People who use, or would like to use, cannabis
for medicinal reasons often have to fight prejudices. In this article,
Sensi Seeds aims to demonstrate that medicinal cannabis users are
perfectly normal people with life stories to tell. Today, we introduce
five cannabis patients: five different faces, five varying fates, and
one plant that helps. Read their stories for yourself.
The use of cannabis – whether for
recreational or medicinal purposes – and its legal status are the
subject of fervent global debate. Medicinal cannabis is increasingly
being legalised, most recently in Oregon, Alaska and Washington D.C..
Legalisation gives chronically and seriously ill people access to a
medicine that was previously unavailable to them. It gives them hope and
assurance.
People who use, or would like to use,
cannabis for medicinal reasons often have to fight prejudices. In this
article, Sensi Seeds aims to demonstrate that medicinal cannabis users
are perfectly normal people with life stories to tell. Today, we
introduce five cannabis patients: five different faces, five varying
fates, and one plant that helps. Read their stories for yourself.
Chris Vrzak
The 36-year-old ADHD patient who lives in
Hockenheim has survived two motorbike accidents that have left him with
chronic pain in his knee, lower spine and shoulder.
He has been using cannabis since 1994.
Chris first became aware in 2009 that it was possible to buy cannabis in
Germany with a Certificate of Exemption. However he would never have
thought it possible that he would one day be among Germany’s official
cannabis patients. If he mentioned to doctors that the plant helped him
and allowed him not to take medications with severe side effects, such
as diclofenac, tilidine and other opiates, he was labelled as a drug
addict and treated as such.
Chris
has already been through a lot: his ADHD was either not treated or was
treated incorrectly. From childhood, he was prescribed drops and tablets
which a doctor fobbed the then 13-year-old off with, saying that
everything would right itself when he reached puberty. The consequences:
inability to pay attention, 1,000 thoughts in his head, quick to become
irritable, aggression, poor concentration! Shortly afterwards, Chris
tried cannabis for the first time and noticed that he was able to
concentrate and thus complete his secondary school education. The doctor
treating him diagnosed drug abuse, in his case cannabis addiction, and
the youngster was prescribed diazepam, a psychotropic drug. There
followed endless visits to a psychologist, drugs counselling and
disruption to his education. After 13 years of heroin and cocaine
dependency, two accidents and extreme burn-out in 2012, Chris managed to
get his life back in order. Things started to improve when he changed
his doctor, got the right diagnosis and was offered substitutes.
In 2013, he started the process of
applying for a BfArM (Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices)
Certificate of Exemption. With the help of the renowned German private
doctor Dr Franjo Grotenhermen – chairman of the Working Group on
Cannabis as a Medicine (ACM) and managing director of the International
Association for Cannabinoid Medicines (IACM)
– Chris submitted his application for the approval of medicinal
cannabis flowers to be supplied by a pharmacy. Without the support of Dr
Grotenhermen, says Chris, it would have been completely impossible
because every other doctor considered the use of cannabis to be
addictive behaviour even though they themselves had to admit that it
helped him every time he took it.
His application took just seven days from
receipt of the documents to the permit being issued. Since October
2013, he has officially been permitted to use cannabis. To date, no
other patient’s application has been processed so quickly! Chris
believes this is because he had been known to the institute for eight
years because of being prescribed substitutes containing L-Polamidon and
Subutex.
Chris has a proactive approach to living
his life. He is working towards independence with a focus on helping
cannabis patients. He is currently building an information platform
where visitors can find out all about healthy eating and a healthy
lifestyle as well as cannabis as a medicine. He is interested in how the
active ingredients in cannabis and other herbs and oils can be ingested
to best effect. His own personal experiences and love of
experimentation have led him to build a new vaporiser, the prototype of
which is almost complete. Chris wants to emphasis this message to Sensi
Seeds readers, and patients in particular:
Stay true to yourself! The journey is the reward! Find a doctor you trust and apply for a permit. Only through medicine will cannabis become legal in Germany!”
Tilo Clemeur
Tilo had suffered from epilepsy since he
was 18. Orthodox medicines did nothing for him, leaving him only with
severe side effects. The 44-year-old thus went in search of an
alternative therapy. In 2000, he found out that cannabis could offer
this alternative but when he told his neurologist about it, he was
advised “not to let himself be made a fool of” because cannabis has no
medicinal benefits.
Tilo went ahead and tried cannabis
anyway. He took it as soon as he started to feel unwell. After a year
free from attacks, he took the plunge and stopped taking the last of his
conventional medications, successfully. Since then he has not suffered
an attack for eight years.
He has had a certificate for medicinal
cannabis flowers from his pharmacy since 2012. He previously took
dronabinol. A resident of Duisburg, he was Germany’s first epilepsy
patient to be granted a BfArM Certificate of Exemption to obtain
cannabis flowers from his pharmacy.
