cannabisnews.com: Michiganders Go To Clinic Seeking Pot To Dull Pain





Michiganders Go To Clinic Seeking Pot To Dull Pain
Posted by CN Staff on December 05, 2008 at 06:40:36 PT
By Tammy Stables Battaglia, Staff Writer
Source: Detroit Free Press
Michigan -- Getting high was the furthest thing from their minds as some of Michigan's first legal medical marijuana users lined a Southfield waiting room Thursday. But they all shared one thing: pain."I pray it helps the pain like they say," said diabetic cancer patient Renee Collinsworth, 48, of Croswell. She is hoping to dull the pain from a 1986 motorcycle accident in Ferndale. "It's not all about smoking it, either."
Michigan became the 13th state to allow the use of medical marijuana to treat debilitating illnesses after voters approved it in November. A licensed physician must grant approval before patients can use the otherwise illegal drug.The patients waiting in the Southfield office either wouldn't or couldn't get approval from their regular doctor. So they were at the opening of the Hemp and Cannabis Foundation Medical Clinics' new location in Southfield. THCF Medical Clinics, a nonprofit headquartered in Oregon, employs seven doctors in eight states solely to sign off on medical marijuana use."If a patient's personal care physician is unwilling to sign off on their registration application packet, we have one that will," Brian Schreckinger, a spokesman for the group, said Thursday. Schreckinger, 28, said he became involved in the cause after excruciating pain from breaking his ankle skateboarding kept him up at night."Sometimes I'd be complaining I'd just want my foot chopped off," he said.John Smith, 33, of Monroe was trying to find relief from back pain stemming from a 1998 car accident. And he doesn't want to use painkillers anymore."I've seen so many people dying on pills," he said. "And that's all the doctors push on you is the pills."Sometimes I think it's in my head, and they're just keeping me doped up on pills."Charles Synder III, 31, of Flint suffers from Nail Patella Syndrome, a hereditary condition that causes kidney issues and painful bone defects."When I use cannabis, it doesn't take it 100% away," said Snyder, who collected signatures to help put a measure legalizing medical use of marijuana on the November ballot. "It doesn't put me in a zombie-like state like OxyContin."Eric Eisenbud, a licensed ophthalmologist, examined each of the patients Thursday. He interviewed them, reviewed their medical records, checked their blood pressure and listened to their heart before handing out authorizations.Eisenbud said he joined the practice looking for more fulfillment than he was finding in practicing ophthalmology. At the clinic, "I see those patients every day that make me feel that I'm doing a worthwhile endeavor," Eisenbud said.Source: Detroit Free Press (MI)Author:  Tammy Stables Battaglia, Free Press Staff Writer Published: December 5, 2008Copyright: 2008 Detroit Free PressWebsite: http://www.freep.com/Contact: letters freepress.comRelated Articles:Medical Pot Law Now in Effect Amid Questionshttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread24354.shtmlMedical Pot Legal Today ... but Not Reallyhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread24351.shtml
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Comment #18 posted by Hope on December 06, 2008 at 19:58:55 PT
Hating this prohibition and what it does
to people, this country, other countries, and law enforcement has nothing to do with liking pot or wanting to smoke it.If I wanted to I would. The law against it is unjust and breaking an unjust law isn't wrong. The unjust law is wrong. I just don't want to right now, because I feel safer not doing so... since I run my mouth, or more precisely, my keyboard, publicly, about it so much. I don't want this prohibition to end just so I can use it legally, as prohibitionists like to throw at anyone who disagrees with them. I want the prohibition to end because it's so wrong. The prohibition of cannabis destroys lives, and kills people. The prohibition of cannabis is literally seething with injustice.By the way, I think most of you probably know that Jonathan Magbie's family got a wrongful death settlement in his case. http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v08/n1083/a11.html?1237
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Comment #17 posted by Hope on December 06, 2008 at 19:15:11 PT
Usually,
my answer when asked why I would smoke it when I have the opportunity, is simply, "I like it."Plain and simple.I like it.
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Comment #16 posted by Hope on December 06, 2008 at 19:12:38 PT
Being "High" is feeling good...
Being "High" is being happy. Being "High" is the opposite of being "Low". Once I had a verbal altercation with a prohibitionist. He said, "Why do you want to smoke the stuff?"I said, "It makes me happy."His angry answer?"Why should you be happy when no one else is?"
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Comment #15 posted by FoM on December 06, 2008 at 17:30:58 PT
John Tyler 
I saw that too. I don't know what is so wrong with feeling better. Just feeling better can make a person smile and be happy.
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Comment #14 posted by John Tyler on December 06, 2008 at 16:33:45 PT
getting high, a good thing
On the National Geographic show last week a cannabis researcher in Israel said that we all have life’s stresses and depressions in our lives and he considered the elation and euphoria associated with cannabis usage a good thing. It gets us back into balance.The fear of feeling good is some hangover from the Puritans who wove their ideas into the American psyche. In a weird way they got high on their own suffering and they are still sharing it with some of us across the centuries.
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Comment #13 posted by FoM on December 05, 2008 at 20:15:21 PT
Hope
I think it's a repeat but I will enjoy seeing it again. I think the Inauguration in January will be the biggest party ever in the USA. They are even leaving bars open almost all night I saw on the news. http://inaugural.senate.gov/history/daysevents/index.cfm
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Comment #12 posted by Hope on December 05, 2008 at 20:13:55 PT
Nah...
Letterman's a rerun. Should have realized. Sorry.
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Comment #11 posted by Hope on December 05, 2008 at 19:32:53 PT
Charles Snyder
Good job! Good job, indeed!
