Marijuana ( Medical ?) Success Stories from Real People

These are the stories I've collected from real individuals who have used Marijuana, pot, cannabis, AKA weed for medical and Non-Medical uses and the long-term effects they have felt as well as the pros and cons of smoking Marijuana.

As many people may not know there is a heated debate of legalization of this said drug into our populace and it could be legal to all just as Alcohol is legal to the populace after the age of 21 even though Alcohol is known to cause thousands more deaths than Cannabis ever has.

Now for the Stories and Opinions:

Success in School: When I was a kid I was a real trouble maker, always doing shit I wasn't supposed to. Later when I tried going to high school I could never stick, I went to 7 schools without graduating due to not showing up and disagreeing with the teachers. Since i started smoking weed I've gone back to school and now I'm at Uni. and I'm top of my class. On a fast track to my BSc in math and most probably PhD by the end.

Anxiety Out the Window: I have a digestive disorder, and weed helps give me an appetite when I otherwise have none. A lot of people with anxiety find that it makes them "normal" rather than lazy. Weed has helped me relax, socially, and become more and more self-aware. I often cook huge, gourmet meals, exercise, or find thoughtful things to do while stoned. It has improved my life and health tremendously (also usually vaporize or make edibles), and find that it helps me with an inherited insomnia. I can relate to it creating a need to stretch, to connect with yoga, as I too have felt it encourage me to take yoga up again.

Bi-Polar Child Makes His Own Decision: My weed success story: The doctors have been telling me since i was a kid that I am bipolar, ADHD, and borderline schizo. I started to notice pretty shortly that the "medicine" they had me on wasn't stopping the symptoms, just masking them and putting me in a zombie-esque state of mind. I started smoking pot young, having grown up in a fast environment. By the time I was 16 I had quit taking all of the pills and was smoking pot on a daily basis and my parents were commenting on how "sane" I had been acting lately... They didn't know I had quit taking the pills. The pills ruined me, turned me into a 100 lb zombie with never ending kidney infections and UTI's, having to drink a gallon of cranberry juice a day just to TRY to avoid the hospital. Seven years after having stopped taking the pills I am still smoking pot every day and I can actually function. I don't have the manic or depressed episodes, or my straight up crazy episodes, unless I have to stop smoking for a few days for one reason or the other. It makes me SANE. And capable of dealing with people [I'm good for cussing out strangers when I haven't been smoking]. I love MJ, it was a miracle cure for me without the horrible side effects of what the doctors were giving me. It has helped me to live my life on a wonderful level ^.^

Indoor Gardening Tips to Save You Cash: I've been smoking weed regularly since I was 16 years old, and I'm now 24 years old. In my high school years I bought weed from other kids my age, until I finally realized that I could save a lot of money by growing weed.

I invested a lot of time and energy in learning how to grow MJ, and now I manage a small crop for personal use (about 3 plants at a time). Weed isn't difficult to grow, but it is difficult compared with most herbs and vegetables. My grow room now contains 3 MJ plants and about 100 other plants including tomatoes, various types of peppers, thyme, rosemary, sage, lavender, basil, dill, and many more.

Basically weed taught me a lot about indoor horticulture, and has saved me and my friends a lot of money. 8 years ago I had no idea how to sustain a crop of plants. Now I can grow just about anything indoors and make it flourish. The legalization of weed would encourage more people to learn about indoor horticulture.

Oh the Places You'll Go: Trying to describe the influence that ganja has had on my life. I'll try and list the high-notes:

-Helped me comprehend the reasoning for higher dimensions (I smoked for the first time with a few engineering and physics majors), and contributed to a newfound interest in EVERYTHING science.

-Helped me land my first serious relationship, with a girl I hung out with while stoned, reducing my nerves and keeping me from screwing things up.

-Helped me see why things are completely objective, and question the ideas I'd always held, allowing me to challenge unwarranted fears and reactions.

-Gave me new insight into how childhood abuse contributed to who I am, allowing me to understand my motivations as well as methods.

-Caused me to question the government's position on drugs, as anyone who wants something as great as weed to be completely illegal, clearly has an agenda that flies in the face of truly understand oneself, and the relationship they have with the world.

-Contributed to great sexual encounters that blew my mind.

-Allowed me to gain the patience necessary to take my writing, drawing, and designing to another level, and by that I mean take it seriously enough to truly believe in my ability to create.

-Helped ease the process of getting to know people, I've had countless sessions with old friends/strangers, where hours have gone by, while we forget about everything outside of the room/car, enjoying the company of one another, questioning nothing, enjoying everything.

-Made me reevaluate what's truly important, and worth worrying about.

-Contributed greatly to my brainstorming abilities, so much so that the day after I can't believe the things I'm reading/seeing, because they're so far from my typical ideas, while also being incredibly insightful/spot on.

-Helped me get through some painful events, such as witnessing deaths, and other shock/ptsd inducing events.

-Gave music a fresh sound, helping me appreciate different types, from jazz, classical, to good hip-hop, and instrumentals.

-Opened my social circle to include people I wouldn't typically hang around, girls and guys.

-Made me unstoppable in Halo and CS, so much so that it scares me.

-Influenced some of my best writing, relating to school, on boring subjects that I had little to no interest in.

