I didn't want to post about Marijuana on 4/20

But, here we are.

In high school, I was arrested for having a nickel bag on me. Had to go through court, community service, narcotics anonymous, everything. Man that sucked. Remind me to tell you that story some other time. 

I started smoking heavily when I began to experience serious head pain. By this time, I was becoming self conscious of the amount of pain-meds I was taking. Even making the switch to ‘daily’ migraine drugs didn’t make me feel too good. As we were all unaware that a cerebral / spinal fluid buildup (Hydrocephalus) was the primary cause of the pain, I started keeping a daily journal where I would write down my habits. What time I woke up, what time I ate, what I ate, how long I slept, etc. One of these facts outlined which medication I took and when. I made myself a system of notes. It wasn’t a very good system (too large) but it evolved into a simple list: time I would wake up, if I fell back asleep or “crashed'“, how much pain I felt, and how bad my Nausea was. I imagine everyone would’ve had a different system, with different symbols, and different colors. Mine was a little red journal with black ink, circles for pain, squares for nausea, check-marks inside the shape would tell me how bad it was. But, the situation wasn’t getting any better.

So I went out and bought a cheap-o battery pen and a CBD cartridge at one of the many LA Dispensaries. Almost immediately, I began to feel a positive difference. The most drastic impact for me was that my nausea subsided dramatically. Just as importantly, I stopped taking the daily painkillers. It calmed my symptoms and made day to day operation a bit more bearable. Obviously, the weed wasn’t a miracle cure or anything. We can thank modern medicine for the surgery. I’d be screwed if this was just ten years ago. I’d be really screwed if this was Game of Thrones era.

I had to be monitored by nurses  & doctors pretty frequently. That was the worst part of the hospital stay, I got very little rest. You know what made the stay easier though?  Hydrocodone. They helped me sleep uninterrupted for a few hours. But i’ve also heard some pretty horrible stories about them, especially from the suburbs, addiction sucks.

Somehow, I made the choice that I would do everything in my power to avoid taking pills once at home. I’ll admit this didn’t work out too well at the beginning. But I lessened the dose the third day and then the fourth and so on. I wrote the dosage on that same journal, I used the same pain scale. I downgraded from Norco to Tylenol. Eventually, the pain was minimal, but the discomfort was still present. I had 52 staples in my head, extremely limited mobility, a hole in my skull (which I’m super proud of), and it was a hot summer. So back to the local dispensary I went. 

Legalization is amazing.  

And now? Now it kind of just stuck around.  You know what else stuck around? My notes. Its become a habit of mine. They help me remember everything I would otherwise forget. Some of it ends up being pretty neat.