The reason I work on medical marijuana appeals

Yesterday I attended a Career Fair at Whittier Law School.  It's been almost 34 years since I was a law student.  A lot has changed, especially the percentage of women.  When I attended, women comprised only 10% of the classes, so it is a real victory for everyone to see more women in law school.

The students walked around the room and were able to visit with attorneys according to their specialty or law firm.  Needless to say, appellate attorneys were not high on their list, although a lot of students asked for advice on writing briefs and oral argument.  I was very happy to help them.  There were a handful of students who were interested in appellate law, but a much larger group was interested in why I made a decision to practice in this area and how I developed my practice.  They also asked about the types of cases I worked on.

One area of my practice always gets a smile and that is handling civil appeals dealing with medical marijuana cases.  At first, my colleagues would smirk when I mentioned these cases and sooner or later would voice an opinion that usually went like this:  "Isn't it true that medical marijuana is really a hoax and a means to obtain drugs for people who simply want to get loaded?"   Quite often this question is asked over a glass of wine or alcoholic beverage that the speaker has ordered "to take off the edge."

Here's my response:  I didn't think too much about marijuana for years.  About two years ago, my boyfriend was diagnosed with esophageal cancer, stage III, and we were looking at months of chemo, radiation, and surgery.   Not to mention the painful recovery from all of this life-saving medicine.  He started on radiation, but the terrible effects did not hit him until later because radiation treatments are cumulative.  Then he started on the chemo and ran around with a container that gave him a constant infusion.  That is when the real suffering began.  He was always sick and found it hard to keep food down.  In fact, he had trouble keeping down the pills that were meant to ease his symptoms.  He started losing weight but still had no appetite.  The surgery was a big trauma for his body and he ended up losing over 50 lbs.!  Medical marijuana helped with this symptoms, quieting his stomach and enhancing his appetite.  It also allowed him to sleep and helped with the pain that had become a constant companion.  He did not get loaded nor did he have a good time on his marijuana.

A few years earlier, our young neighbor, who had been on the planet for all of eight years, was diagnosed with brain cancer.   At his tender age, he went through radiation, chemo, and surgery.  The treatment, which was meant to save his life, almost killed him several times.  The chemo was so hard on him that he had to be hospitalized just to be treated.  He shrunk away and he too lost his appetite even though food was necessary to replenish him.  His family is very religious and belongs to a supportive church, but medical marijuana still raises a few eyebrows.  He seemed to recover, but then a few years ago, about the time my boyfriend became ill, his cancer returned.  This time the family resorted to medical marijuana in the form of a tincture.  It helped in a way that the traditional medications did not, and it was a natural substance that did not have any side effects.  The family was a little concerned about what their church would think, but of course, the health of your child will always win out.  And now that he is fourteen years of age, no one can say that he is just doing this to get loaded.  On the contrary, he is lucky if he can get through the day without throwing up and losing weight.

Of course, these are the more serious cases.  People use medical marijuana for a variety of ills, some of them very painful, while others may have a use that causes society to question the need for marijuana.  For instance, if someone takes it for anxiety or insomnia, and it relieves those symptoms, should their needs be taken less seriously?  And if someone with those same symptoms opts to use a natural substance in lieu of sleeping pills and anti-depressants, which have many side effects, can we honestly criticize that choice?  One of the complaints I hear from medical marijuana patients is that they did not want to use Vicodin or Oxycontin because it caused too many side effects, was addictive, and made them into zombies.

Some of us fight for the right to use marijuana without criminal penalties (which I support), but at this point, I am willing to fight this battle so that sick and injured people can find some relief in using marijuana.