Patient Story: Christopher H.
I remember the day I realized I wasn’t immortal.
I was in my twenties, and it’s funny because until I realized I wasn’t immortal, I never realized I thought I was. In fact, I don’t think I ever did think I was but I’m sure I didn’t after that day thirty years ago. In the morning, someone t-boned me pulling onto a busy street from a parking lot; in the afternoon, someone rear-ended on the ramp from one busy freeway to another. Recently, I aggravated the back injuries I received that day that have gone mostly untreated for thirty years. For the last two weeks, despite daily chiropractic care, including traction, hydro massage, chiropractic adjustments and trigger point injections, I haven’t gotten better and the pain was so strong that I dragged myself to a pharmacy at 4:00 AM to get acetaminophen and ibuprofen despite not having taken any over-the-counter medications in at least a decade. I wasn’t sleeping more than three hours a night and I was desperate. That’s when I called on a friend I knew had advocated for medical marijuana. I did not want to take pharmaceuticals (even over-the-counter pharmaceuticals) and they weren’t relieving my pain anyway. With my friend’s help, I chose cannabis-infused gummies without artificial colors or flavors and started slowly increasing my dose until I found the minimum effective dose. Finally, I got relief from my pain. Before medical marijuana, I slept three to five hours a night; now I sleep six to eight. Before medical marijuana about all I could think about was my pain. The best I could do was distract myself. Since medical marijuana, I’m back to reading and writing and sleeping and living my life.
Christopher H.