  ใรJirX |
|
On Christmas Eve, 1992, they told me I had Multiple Sclerosis. Six years later, I started smoking marihuana Friends had often mentioned the use of medicinal marihuana for MS patients. My sister told me that the physician she worked for prescribed marijuana on a regular basis. But I didn't really dare to start using it, because it sounded too much like drugs to me. This was not how I had been brought up. In the end, I had such severe cramps in my legs that I couldn't sleep at all. I couldn't endure the pain any longer. That's when I finally started using marihuana. My husband, Frans, brought the first marihuana home for me. He had met a young man who was working in a coffee shop and told him my story. He gave frans a small bag of marihuana and said, "get her to try this; tell me about it later." So Frans came home with that little bag and I asked:"hat do I do with this, eat it or something? How do I use it?" He had observed the people in the coffee shop to see how they did it and had asked the young man how to roll a joint. .Then we bought one of those automatic joint-rolling machines. My hands weren't working anymore and I couldn't write either. But I can do all that perfectly again now. I'm very happy about that, because I always took pride in my handwriting. At first I found weed really disgusting. It also made me very ill. However, my spasms had gone and that's why I carried on using it. The medicines that I had once used didn't work. from that moment on, I actually started feeling a bit better every day. It was just like the light being switched on in little rooms in my head. It also changed my outlook on life a lot. The effect of marihuana on me, as I see it, is that it has brought the relationship between my body and soul back into balance. Once I knew how to use it, I started weighing a quarter of a gram a day and rolling that into a cigarette. Back then, I still smoked a pack a day, but I have quit smoking cigarettes now and this is something I achieved with the help of marihuana. With marihuana I managed get rid of all the other medication I had been using as well. I don't use pills to sleep anymore, and don't use any for my menopausal symptoms of a rheumatic nature. No painkillers, no muscular relaxants. I haven't needed any treatment to increase my energy level. Those treatments always made me feel like a young puppy, but soon I would turn back into an old dog, that just lay in its basket all day. So, I couldn't be bothered anymore to lie attached to a drip every day for a whole week just to feel better for a short while. While on medication, I spent two- thirds of my time in bed. Even walking from the bedroom to the living room made me tired. Once I got there, I was ready for bed again. Taking a shower in the morning was a task that drained me for the day. I couldn't even do that anymore. Gradually, through the use of marihuana, I started to feel like a human being again. I can't really describe it,but I just feel like a different person. I'm living again to such an extent that I can even do sports again? Frans told me that he found it unbelievable, that we played tennis together last year! Once, during a game of tennis I suffered a heart attack. This didn't have any- thing to do with MS;it's something I was born with. It's a different story, but I think that marihuana helped me recover from the heart attack. My reaction to the fact that another incurable disease had been introduced into my life was very different. It was simply a matter of the hardening of the arteries. I stayed very calm during the heart attack and just started to meditate when it happened. I see things in proportion. I feel better equipped to deal with events. In the spiritual sense, I have become stronger! Simply carrying on with the use of marihuana kept me from having to use other medicines. At the hospital, the nurses came into the room with sleep- ing pills for everyone, but I had my own medication with me. The curtains were drawn around my bed and I vaporized some marihuana. This was in the coronary ward! I had to make a choice, because I wanted to carry on smoking weed. Either my MS would escalate again, or I would run the risk of another heart attack. Let's say I had to choose between two 'wrongs' but - because I knew what marihuana does to me - I thought,'I will get through this as well.'The way you deal with things is important. I had my MS pretty much under control and I could think, 'Why did this have to happen as well?' I might have let it get me down and never got over it. But marihuana and meditation gave me the strength to overcome all my troubles. During my convalescence, after the heat attack, I had the strength to share this with others. I told them about my use of medicinal marihuana. The reactions varied, of course, but most people thought that, if it worked for me, then I should use it. There were also people who said,"hat, drugs?Just give me a beer..." They didn't understand a thing. It was obvious that I had been in a downward spiral and had only just managed to come out of it, but, with the help of marihuana, I did. I don't think I would be sitting here today if I hadn't started using marihuana in 1998. Knowing that I had been so far down and that I had still managed to find the strength to recover increases my belief in marihuana. Also, I got out of the spiral because of Frans. I think that I would have dealt with things differently if the hadn't been there for me. I cannot deny that. He has a very special ability to empathise and has always found it completely natural to tune into my wavelength. It is very important that people around you know what you're doing and try to imagine what you feel and what you have to give up. However, they should try to keep their opinions to themselves; that would be much nicer for the patients. Why should someone be judged on the basis of their use of a medicine that has proved to be their saviour? Isn't that unjust? I also see this fear and lack of understanding in the partners of others as well. They say things like,'my partner is using drugs, what will it do to her? Where will I get that rubbish and now she needs so much and in a years time she'll need so much..." This is actually something I would like to emphasise: if it is a case of being addicted to marihuana, then I am addicted, because I'm addicted to feeling good. Everyone has the right to be happy and to be content with their body and the life that they are leading. And if I can manage this with marihuana, is that something to condemn? And if this costs about Euro 100 a month, so what? Other medicines that don't help and are many times more expensive are prescribed in abundance. Going on holiday can be a problem, because the possession of marihuana is forbidden in some countries. First, we were prisoners in our bedrooms and now that things are getting a bit better, prisoners in our own country. I feel good and could handle going abroad for once. But where could we go? We would love to visit the tropics, or Nepal or India, you name it. forget about going to America, with its severe drugs policy. Marihuana has a spiritual influence on people, too. I think that it speeds up the awareness process. For me, meditation helps with that as well. How you deal with smoking it and how those around you deal with it is very important; how your partner deals with it and what to tell the children. They will want to know why Daddy or Mummy is using marihuana and you must provide them with accurate information, because it has a very different effect from what I have always been told. My children see how marihuana affects their mother and have no problems with it. I notice the gratitude they feel for my reaction to it. They accept it. For instance, I got this amazing Christ- mas poem from my daughter-in-law. That was the best present she could ever have given me. Sometimes you have the feeling that your closest family members don't exactly understand all the things you're going through, because they are still in their youth. If someone asks me how I am, I'm always doing great. I'm not one to complain, don't want to burden anyone else with my problems. When I realized that my daughter-in-law saw through me so clearly, I was touched. One of the best things is that now we can look after my grandchildren again and that is a real luxury! That is what I'm fighting for, to live for the moment, to enjoy everything that is there today and to be grateful that I can have hope for the future again. |