For a year and a half, Tilo has been
working as an editor for the magazine grow!, for which he interviews
patients and relates their stories. He also raises awareness by giving
talks at events such as the Cultiva Hemp Expo in Vienna and the Steam
Parade in Cologne. He is highly critical that doctors are not permitted
to simply prescribe cannabis without first requesting permission from
the Federal Opium Agency, whereas other medicines, such as strong
opiates for example, can be prescribed. Furthermore, many doctors are
simply frightened to deal with cannabis as a medicine, much less
prescribe it, because they don’t want to come into conflict with the
law. His talks also touch on the immensely high cost of getting cannabis
from a pharmacy: €74 for 5 grams, whereas home-grown cannabis would
cost €2.20 per gram (for the first crop and the associated initial
outlay) and €0.35 per gram thereafter! He wants to tell Sensi Seeds
readers:
Fight for your right whether you are a patient or a recreational user. We know that the ban does nothing but harm. Lots of people lose their driving licence simply because they had a drag on a joint three days earlier. Patients are denied the opportunity to grow their own, even though there are constant disruptions to supply lasting weeks and forcing patients to look elsewhere. Make yourself heard and make it clear that we all have a right to cannabis.”
Claudia Russo
The 42-year-old, who has chosen to live
in Berlin, is a widow with a grown-up daughter. She has a long list of
ailments: hepatocyte hepatitis, an irregular heartbeat, cancer, chronic
asthma, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), osteochondrosis,
polydirectional disc protrusion with vacuum phenomenon, spinal
fractures, spinal column syndrome, spondylarthrosis, disrupted sleep due
to pain, depression, chronic pain syndrome, abdominal cancer.
Claudia has officially been a cannabis
patient since March 2014. However she was familiar with the plant before
then. She had been using cannabis for years because it gave her support
in many areas and calmed her mind. It took around six months for her to
obtain permission to use cannabis. “The waiting, the suffering and the
never-ending delays with letters made it feel like an eternity,” says
Claudia.
When she was diagnosed with cancer and
the stem cell reconstruction treatment she received almost killed her,
she desperately started to look for last resorts in alternative
medicine. At a certain point, she came across a video about Rick Simpson
oil. She looked into it and started to make her own. The results were
astounding, but she found the substance unpalatable, so she began to
further develop it, making oils for a wide range of uses. Claudia’s
cancer is currently in remission. Cannabis is the only medicine she
takes!
Claudia has a lot to say – to the
doctors, to the health insurance companies and to her fellow human
beings. And so despite her incapacity to work, she keeps busy
volunteering. Work keeps her alive and distracts her from the pain.
Claudia does acceptance-oriented drug work, advises ill people, the
elderly, addicts and concerned parents and she has a small shop where
she sells her own painted designs. She is very active in drugs policy and helps others in applying for permission to use medicinal cannabis flowers. Her message:
HEMP IS HOPE.. NOT ONLY DOPE”
Alexander Jähn
The 32-year-old German is married with
one child. Alexander has been a cannabis patient since 2002 because of
pain, paralysis and spastic cramps that are the result of a serious road
traffic accident. Prior to the accident Alexander was a retail
salesman, now he is unable to work.
Before he was officially permitted to use
cannabis as a medicine, the doctors tried to control his pain with
tilidine, morphine, tramadol, fentanyl and other medications. Having
applied for medicinal cannabis flowers from the pharmacy, Alexander had
to wait three months to obtain permission.
He was familiar with cannabis from his
youth but it was only after he became ill that it occurred to him how
much it really helps him. His message to Sensi Seeds readers is:
Herb is the Healing!”
Ralf Herrmann
The 40-year-old from Heidelberg is a
single father with a young daughter. Ralf takes cannabis for ADHD, a
slipped disc and arthritis in his shoulder. Sensi Seeds had already
introduced him previously in a portrait.
First Ritalin for ADHD, Vioxx, then
tablets containing opiates for the pain and anti-depressants to held
with his mood swings – Ralf refused them. He found this cocktail of
medicines too dangerous. He smoked cannabis and was labelled an addict.
Why did he do it? Because it was what made him feel the most well and he
had his pain under control.
From 2001, Ralf was permitted to take
dronabinol. His GP at the time prescribed it for him when other
medications failed to help him effectively, and most importantly without
any side effects.
In the summer of 2010 he became aware of cannabis flowers from the pharmacy
via the ACM website. After finding a doctor prepared to support his
application for an exemption, he took the first step. Following endless
telephone calls, it took Ralf two months to obtain the BfArM Certificate
of Exemption that allowed him to obtain cannabis from the pharmacy.
However it took several years in total before he was permitted to use
cannabis. He received his approval for medicinal cannabis flowers in
December 2010 and is happy to have gone down the cannabis route. When he
was granted his Certificate of Exemption, Ralf felt that he had finally
been acknowledged by society.
In December 2010, there were
approximately 60 patients considered to be untreatable and permitted to
obtain cannabis from their pharmacist; today there are just under 300
such patients. Unfortunately, no Germany health insurance company will
yet cover the costs of the medicine – patients are required to finance
the costs of the cannabis themselves.
Ralf was one of the patients who appeared
before the Administrative Court in Cologne in mid-2014 to fight for the
right to grow their own cannabis. Unfortunately he was one of those
whose claim to grow his own cannabis was rejected. But Ralf didn’t let it rest there – he submitted an appeal. His motto:
Legalise it worldwide.”
Ralf is a professional heating engineer
but had been working as an IT systems engineer in recent years. Working
out in the field, he had his own company car and operated independently
while on the road. But he initially gave up his job for personal
reasons.
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