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Comment #10 posted by Hope on December 05, 2008 at 19:31:48 PT
Letterman
You don't think it's a new one? It's a rerun?
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Comment #9 posted by Hope on December 05, 2008 at 19:28:38 PT
Getting High ... Museman Comment 1
That reminds me of a habit my son took up one year while he was at college. No, not cannabis. (He said he didn't even try cannabis because he was afraid he would like it and he wanted to spend his money on pizza.) But he started saying this odd thing... I think just to aggravate people who thought he might be doing something. He often said about one thing or another, "That makes me so high!" or "I am so high on that!" It was kind of alarming, but funny, knowing him like I do, to hear him saying that... and very joyfully, at that. People really did look at him funny when he said it... which of course he loved. He just made a habit of saying that for awhile, but it certainly got people's attention.I've, naturally, always been very high about him.
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Comment #8 posted by FoM on December 05, 2008 at 19:23:14 PT
Huffington Post: Altered States?
December 5, 2008  Excerpt: Or maybe I should call this one "holiday cheer." Ahem.On this, the 75th anniversary of the end of Prohibition (the Twenty-First Amendment was ratified today, in 1933 -- the only amendment to have been ratified through state conventions rather than state legislatures), let us all thank Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Utah (!), the final three states necessary, who all ratified it on the same date. So here's to... um... Utah, for preserving the right to drink?Something just doesn't sound right about that, but I checked the history books, and that's what it says....Anyway, other intoxicating news this week came from the world of anthropology. Scientists found (or admitted they had found, who knows if a little more was... um... "experimentally destroyed" in the process) 789 grams of marijuana (that's one and three-quarters pounds, folks) in a burial site in the Gobi Desert. Seems like a fine time to bring up the subject of medical marijuana to me.http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28034925/"Mankind has been using marijuana since before the Hippocratic Oath existed. More and more states are changing their laws to allow for medical use of marijuana. The biggest obstacle to these experiments in democracy is now the federal government. Seventy-five years ago, America threw out Prohibition. Today, I will strongly urge President Obama to consider supporting changing the designation of marijuana from Schedule I to Schedule II, which will legally allow these states to regulate marijuana just like any other prescription medicine." Chris Weigant blogs at: ChrisWeigant.comhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/chris-weigant/friday-talking-points-57_b_148895.html
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Comment #7 posted by fight_4_freedom on December 05, 2008 at 18:54:04 PT
Hope
Thanks for the heads up on Obama!
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Comment #6 posted by fight_4_freedom on December 05, 2008 at 18:37:15 PT
My friend Charles is in a different paper every 
other day, I swear! But he is a true fighter and he deserves it.-Charles Synder III, 31, of Flint suffers from Nail Patella Syndrome, a hereditary condition that causes kidney issues and painful bone defects."When I use cannabis, it doesn't take it 100% away," said Snyder, who collected signatures to help put a measure legalizing medical use of marijuana on the November ballot. "It doesn't put me in a zombie-like state like OxyContin."-I didn't think this would all be happening so fast after the election. But I'm glad I was wrong.
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Comment #5 posted by FoM on December 05, 2008 at 18:23:13 PT
Thanks Hope
I go back and forth between Leno and Letterman and I think Letterman is repeating shows from right before the election. Leno was repeating last week. I saw Tina Fey on Letterman last night. That was good. She played a great Sarah Palin.
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Comment #4 posted by Hope on December 05, 2008 at 18:05:02 PT
Obama
is going to be on Letterman tonight.
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Comment #3 posted by The GCW on December 05, 2008 at 17:25:08 PT
P-word has not come up. 
US MA: OPED: A Day to Remember: Prohibition Isn't ForeverMany observers have compared the Obama transition to FDR's in 1932-33, but the important P-word has not come up. CONT.Source: Metrowest Daily News (MA)
Copyright: 2008 MetroWest Daily Newshttp://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v08/n1093/a08.html?397
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Comment #2 posted by FoM on December 05, 2008 at 17:19:14 PT
New Book Exposes The First Federal Trial 
New Book Exposes The First Federal Trial of a Medical Marijuana Doctorhttp://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2008/12/05/18553721.php
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Comment #1 posted by museman on December 05, 2008 at 12:21:24 PT
"Getting high "
Nope, no "getting high." Wouldn't want that to happen. Just kill the pain please, I don't really care if I 'feel good.'Hmmm. I sense a bit of deliberate ignorance of the major factor in using cannabis for medicinal reasons; its 'psychological effect' of 'getting high.' the infusion of a 'better attitude,' hope, where there was none, and some small bit of return to life without the dullness of pharma endorsed chemical drugs.Is it OK to go to church and 'get high' on Jesus? Even if it leads to, and is a gateway to harder attitudes like prejudice, judgementalism, false moralities, social division, war, and corruption of power? Is it OK to 'get high' to the point of enthusiastic rioting when your favorite team wins a game?Is it OK to 'get high' from eating out at your favorite restaurant?Apparently the term 'get high' also means 'feel good.' Essentially that is what they are saying, "we don't mind if you take drugs, we just don't want you to 'feel good' about it. You are supposed to suffer, and the only ones who are qualified to aleviate that suffering are the drug peddlers who sit in offices with doctorates on their walls, golf clubs in their closet, a list of drug prices on their PDAs, and like to go around calling themselves 'doctors,'Mr. Eisenbud may be an exception - he better be with a name like that!Stop telling us that 'getting high' is somehow a bad thing, when it is a fundamental element ot the wonderful healing properties of cannabis, this is just another stigma of the WOD like 'hippies'- and it is as false as all the other lies and propaganda.FREE HIGHS FOR EVERYONE
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