There are more, I'm sure, as well as some I could include which aren't really positive. However I'll leave them for their proper place, and just conclude by saying I've taken an extended break from weed. That said, I'm in no way against it, and believe it should be legal (as well as all drugs). I'm sure I will smoke again, as it has taught me some invaluable lessons that I couldn't live without (such as: weed is great for reflection/deep understanding, but can definitely hinder my nonsense filter/spontaneity). I just want to finish college and begin a company/job(ack), with as much wind in my sails as possible. I've promised myself a blunt after graduation though :)

Hepatitus C an Weed: My story: I got Hep C from a girlfriend that I shared needles with. Fast forward 20 years later and I am SICK. I vomit every morning and half the day, mostly dry heaves. I weigh 128lbs, fully dressed with shoes, belt, wallet, phone, etc. At 5'8", not a normal weight. I am lucky if I can eat once a day and basically subsist on Nesquik chocolate milk...trying to eat anything is like trying to chew on sawdust; I can't even get it to the back of my mouth to swallow. Doc puts me on some meds give me a small appetite, but they cost $490 for 11 days worth(what my insurance will cover) and make me sensitive to light, forget stuff and have diarrhea. Things are not getting better, even after Interferon treatment. I am living off of my savings and the 5 hours or so I can work a week and am out of pocket over $60,000 for doc bills not covered by my insurance.

Out of desperation I move in with a friend and his wife. She is a nurse and wants to help, and she has Hep C. She is on medical MJ and is relatively healthy, but since I am a recovered meth addict, I am deathly afraid on ANYTHING that might lead back to that. After much coaxing, I decide that I really have nothing to lose.

That was 4 years ago. I now weigh 177lbs butt nekkid, I eat regularly and almost never vomit(there are spells). I work ~50 hours a week in I.T. and bill over $150,000 a year for my work(which makes my boss very happy), and I grow my own meds at the cost of about $150 a month and have so much that I give half away to local card holders.

I do suffer some short term memory loss, that I counteract by writing everything down in a notebook. I also occasionally suffer from a severe case of Cheeto fingers, which soap and water is an excellent cure for!

Pot a Migraine Cure? My wife has hemiplegic migraines 5x a week and can't take Maxalt because of a prior stroke. Nothing BUT pot has helped her with her migraines. She was taking 4 different daily meds (including an anti-seizure med) and one as needed for migraines and still getting 4-5 a week. MJ makes them all go away.

Epiphany Moment: (I) was run over by a hit and run drunk driver as a teen... the meds they gave me were making me extremely nausiuos.. i wasnt eating and losing weight fast.. my parrants were talking about putting me back in hospital to get an IV drip.. i was really hating life.. in pain, sick to my stomach.. druggy.( i know it;s weird but i dont like this feeling) One of my friends stopped by with a joint(i didnt really smoke all that much.. once or tiwce a month.. normally at parties) I was amazed how fast my nausia went away.. my pain was still there but bothered me less..and half an hour later we went to mcdonalds and scarfed.(before that the most i'd eat is a few crackers)

After that was the first time i bought pot... to treat myself.. without all that nausea.. but i honestly think POT kept me out of the hospital.. and i know it helped me get through that time with all my broken bones. it was also a kinda of strange epiphany for me.. the drugs they gave me and said were good for me.. made me feel like crap and didnt really work.. while the illegal drug.. accually made me feel ok.. with the only side effect being the munchies.. which is exactly what i needed at the time.

Treating Depression with Cannabis: [0] I've told this story before but I will tell it again. I have severe depression. I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder when I was 14 but doctors later told me it's depression. I didn't start smoking weed regularly until I was 28. I'm turning 30 this February. Since I've started smoking regularly (daily since August), I've quit smoking cigarettes, I've almost stopped drinking all together. I had a few drinks this weekend for new years but before that it had been two months. I used to drink 2-3 beers a day. I also drank soda constantly. I've switched to a refillable water bottle. I was probably spending $100-150 a month on beer and another $100 on soda and $150 on cigarettes.

I no longer have my frequent outbursts, I used to snap at people multiple times a day. I spend more time with my kids. I spend more time with my wife. I spend time helping out around the house. I actually enjoy spending time on the house instead of dreading it.

I've lost 40lbs in the last 4 months. I've quit playing MMO's and picked up healthier habits like playing the electric bass. I would either play World of Warcraft or sit in front of my TV for most, if not all, of my free time before pot.

I spend more time with my friends now. Before I started smoking I had given up on my of my former friendships, now I spend at least two days a week with my old friends. I've started shaving every day instead of once a month at times. I shower regularly and comb my hair on a daily basis instead of shoving my hair into a hat.

Most people can't comprehend how debilitating depression can really be. I think between the empathy and introspective weed causes and how much calmer and more enjoyable life can be with it were all contributing factors.

Probably the biggest problem with weed is the affordable stuff (mids or lower) is the most common available to most people. You never really know what you're getting and a indica heavy strain will make you want to sit around and do nothing.

Whenever Michigan changes the MMJ laws to cover depression, I will be getting an ID card.

Right now there is a "Drug War" with cartels who know what Legalization would do for their business in trafficking illegal Marijuana in the United States and are actively threatening and even killing people to stop this from happening.

The american people according to a poll by Gallop says that the population is 43% in favor for legalizing Marijuana period. This number has jumped a staggering amount from the last poll and with media and news so easily shareable these days the positive effects of THC and Cannabis for treating people with disabilities and Bi-Polar has increased dramatically in California where they have placed open legalization on their ballot for 2010. 

In addition to the properties of Marijuana for human use there are tons of functional uses as a crop that farmers would benefit greatly from including: Feed for animals, Manufacturing uses for clothing, Essential oils, and the list goes on. As with everything in this world there is both positive and negative effects to our actions. Marijuana can be a great thing when used correctly and with purpose. 

Sincerely,

Brian