Cancer and Pot...some answers and input

Factual Questions
1

Friend of mine has damn nasty stomach cancer. His stomach was removed, along with part of his esophogus, and now he’s getting chemo and radiation. What he has for a stomach is now very high up in his chest, and he finds eating very unpleasant. He gets ill, his lungs interfere, it’s really a drag. But he’s lost all the weight he can afford to, and he must start eating.

All his doctors are begging him to smoke pot.

Questions:
We are in California… does anyone know exactly how the pot law works? Can I get it for him? Does he have to grow it? (Not that any of this makes a difference, but we’d like to be as within the law as possible, if possible)

Would eating it, assuming he could, be as effective at waking up his appetite? And wouldn’t he need about 10 times as much?

Any other tips or tricks? his biggest problem is that he doesn’t want to cough, because coughing upsets his stomach.

All input welcome.

Stoid

2

I haven’t a clue about the laws in CA, so i can’t help you much there, but…

First of all, if he doesn’t want to cough, make sure to get ALL the seeds and twigs out of the pot. Seriously. Seeds and stems (even very small ones) can make the smoke very harsh. They can give you a headache too, and FWIW, seeds contain 0% THC, so it’s pointless to smoke them (unless you want a badass headache). Also, something i highly advise is to use a water bong to smoke out off. Get a bong, put the water in it, and drop a few ice cubes in it. Let it set for a minute to chill the water down, then smoke it. You will be amazed at how smooth it makes the smoke. I mean REALLY amazed…

Yes, you can eat it! I’m not sure on the exact ammount, but i have a friend the makes the BEST pot brownies in the world. He simmers the weed in some butter to get it nice and soft before cooking and a lot of other special things. I haven’t talked to him in a while, but i will try to contact him for the recipe. If i recall correctly, he used an ounce of pot in 1 pan of brownies. Like i say, i will try to contact him.

Oh yeah and one other thing… if you don’t already own a bong, you will have to make a trip (no pun intended) to the local head shop (planet K, gas pipe, etc) to buy one. BUT, make sure you ask for a water pipe, not a bong! It’s the same thing, but (at least here in TX) you’ll most likely get thrown out of the store for saying bong. They’re just scared of the cocks…, er, i mean cops… :wink:

I hope this helps, and please try the ice thing, you won’t regret it!!! :slight_smile:

-Dani

3

Dani Filth: regarding the HD question I’ve just thought of another explanation. You’re imagining it… :slight_smile:

4

<bugs bunny voice> Ehhhh, could be Doc…</bugs> :wink:

-Dani

5

I don’t know much about the specifics, but this article might be of interest:
http://www.salon.com/people/feature/2001/01/31/marijuana/index.html

It seems to me that your friend just needs to find a doctor that will prescribe it for him. Growing it himself would take a lot of effort.

6

Well, first things first:

This is incorrect. Seeds do have a measurable amount of THC. In fact, the DEA once seized 17 truckloads of hempseed at the Canadian border because they contained THC. Of course, it’s totally legal to import THC-containing seeds for use in birdseed (in fact, birdseed was specifically mentioned in the original law banning pot), but that didn’t stop the DEA.

I will, however, agree with you that the stems and seeds make for a very harsh smoke. I usually dump mine down the garbage disposal.

How to smoke pot without coughing

Of course, the easiest way is to take very small tokes. The bigger the hit, the greater the likelihood you’re going to cough up a lung.

Another way, which most people have never heard of, is to vaporize the pot. This involves heating pot to the point of THC vaporization, but not to full combustion. The vapors have sort of a piney taste and are not as likely to make you cough since you’re inhaling no smoke. Any head shop, online or IRL, will be able to sell you a vaporizer. Prices range from $30-$400.

Eating

I really don’t recommend this. It doesn’t really produce too much of an effect on me even though I’d use doses that were several times what I’d normally smoke. However, some people swear by it and say it’s simply wonderful. YMMV.

The main reason I don’t like eating pot, though, is that it simply tastes vile! I’ve made pot brownies, cookies, and a pot/vodka solution. Each time, I had to try my damnedest to choke the stuff down without throwing up.

Medical pot in CA

I think you can get a special “pot card” to show any policeman who might be harrassing you. I’m sure that’s how they do it in Oregon, but I’m not positive that that’s how it’s done in California.

As far as obtaining medical marijuana, I think the laws allow for a certain number of plants - it’s 7 in Oregon. If you don’t want to grow it, cannabis clubs may be able to help you out by selling it at costs far below what you’d pay on the street. Check out http://www.marijuana.org for California-specific information on medical marijuana.

7

You’re probably already aware of this, but I should mention it anyway.

Federal law supercedes state law. The feds can and WILL bust you for medical marijuana, especially if you’re vocal about your use. Read up on Todd McCormick and the late Peter McWilliams, who insisted throughout his trial that he wouldn’t live to see a day of jail time due to advancing cancer and AIDS. He was right. He died shortly after sentencing. The most depressing thing is that the poor guy spent the last months of his life fighting this when he should have been enjoying what life he had left.

The goverment thinks nothing of throwing dying people in jail for totally victimless crimes. Hell, many of them probably won’t even live long enough to suffer any ill effects that the pot could cause!

