Wednesday, May 10, 2017

Sprung



I wore my pot socks this morning and sprang Sophie from the facility. We're home now.

I also had an intense conversation this afternoon with an administrative RN from The Neurologist's hospital regarding The Neurologist's statement to me yesterday that she was "under direct orders from her boss not to discuss cannabis medicine." I was lying on my bed recovering from the last couple of days and looking at my feet while "discussing" the issue with the administrative RN whom I will call Karen.

I want to record all of this in real time because the emotion that propels me to write is as essential as giving "thought" to it over time. In doing so I am attempting to break the hegemony of not just the neurology/medical/industrial complex but also of the patriarchy that would stifle emotions or otherwise lessen their validity. This has nothing to do with gender. Part of our power is due to our hearts, our emotions, to what is at stake. Quality of Life. Life. Death. Intellect and reason is another part, but not primary and certainly not dominant.

Break is hyperbole, of course, because at best I will make not even a crack.

Have ya'll ever seen the movie Michael Clayton? If you haven't, you should. If you have, I'm sure you remember Tilda Swinton's character -- Karen -- and Swinton's incredible performance. The administrative assistant I spoke with today used all the hems and haws that we in the cannabis community have heard over the years, and she did it so easily that at one point, I lost my composure and said, Karen! Do you hear yourself? You sound like a robot! I wiggled my marijuana toes and Tilda Swinton's Karen flashed through my mind. I imagined GW Pharmaceuticals to be a sort of Dostoyevskian Grand Inquisitor programming Karen in real time.

Things did not end well. I loudly object to doctors not feeling free to discuss their patients' medicine regimens. I believe, from experience, that the relationship between doctor and patient is sacred and should be one of mutual trust, and that in this instance, in this real time when we are on the frontier of revolutionary treatment for refractory epilepsy, complete transparency is incredibly important. That trust is broken for me, but I'm old. I've been doing this for so long that, frankly, other than the incredible panic I feel every now and then that we are truly on our own, I don't give a flying foo what hegemonic Powers That Be think. If they can't have a simple discussion about my daughter's medical cannabis, or even show a modicum of interest in her welfare, I can't trust them. I worry about young families who need far more guidance than I, and it depresses me that all the work we've done to bridge this enormous communication gap between physicians and families is completely ineffectual.

I will be writing some formal letters to The Powers That Be. I am joining with a few other members of our community in a concerted effort to object to what we saw, as well, on that video the other day where an esteemed neurologist directly told his colleagues to report parents using cannabis medicine on children to Child Protective Services.

There's something going on.

Like Michael Clayton says to Karen, For such a smart person, you really are lost.

14 comments:

  1. Thank you. You are absolutely right, that physicians and patients ought to be completely honest and forthright with each other about all aspects of a patient's treatment, and, even their lives (inasmuch as the patient wishes to share details with his/her physician). It should go without saying, but if you have to join with others and shout it at the top of your lungs, I will be with you in spirit, championing your words. What a load of shit that there are certain aspects of Sophie's treatment that are taboo - especially given the longstanding nature of your relationship with this doctor and the significant gains she has made thanks to cannabis.

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  2. Said it earlier. It is medical malpractice not to discuss what a person has in their body.

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  3. Saying it in the moment, no editing, gives force to the words. And you....are a force to be reckoned with.

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  4. Elizabeth, I so agree. The work we did and so many others seems like a waste of time. Doctors don't seem to value us our knowledge and I guess i'm in the little mother mind group too. We've run into the most basic epilepsy care that wasn't done and when i asked my neuro about it he blamed me because maybe i didn't listen to the nurses and they thought i didn't want to do .... whatever and NOPE i'm not going back!

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  5. If you were at the 99 cent store in mira mesa today please reply to me , lisa

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  6. I will say it again bit is worth repeating. All pioneers are considered to be have moonstruck madness. It wasn't long ago in the province I live in a Doctor would never even consider writing an Rx for Marijuana. Now? I asked my doctor for one today. She did not bat an eye, signed the form and pushed it across her desk. She explained a few things but it was easy. Now I can partake legally. Don't give up. You are a pioneer. Someone here fought for me. You are fighting for Sophie and so many others. It will happen.

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  7. Apparently it can only be discussed if some Pharmaceutical is making obscene amounts of money pushing it thru Docs to their Patients... betcha when they get the synthetic version they can profit from cranked out they will have absolutely no problem talking about it incessantly... it all makes me quite Sick to my stomach. I distrust Western Medicine so much and if our crappy Insurance covered my Eastern Medicine I would never utilize Western medical practices again! Alas, they call over 2500 years of Eastern Medicine 'experimental' too... go figure. Dawn... The Bohemian

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    1. You nailed it - THAT is exactly what is going on!

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  8. You are strong. We are listening. Sending love. Xo N2

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  9. I'm so sorry you had to go through this latest ordeal including that "icing on the cake", the response of Sophie's neurologist about her boss' prohibition of discussing cannabis with her patients. It's just incredible.
    I hope you and Sophie and back home and fully recovered.
    (I'm not sure whether this is a positive or a negative but you'd never find a chandelier in hospital room around here.)

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  10. I am currently working on a film titled: The legend of 420. For those truly interested in this issue I urge you to see a sequence from my film which brings to light a growing population of folks who are cannabis refugees. https://vimeo.com/215731886 password: 6630507. It is time for the walls of injustice to be torn down.

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  11. Bravo! I haven't seen Michael Clayton. I guess I should! I'm so glad you're standing up to these people. You have so much authority on these subjects, and they cannot be allowed to fail to see that.

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  12. No rocket science, especially about the med community overall. Pharm feeds off and feeds it, now it wants the lions share of a thing that sadly everyone else worked so hard to prove was the right thing all along. They will of course fuck it up.

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