LA Times - first person - worth reading...

[SoCalGal]

The cancer drug


Cancer opens one's eyes to the many facets of marijuana.

By Diana Wagman

December 22, 2007

Ahh, cancer. One learns so much from being diagnosed with a death-sentence disease. Of course, 95% of it is stuff you would rather not know, but that other 5% is downright interesting. For example, "America's Next Top Model" is much more fun to watch when you've lost 15 pounds without trying. During chemotherapy, vanilla smells good, but vanilla wafers taste disgusting. And eyelashes really do have a purpose; without them, my eyes are a dust magnet.

But the most compelling fact I learned was about my friends. Not just what you would expect: how they cooked for my family and picked up my kids and took me to doctors and pretended not to notice how bad I looked and, most important, that I could not -- cannot -- survive without them.

No, what really shocked me was how many of my old, dear, married, parenting, job-holding friends smoke pot. I am not kidding. People I never expected dropped by to deliver joints and buds and private stash. The DEA could have set a security cam over my front door and made some serious dents in the marijuana trade. The poets and musicians were not a surprise, but lawyers? CEOs? Republicans? Across the ideological spectrum, a lot of my buddies are stoners. Who knew?

OK, I admit it, in college I smoked dope with the rest of them. I mean, everybody was doing it -- an excuse I do not allow my children -- and at parties I didn't want to be uncool. Plus, I felt my only other option was alcohol, and the sweet drinks I liked were too fattening. But that was a long time ago, and since then I have learned to drink bourbon straight, get high on life and appreciate the advantages of not doing anything you wouldn't want your kids to do.

I thought all my friends felt the same. Boy, was I wrong. When I surfaced from my chemo haze enough to care about anyone else, I was curious. Why do so many 40- and 50-somethings still get high? I asked my suppliers. Pain was the No. 1 answer. Not just the psychic angst of being mothers and fathers to teenagers, but real physical pain. We're all beginning to fall apart, and for those who imbibe, a couple of tokes really take the edge off the sciatica, rotator cuff injuries, irritable bowel syndrome and migraines.

The second biggest reason was anxiety. Perhaps we can blame politics for middle-age pot use: the war, the environment, the loss of our civil liberties, little things like that.

Obviously some of us use drugs to ease the lives of quiet desperation we never thought we would have back when we were getting stoned the first time. Our drug use now is really the same as in college. Then I got high to relax, to gain confidence, to forget I was an overweight, mediocre college student terrified of the future. Now we get stoned to relax, forget our disappointing careers and mask our terror of not just our own future but the future for our kids as well. Is it so different from my dad coming home from work and having a couple of martinis? Or my mother and those little prescribed pills she took when she felt "nervous"? At least -- we can rationalize -- marijuana is all natural.

I spoke to my oncologist about the pros and cons of marijuana use for cancer patients. He said he was part of a study 25 years ago on the effects of pot on nausea, joint pain and fatigue caused by chemotherapy. It worked then, he said; it really helped some people. But now they have great new drugs, such as Emend, dexamethasone and Ativan, that keep the nausea and other pain at bay. He said the people who use pot now do it because they like it. Or maybe they use it because they would rather support a farm in Humboldt County than a huge pharmaceutical conglomerate.

After chemo No. 1, I was violently ill. Anti-nausea drugs notwithstanding, I was hugging the porcelain throne. My body did not want to be poisoned; I guess it liked cancer better. I was willing to try anything, so I lit up. It helped. A lot. I collapsed on the couch, I zoned out watching "Project Runway," I was able to take deep breaths without puking.

My 15-year-old daughter was shocked. The look on her face was proof that her elementary school D.A.R.E. program had really done its job. A friend -- not a supplier or a user -- explained to her it was just to make me feel better and that if it worked, wouldn't that be great? My daughter reluctantly agreed, but I knew she didn't mean it. I had come full circle in my life -- the next time I had a toke, I stood in my bathroom with the fan on, blowing smoke out the window, but instead of my parents, I was scared my kids would find out I was smoking dope again.

The biggest pain of cancer is the gnawing, scratching, bleeding dread that they didn't find it all, that you didn't go to the doctor soon enough, that it is growing out of control at this very moment. My doctor recommended meditation. Yeah, right, I thought, more time sitting quietly trying not to think about dying. I had carpool for that. Meanwhile, I lost all taste for alcohol. Even half a glass of wimpy white wine could make me toss my cookies, so I turned to my friend Mary Jane occasionally, only when nothing else would do.

In the middle of one post-chemo night, my husband was out of town and I was sick and I got up and tried to get the little pipe lit and take one hit so I could maybe sleep. My son heard me struggling and he came into my bedroom. He lit the match for me and showed me where to put my finger on the "carburetor," the hole on the side of the pipe, to make it draw. I was too grateful to ask him how he knew all this. He stayed with me until I felt better. It was mother-son bonding in a new way.

Just another reason to say: Thank you, cancer.

Diana Wagman, a professor at Cal State Long Beach, is the author of the novels "Skin Deep," "Spontaneous" and "Bump."

http://www.latimes.com/news/custom/s...la-news-scimed

[MJo]

RE:
The second biggest reason [for middle aged pot use] was anxiety.

-----------------------------
As an asthmatic, I'll stick to Xanax for anxiety. Cancer is terrifying. If we need antidepressants or anti anxiety meds -- or Pot -- to get through treatment, go for it. Pot is still illegal, though.

[janet/FL]

LOL that was really funny. Not wanting your children to find out you are smoking pot!! LOL
I am for the legalization of it though I have tried it and not liked it--except after chemo, it sure might have helped with problems more than just nausea. Like a renewed sex life.

[Soccermom]

Thank you Flori. I have a soon to be 15 year old and had to chuckle at the ironies of life...My favorite expression is "Never say Never". Once again again, Thank you Flori...you make me look into my soul,back into the place I remember from those months on chemo...

Hugs,
Marcia

[Sheila]

Flori
You post made me go back in time! My brother from California always tells me to ask the Dr. for Marinol or medical marijuana....I told him I don't need it...or at least not yet! on't they have the marijuana cafes in California for medical use?

[dhealey]

Thanks Flori, my 20 year old son offered me some when I was doing adrimacin (the red devil). I almost took him up on it. There have been some studies going on that there is something in the pot that seems to help breast cancer, but you can not get enough of it to help just by smoking it. I think this study is going on in California. Personally I think they should just legalize it.

[michka]

My son, who is 22 now, started smoking Pot when he was 15. Just a little, to do like the others. Everything was fine in the family. But he got "addicted" very fast. He stopped his studies and was unable to concentrate... I never let go and he is only now starting to climb up the hill again. And he only smoked Pot. This happens to a a small portion of Pot smokers. I ran after the drug dealers, worked with the police, the school the doctors...I saw so many other kids who ruined their lives with Pot. And their families with it. I do not agree to legalizie Pot.
But I do agree using it for pain. It should be used like Morphine. I also had my head in the toilet for hours. Chemo was horrible for me. I lost 25 pounds and was not fat. Plus the rest...The anti nausea pills did not work much. I understand what you went through Flori. If I had known that Pot could have helped me, yes I would have tried. I am sorry I did not know. But under control. Doctors still do not take care of "pain" enough. maybe I could use it now? I'll ask my doctor in the pain center.
Michka