People wonder why I hate my government. What they’re doing is downright evil and most people really don’t seem to care all that much. sigh

8

Stoid -

I don’t know anything about the CA laws; best check there for details. There are a couple of organizations that were set up to help inform people on the issues. I think they still have the buyers clubs, too.

From my spouse’s experiences:

  1. Tell your friend to be careful to not smoke too much. A very small amount (one or two light tokes, depending on equipment and tolerance) generally relieved nausea and improved appetite. More than that, including getting stoned, generally caused nausea worse than you started with.

  2. Eating probably wouldn’t be very effective, because you have to eat it first and then wait quite a while before it takes effect. In addition, it is much harder to control dosage. IME, eating didn’t work at all for this type of problem.
    You can get a prescription for medical marijuana, but last I knew (some years ago) it was an oral compound (capsules). You had the problems listed above for eating pot, plus it just didn’t seem to work. BUT, if you can get the scrip, at least you have an excuse if you get drug-tested, eh?
    As far as coughing, what they said: clean the pot well & dispose of all seeds & stems, and use a water pipe (ice does help). I’d also advise getting a carbureted pipe, which allows you to take a small toke and then ‘wash it down’ with lots of air. If you don’t use a carburetor, just take a very small puff on the pipe and then inhale lots of air. The idea is to dilute and cool the smoke so that it is less irritating. You can always take more hits instead of deep hits.

Eating. neutron star is right - pot brownies are disgusting. I almost threw up the only time I tried them. I have no idea why people think those two flavors go together. I’ve smelled & tasted other pot recipes - pot just tastes nasty. Except for my secret recipe, of course. :wink:

9

The drug you’re referring to is Marinol, a synthetic form of THC. People who take it report that it doesn’t work nearly as well as pot. This could be due to the fact that pot has several hundred chemicals in it. THC is just one of them.

Curiously, Marinol had no problems whatsoever in being approved by the FDA. They readily acknowleged THC’s medical uses. Strange that the plant that contains this drug still sits atop Schedule I, designated as having “no medical uses.” Yup, makes a lot of sense to me, too. :frowning: Well, actually it does make sense when you consider that the pharmaceutical industry is one of the top contributors to political campaigns and would stand to lose a lot of drug sales if medical pot was legal.

After all, a few extra bucks is always far more important than the lives of some piddly little AIDS and cancer sufferers. :rolleyes:

10

Sheesh you guys…you aren’t supposed to actually eat the pot itself…you saute it in butter, then strain the pot out and throw the pot away…the butter is what you eat, either spread on toast or used in some kind of recipe…like brownies.

11

I don’t want to turn this into a Great Debate (though it might head there anyway), but I can’t just let this non sequitur pass by without comment.

Marinol is a single substance with defined dosages that underwent clinical testing. It is the kind of thing the FDA can approve; if a substance isn’t harmful, it will be approved. (I admit that I’m generalizing and simplifying wildly.)

Marijuana is, as you say yourself, a complex organic substance with hundreds of chemicals, many or all of which may have some separate (and quite likely contradictory) effects. It also has no standard dosage, and the levels of all these chemicals can and do vary between samples. There’s simply no way to do a laboratory evaluation of its effectiveness; there are too many variables to control for.

Generally, the advance of medicine has been from using naturally occuring organic substances that tend to have some beneficial effect to isolating the particular chemical or chemicals in that substance, controlling dosage, and administering only the active chemical in a controllable form. I understand the desire to have effective anti-nausea agents, but, at the same time, no one is talking about the amazing advantages of chewing willow bark over using “dead chemical” aspirin. (I’ll skip over the usefullness of an anti-nausea agent that has to be swallowed for now – we could easily conceive of more useful delivery devices for THC, such as an asthma-medicine inhaler.)

12

Along with what Dani Filth mentioned a water pipe (bong) is probably the best way to go. Unfortunately getting one isn’t as easy as it once was. If your friend lives in an area where obtaining one is difficult or impossible try the following:

[note: bong-making instructions redacted by manhattan]
As to the legality of smoking marijuana I wouldn’t sweat it too much in your friend’s case. Small amounts purchased from someone you KNOW and kept for personal use in the privacy of your own home will almost certainly never get noticed. Presumably your friend won’t be driving or operating heavy machinery while under the influence.

Ironically the government’s insistence on keeping marijuana illegal makes it easier to get in some cases. When I was in high school I had a helluva time getting my hands on beer (which is legal but controlled) but I had absolutely zero problem getting my hands on pot (and I do mean zero…in some cases I could even have it ‘delivered’ to me).

Go figure…

[note: On the theory that if a piece of drug paraphanalia is unavailable in an area it is because they are illegal there, I have removed the instructions on how to manufacture one. -manhattan]

[Edited by manhattan on 03-08-2001 at 05:39 PM]

13

I don’t know why i didn’t post this before, but Jeff_42 reminded me with his post. You should visit http://www.yahooka.com (get it? a parody of yahoo.com) for answers to this. It’s the best website i’ve found dealing (no pun intended) with mj. It’s kinda a pot search engine. There you will find anything you could ever want to know regarding laws, making pipes, rolling, drug testing, EVERYTHING. Enjoy. :slight_smile:

-Dani

14

Oh yeah and Krispy Original, i believe that’s what my friend did with his brownies, sauted (sp?) the weed in butter and threw the weed out.

-Dani