Jim Finnel
Fallen Cannabis Warrior & Ex News Moderator
Peace, hope, love, goodwill, light in the darkness—they’re what every winter solstice holiday has ever been about, but also sadly sometimes as elusive as a hungry child’s faith in Santa. Elusive because the world can be harsh, and because we too often don’t register the dissonance inherent in riding to elaborate diamond-studded holiday celebrations in plush chariots to celebrate giving and goodwill while taking from those with less so we can have more.
It’s an age-old thing, the dark quicksand that power becomes, and it has mostly determined who eats well and who doesn’t, and which freedoms and rights and medicines we have access to and which we don’t. But hope and light and goodwill are age-old, buoyant and resistant too, and so we kiss under the mistletoe that is now a plastic relic of what was once a valued medicine. North American mistletoe and mistletoe berries are poisonous, but the leaves of other varieties have historically been used to ease anxiety and headache, and to promote sleep and stimulate the immune system—uses which science supports; in Europe mistletoe extract injections are used as a cancer treatment.
Back when healers were mostly women—back before the masculization, professionalization and chemicalization of medicine—we all, for better or worse, relied on botanical medicines. And now that science has, for better and worse, brought its own gifts of medicine (I am profoundly thankful for many powerful anti-seizure, anti-pain, anti-all-things-unbearable meds), we ignore and dismiss many beautiful botanical medicines in favour of more powerful (and more toxic) chemical ones.
But it’s the season we kiss under the mistletoe, and would rather not think about things like cancer, or about five-year-olds depending on the love and expertise of those at the Stollery’s new pediatric pain clinic. And kissing is an excellent thing to do, and love can ease stress and depression and elevate pain-relieving feel-good endorphins and endocannabinoids produced by our brains.
And speaking of cannabinoids and peace and goodwill and botanical medicines, we’ve had good news on one valuable, cheer-inducing and often considered sacred botanical. THC’s potential to reduce inflammation in the brain, stimulate the formation of new brain cells, and reduce risk of Alzheimer’s has recently been getting some serious attention from neuroscientists, and pot has, as of October, been given a green light to get to medical users through other medical users.
Thousands of Canadians echo Grant Krieger’s love of the pot butter that can give him a good night’s sleep, and who but Scrooge (and sometimes our governments and our courts) would deny anyone living with chronic treatment-resistant pain a good night’s sleep on high-quality organic pot? Therapeutic uses of marijuana are indisputable, so this is good news for medical users, and isn’t good news what Christmas is all about?
To the rigidly proper and nervous about herbal medicines not sanctioned by western medicine, I’m not saying we should all replace breakfast with pot. But unlike other pain meds, pot bypasses our livers and, especially vaporized, comes with a far, far lower risk profile than prescription pain meds. In 1988, the US’s own Drug Enforcement Administration Judge said, “Marijuana, in its natural form, is one of the safest therapeutically active substances known to man.”
Aspirin, readily available, can cause a lethal reaction at 20 times the recommended dose, and some drugs (chemo therapies for example) can do so at a fraction more than the therapeutic dose. Based on lab tests, marijuana’s risk is too small to note—to achieve fatal toxicity a smoker would have to consume thousands of times more than what is delivered by a therapeutic dose.
We need light in the legislative darkness determining our medicines; we need to nurture empathy. But I’m hopeful. We’re seeing cracks, and light, given a crack, leaks through. And we’re hard-wired for empathy and goodwill—MRIs of the brains of children watching others in pain show them responding as though the pain were their own. ‘Tis the season to nurture that bent.
News Hawk: User: 420 MAGAZINE ® - Medical Marijuana Publication & Social Networking
Source: Vue Weekly
Author: Connie Howard
Copyright: 2008 Vue Weekly
Contact: health@vueweekly.com
Website: Vue Weekly : Edmonton's 100% Independent Weekly : Well, Well, Well: To all some good herbs
It’s an age-old thing, the dark quicksand that power becomes, and it has mostly determined who eats well and who doesn’t, and which freedoms and rights and medicines we have access to and which we don’t. But hope and light and goodwill are age-old, buoyant and resistant too, and so we kiss under the mistletoe that is now a plastic relic of what was once a valued medicine. North American mistletoe and mistletoe berries are poisonous, but the leaves of other varieties have historically been used to ease anxiety and headache, and to promote sleep and stimulate the immune system—uses which science supports; in Europe mistletoe extract injections are used as a cancer treatment.
Back when healers were mostly women—back before the masculization, professionalization and chemicalization of medicine—we all, for better or worse, relied on botanical medicines. And now that science has, for better and worse, brought its own gifts of medicine (I am profoundly thankful for many powerful anti-seizure, anti-pain, anti-all-things-unbearable meds), we ignore and dismiss many beautiful botanical medicines in favour of more powerful (and more toxic) chemical ones.
But it’s the season we kiss under the mistletoe, and would rather not think about things like cancer, or about five-year-olds depending on the love and expertise of those at the Stollery’s new pediatric pain clinic. And kissing is an excellent thing to do, and love can ease stress and depression and elevate pain-relieving feel-good endorphins and endocannabinoids produced by our brains.
And speaking of cannabinoids and peace and goodwill and botanical medicines, we’ve had good news on one valuable, cheer-inducing and often considered sacred botanical. THC’s potential to reduce inflammation in the brain, stimulate the formation of new brain cells, and reduce risk of Alzheimer’s has recently been getting some serious attention from neuroscientists, and pot has, as of October, been given a green light to get to medical users through other medical users.
Thousands of Canadians echo Grant Krieger’s love of the pot butter that can give him a good night’s sleep, and who but Scrooge (and sometimes our governments and our courts) would deny anyone living with chronic treatment-resistant pain a good night’s sleep on high-quality organic pot? Therapeutic uses of marijuana are indisputable, so this is good news for medical users, and isn’t good news what Christmas is all about?
To the rigidly proper and nervous about herbal medicines not sanctioned by western medicine, I’m not saying we should all replace breakfast with pot. But unlike other pain meds, pot bypasses our livers and, especially vaporized, comes with a far, far lower risk profile than prescription pain meds. In 1988, the US’s own Drug Enforcement Administration Judge said, “Marijuana, in its natural form, is one of the safest therapeutically active substances known to man.”
Aspirin, readily available, can cause a lethal reaction at 20 times the recommended dose, and some drugs (chemo therapies for example) can do so at a fraction more than the therapeutic dose. Based on lab tests, marijuana’s risk is too small to note—to achieve fatal toxicity a smoker would have to consume thousands of times more than what is delivered by a therapeutic dose.
We need light in the legislative darkness determining our medicines; we need to nurture empathy. But I’m hopeful. We’re seeing cracks, and light, given a crack, leaks through. And we’re hard-wired for empathy and goodwill—MRIs of the brains of children watching others in pain show them responding as though the pain were their own. ‘Tis the season to nurture that bent.
News Hawk: User: 420 MAGAZINE ® - Medical Marijuana Publication & Social Networking
Source: Vue Weekly
Author: Connie Howard
Copyright: 2008 Vue Weekly
Contact: health@vueweekly.com
Website: Vue Weekly : Edmonton's 100% Independent Weekly : Well, Well, Well: To all some good herbs
