Hi everybody, this is a wonderful site with excellent information for patients, medical professionals, activists, students, research fanatics, fun heads, friends, and supportive msg board internet users. My health is poor. I suffered an injury on a New York commuter train in 1994 and the fall I experienced left me with a herniated cervical disk and permanent spinal nerve root damage. In 1998 and 1999 I underwent three anterior cervical discectomy surgeries to alleviate the daily, 24x7 stabbing pain in my right neck and shoulder. There surgery helped a little and I still have daily burning pain in my mid cervical area running down into my right arm and shoulder. Since 1999 I have been on slow release opiate therapy but my pain management protocol does not completely address severe pain with cervical cephalgia (bad, acute neck pain flare ups w/vomitting) that ocurrs 3 to 4 times a month. I told my husband that the best way to locate a trustworthy, reputable maryjane user who we could purchase from was through a political activist group such as NORML. Not a cocaine dealer who has not interest in getting pot....not as much profit compared to cocaine. During my youth I tried pot about 12 times (I had a dating crush with a guy who used it daily) and stopped. My husband used it from age 19 to 43 occasionally and he is right: it is safer relaxent compared to drinking alchohol. My body chemistry is adverse to any alcohol so I stopped my wine and beer moderate use in 1998 (reduce risk of female cancer and improve fertility was the motivation of no wine/beer). We like the city atmosphere and people in the Washington Baltimore area, it is very international and cosmopolitan. My husband is supportive of my decision to use maryjane to manage my nausea and vomitting and seems to think it will improve my pain control. What do you think? Does NORML have a national or regional newsletter that I could post a discrete ad in? This is such a sensative area and yet I would trust a proponent of a lobbyist organization because of its membership, education and history of being a spokesgroup for the good users, the everyday people who are stricken with cancer, pain, damaged nerves, anxiety.... I am willing to privately return any and all emails sent to me offline....and give you my phone number so we can chat. Today (it's Sunday) I am going to do some internet searches on NORML to see how their infrastructure works. I am confident that an intelligent member of our community will email me and clue me into a support group or other patients who manage their illness/condition with maryjane. I feel sorry for so many people who have a painful disability, whether from injury or the ravages of cancer....and their doctor is anal about prescribing opiates to wash away the intense pain which is impossible to bear without a decent medicine. The other internet resource I used in 1999 was the alt.support.chronic-pain newsgroup. It was through that online support messageboard that I learned about slow release opiates, pain management specialists who titrate working dosage amounts for disabled patients and are society's advocates for pain medicine that WORKS in dealing with the federal DEA and state medical licensing boards. I am 43 years old and married almost six years to a wonderful man who loves me very dearly and has gone through heaven and hell in being my caregiver since my health condition worsened. We are both deeply in love and share many common interests and past times. We both are idealists, dreamers,,romantics and yet hard working practicalists (If you have a dream, a goal then working hard and persevering to make it real is worth everything in the long run). My husband's diet doctor believes that smoking pot is "benign" and much safer than using cocaine or stimulant designer drugs. He respects medical use of maryjane but in Washington DC it isn't prescribed for actual use, not like West Virginia, Minnesota or California. Looking forward from all of you for some suggestions so I can network/schmooze with another "professional" person (person who works at a committed occupation for a living not a snob, Narc or cocaine dealer)
I cant help ya but, you've come to the right place. Goodluck with your findings and hopefully some of that pain will ease up.