first really severe depression. I cried myself to sleep every night for a year.
When I was nine one of my sisters, who is 13 years older than me, came to visit and and spent a night in my room. She noticed the crying and got my lonely secret out of me. I begged her not to tell my parents but of course she did, assuring me that I was not the guilty one, that I had done nothing to provoke the attack and that the man who raped me was a very sick and damaged individual who had probably been similarly abused as a child. Her words were very important to me and I think her intervention in part made it possible for me to grow up in one piece, and not hate all men or fear sex as an adult.
After my sister left my parents turned on me. My mother called me a slattern and a slut. Mind you, I was nine years old. My father kicked and beat me again, and this time, as I attempted to escape his blows I ran for the building stairwell. My father followed, grabbed me at the top of the stairs and in my efforts to get away from his smacks and kicks I fell down that flight of concrete stairs and could not move when I landed at the bottom.
My father picked me up, carried me to bed, and there I stayed for several weeks. There was blood in my urine and I was bruised everywhere. Eventually the family doctor was summoned, after the bruises abated... he noted an elevated white blood cell count, heard from me about the red urine, and thought I might have nephritis. I don't remember ever being medicated for that, so he must've decided I didn't. Since then every time I've had bloodwork done a high white blood cell count has been noted.
In my early thirties I reported a chronically aching back, shooting pains in my hips and a stiff neck to my family doctor, who noted scoliosis in my spine. He said," If you think this hurts now, get ready, it's going to hurt more as you age.You can expect to be using a wheelchair in a decade or so" He retired that year and I was without a primary care physician for some time.
The next several doctors I saw were not too concerned about my back. They thought my pain could be mostly psychosomatic, and that seemed to make sense, as I'd been through a failed marriage, a divorce and the very painful, unexpected break up of a subsequent relationship. The diagnosis of stress and depression as a rationale for my painful symptoms seemed to make sense then because, after all, I was now a single parent, dirt poor, alone, under considerable stress and certainly very sad.
I humbly submitted to that diagnosis and agreed to try a varied series of psychoactive drugs to address my depression and anxiety. Nothing seemed to make much difference. I was very physically reactive to each and every drug I was offered. And this has been true of me with pills of any kind all my life. Gastric distress, cramps, nausea, diarrhea, constipation, dry mouth,"floatiness" , welt-like hives and rashes that lasted for months were among the side effects I endured. And my back still hurt, a lot. I didn't feel much of a lift in my depression, but talk therapy with a counselor effectively helped me to deal with my past, be present for my children's sake, and to try to plan for my future. The first therapist, who I loved, we related so well, moved away and subsequent counselors were of the opinion that fullblown happiness or success were not necessarily pragmatic goals for me. They characterized me as chronically depressive. One therapist suggested it was ethnic sadness... something about being Jewish...
But if I took my meds regularly, and if I could just function well enough to work, and to cope with the challenges of parenting teenaged boys without becoming suicidal, that was enough. The counselors, even that first, nice one I liked so well, advised me to lower my life expectations. Never mind going back to college, too stressful, or getting a drivers' license, since I had a fullblown panic attack when I first tried to take the test. I couldn't afford a car anyway, so why bother learning to drive? (I learned anyway,and had a car for a while, in my forties, which made me probably the oldest person in the state to operate a vehicle on a learner's permit.) The psychiatrist warned that stopping medication could quickly lead to suicide for me and he advised me to stay on my SSRIs and ativan or something similar for the rest of my life, probably. My hepatic system suffered, my gall bladder was removed, I got fat, had a permanent rash and was always mildly depressed, but that seemed better than being suicidal, after all.
I disclosed to my therapists and psychiatrist that I was using marijuana when I could afford to (not often) and experiencing significant relief from both the physical pain and my emotional burdens while stoned..
The psychiatrist helped me look online for possible adverse effects from the interraction of pot with my meds... we found none, but he advised me not to smoke pot anyway. The therapists I saw ( I kept trying to find one as good as my first) were of the opinion that smoking pot would impede my ability to deal effectively with my emotional problems. Whatever! The last counselor I ever saw suggested I try methadone for my pain, she'd heard great things, and she wanted me to enter a drug treatment program to deal with my marijuana "addiction". I was aghast. Against medical advice, I stopped using ativan and Serzone, stopped seeing the silly methadone touting therapist, refused drug addiction treatment and said goodbye to my shrink and that whole paradigm of medicated mental illness.
Depression, if things are really sad, I've decided, is a natural and maybe even healthy response. Depression that lifts when things get better is normal, not an ethnic quirk or a disease. Good, organic homegrown pot is enough of a mood elevator and pain management tool for me, when I can wield it, to see my own way toward improving my lot and experiencing real, lasting happiness.
In search of new answers I started seeing a new primary care person in my early 50's, and she referred me to a rheumatologist. He was good, and thorough. He ordered bloodwork, looked at an MRI of my back and gave me the double diagnosis of Ankylosing Spondylitis complicated by fibromyalgia. For a year I dutifully tried every med he tried to help me with, without good results. I am hypersensitive, it seems, to pills of any kind. I've always known that narcotics make me puke. Codeine no good (blech I feel nauseous just thinking about it.) NSAIDs, bad..Sulfa drugs, steroids... fuggedaboudit!
With my rheumatologist's full sympathy, I decided to lay off the meds again.
Here's what I do about my diagnoses now: I'm in a relationship that stabilized after some rocky stretches, and is now usually very pleasing and good, I have good friendships, I adopted a couple of cats,I stay in touch with my wonderful children, (my eldest is now at Harvard Extention taking pre med courses! and my baby is married, a medeival scholar who is graduating this year and entering the Peace Corps with his wife.) I eat healthy food, I excercise moderately and meditate, and if I'm really in acute pain I use only over the counter ibuprofen, which is tricky, as it sometimes backfires and causes all the old icky side effects to flare. Beyond that, though it's terribly pricey and hard for me to obtain with any regularity, pot has afforded me, when I can avail myself of its gentle assistance, profound relief. Side effects... less money, more peace. I am physically comforted and uplifted, capable again of laughter, of creative thinking, of joy and pleasure in my sons, my partner, in my surroundings, my work, my volunteerism, my music, my art, my friendships. I may be self medicating for my physical and psychological issues but I have to add that pot does much more than just medicate or sedate me. Pot has given me back my self, my love of life, my sense of hope and of wonder, of spirituality, of belonging to my world, and I get the sense when I partake that I am being helped by a powerful, compassionate green ally, my helpmeet and relative in the web of life.
Of course I can't afford to have much of that, and dare not grow my own, but when I have pot, I can report affirmatively that my pain levels are manageable, I remain in good spirits, and although in many ways my life is severely restricted by both illness and unrelieved poverty, my life still is sweet, no longer examined, and very much worth living.
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