Neuropathy Medicine

Buddy Talley of North Carolina: Neuropathy of the Feet

Buddy is 86 years old. He started in the tobacco business when he was 17. He didn’t retire until he was 73. A buyer for Kent, Newport and Old Gold, the fast paced, highly competitive world of a tobacco broker was the driving force for most of his life.

Buddy has outlived his wife by eighteen years. Now it’s just him and his son Tom. Tom is Buddy’s caregiver, now. Tom is also chronically ill.

Buddy has been suffering with Neuropathy of the feet for twenty years. He said that it feels like nails piercing the bottom of his feet. ” I jus’ never had anything in my life to hurt like this.”

Neuropathy encompasses more than 100 diseases and conditions affecting the peripheral nerves-the motor, sensory and autonomic nerves that connect the spinal cord to muscles, skin and internal organs. It usually affects the hands and feet, causing weakness, numbness, tingling and pain.

Buddy is a veteran. He served four years during World War II. He was told that it was probably the long walks packing heavy equipment that lead to his feet problems.

Two recent scientific studies (Headline from 2007) have confirmed what Buddy has found (that conventional narcotics don’t work for his condition) and what he has been told (that Cannabis is effective for Neuropathic foot pain).

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Chemo Blows! Cannabis Sooths..

Catherine Adaberry of Missouri: Breast Cancer

Catherine developed breast cancer in 2002. She was in her 40’s. No one in her family had ever dealt with the disease. It was a difficult time for her and her loved ones. She underwent surgery and considerable chemotherapy and radiation treatments. “Physically, it took quite a toll on me…I was very sick.”

“I was sick the whole time, and I used marijuana. It helped.”

She had heard that cannabis could help with those battling cancer. A member of her extended family had dealt with brain cancer. He used cannabis and attributed his prolonged life to his use of cannabis.

With the chemo, Catherine didn’t want to eat. She just didn’t have an appetite. She was a nervous wreck. “I would smoke and I could eat. I would smoke and I could sleep. With the radiation, it was the same thing.”

“There’s just so much stress with having cancer. I mean, your hair falls out. You don’t feel good. I had grand babies during that time and I couldn’t hold them. I was an emotional wreck. It helped. So many pills…you don’t want to take another pill. It was so much better just to smoke – and to eat – and to smoke – and to sleep.”

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Spinal Injury Pain Relief!

Todd Walk of Missouri: Spinal Injury, Neurological Pain

Todd has a spinal cord injury at T3, that’s complete paralysis from about the mid-chest down. Because of the traumatic nature of his injury, he suffers from neurological pain.

It’s tough for Todd to describe the experience. “…strangest type of pain you can describe. You can’t understand what it’s like unless you have it.”

There can be different degrees. Todd’s is moderate to severe. “It’s like being burned or stabbed, or, anything like that…twenty-four hours a day.”

For Todd, it’s worse at night. “It’s not as bad during the day as long as I take my pharmaceutical medication.”

The pain is particularly bad when storms are coming in and when he forgets to take his medicine.

“Nothing really seems to help.” Todd is prescribed a number of anti-seizure medications. “Some, I take for the baseline pain, but they don’t help with the flare-ups.” Opiates are reserved for the flare-ups. “That doesn’t seem to do much either.”

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Cerebral Palsy Won't Stop Her!

Jacqueline Patterson of California: Cerebral Palsy, Stuttering

Jacqueline used to live in Kansas City, Missouri. Jacqueline, who suffers from Cerebral Palsy and a moderate stutter, doses with Cannabis to ease her symptoms. When she is able to use cannabis, the pain associated with her disability lessens and her stutter becomes all but negligible.

While living in Kansas City, she was under the constant threat of losing her children since the state of Missouri and it’s law enforcement refuse to recognize her holistic choice for medicine. To them, Jacqueline, in spite of her condition, is nothing more than an addict and a danger to her children.

She had to flee to California or face having her children removed from her and placed in foster care.

Jacqueline became known nationally when she appeared in Showtime’s documentary “In Pot We Trust”. During the film, she demonstrates for the camera the transformation that occurs when she medicates.

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Arthritis Relief!

Marena Collins of Missouri: Arthritits

Marena is from Clinton, Missouri. She suffers from arthritis. She’s no longer able to take anti-inflammatories. The only pharmaceutical that she is currently taking, she may have to stop, since her stomach and liver are already compromised by the prescriptions she has taken in the past. The only medicine that she can be certain that her body will not eventually reject is cannabis.

“I didn’t know how bad my arthritis was until a few months ago. …I ran out of cannabis. I thought my arthritis was just some aches and pains here and there. But when I ran out of cannabis, slowly, over time, my body began to stiffen up.”

She discovered that the stiffness in her joints rendered her almost completely incapacitated.

“I called my doctor. He asked me what I was taking for anti-inflammatory and pain. I told him cannabis. He said to go get more. That was the best thing there was. He couldn’t give me anything better. He talked a little bit about the side effects and the side effects of contemporary (pharmaceutical) medications. I would much rather do the cannabis.”

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"Multiple Sclerosis Under Control"

Joe Cullin of North Carolina: Charcot-Marie-Tooth, Multiple Sclerosis

Joe lives in Whitier, a very rural part of North Carolina. He began using cannabis in 1999, following the accelerated progression of his congenital disease, Charcot-Marie-Tooth.

Charcot-Marie-Tooth, or CMT, is the most commonly inherited neurological disorder. It affects an estimated 2.6 million people.

Joe’s condition is slowly robbing him of the use of his limbs. He is already confined to a power wheelchair.

“It gives me muscle spasms and loss of nerve to muscle control…I cannot control balance; how to walk, anything like that…”

He has chronic pain that accompanies the spasms. Joe has found that cannabis relaxes his muscles when he has these episodes, much better than with the Flexoril that his physician has prescribed him; better than the Vicodin or Hydrocodone. The opioid narcotics made his skin crawl and itch.

Joe has seen a slow but steady decline in his physical strength and balance. At times, he is depressed. But he’s not tempted to seek refuge in alcohol or other drugs. To him, those would just be escapism.

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"My Chronic Pain Subsided"

by Linda Yelvington of Missouri: 

Scoliosis, Chronic Pain

Linda lives outside of Joplin, Missouri.

  Linda has been active in the movement for legalization for many years; since the 70’s. “It just doesn’t make since for it to be illegal – for something that is essentially harmless.”

Linda has Scoliosis. She was treated for it with a Milwaukee Brace when she was a teenager. That experience alone brought on depression.

She had her hip replaced when she was sixteen following a car accident. She also has degenerative problems in both wrists that make it difficult to work with a cane when her “bad hip” is aggravating her. She also has degenerative disc disease.

Hydrocodone, Darvon, Darvocet, Vicodin, she has run the gamete of pain killers. Such has also been the case with anti-depressants. She began taking Zoloft following the passing of her father. She has also been on Xanax.

There came a point in her life when she realized that the doctors were just “shoving more and more opiates at me – whatever they could prescribe, and it wasn’t helping – and cannabis did”.

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