Medical Marijuana

[pinkynose]

Hey Crazy Joe.
Not be able to sleep has probably been the biggest problem I have had with my symptoms. Everyone one of the "prescribed" drugs I have taken that help me sleep have a trade off the next day. Whether it be feeling hung over, lack of energy, memory problems, etc. None of them were enjoyable. Now, mmj is a different story. Even if the strain did not seem to help my symptoms it did help my mood. Rarely was I hung over and if I was it left with my morning coffee. Enjoy your time in California. I did.

NatWest, I am not going to Cali right now. I was referring to when I was making plans for a prior trip.

[Rustsmith]

Joe, I was eating a 10mg THC chocolate each evening about an hour before bedtime. I never even felt the slightest bit of buzz from the THC. I would feel more from a half glass of wine. But what I did get was a dramatic increase in the number of hours that I would remain asleep. I went from 3-4hrs/nt to 7-8hrs/nt with so side effects the next morning. So, the mmj was doing something that prescription sedatives cannot, namely give me more than a couple of hours of sleep. What the mmj was not able to do was allow me to reduce either my DA or my gabapentin doseage, at least not for the one-night experiments that I was able to conduct. I am therefore counting the days until I get there and can once again sleep "normally".

[crazy joe]

Thank you Steve.. I am counting the days for my experiment trip to the Bay area too... This seems so promising. Hang in there Steve....Still planning Colorado too where my cousin can see me only in Jan 2016 in Pueblo

[NatWest]

Good morning, everybody. I know a number of you are trying mm, and some of you are even considering moving to an mm state, so I wanted to give you an update on what I’ve experienced so far. I know this is long, but I wanted to provide as much info as I could.

First, using a vapor pen with a high CBD content definitely does give immediate relief to rls symptoms, and for the 1st 3-4 months, that relief lasted all night. Then it began to last only a couple of hours, and I needed to add something to help me stay asleep. So, I began taking high CBD tinctures. These worked great at first, and I’d get a good solid 4-5 hours of sleep from each dose, but then I had to start increasing my dose, from 1 dropper full to 3 droppers full. Then these began to wear off more quickly. Next, I added edibles, baking cookies, first with 1/8 tsp of mm per cookie, then 1/4 tsp per cookie. Worked great at first, but then I went from 1 cookie to 3 cookies before bed, and now it seems to not work at all. This may be a matter of not having found precisely the right strain of mm to combat rls, or maybe I need to increase to ½ tsp per cookie. At this point I don’t know.

After about 8 months, it appears that rls builds up a tolerance—just as it does with prescription meds. There is definitely immediate, short-term relief available, but I am still looking for something that will last through the night on a regular, long-term basis.

I’ve recently discovered that dispensaries do not always have the products you are looking for in stock. They cannot order specific products, but rather have whatever the distributors bring to them. The vapor pen cartridge I’d been using was recently discontinued, so I’ve had to find a new one that works. The cartridges cost about $45 for ½ gram, so it can be expensive to experiment, and since it’s not legal nationally, there’s little research to turn to. Unless someone at the dispensary has rls, you probably won’t get precise info on what will work best for you.

Finally, it is not strong enough to combat the symptoms that occur during withdrawal from da drugs, which can be brutal, and last for days. But you won’t know for sure how it works if you are still on other drugs. It might possibly work for augmentation, but, since I went completely off prescription meds I don’t have experience there.

I hope some of this is helpful to those of you who are considering making a switch. I know rls is different for everyone, but thought I’d share my experience so far. I plan to stick with it, but it’s an ongoing project!

[crazy joe]

so once you are on MM for more than 10 days and no DA drug does this qaulify for drug free holiday?

[ViewsAskew]

so once you are on MM for more than 10 days and no DA drug does this qaulify for drug free holiday?

Not sure what you are asking....are you saying that if you stop DAs but use MM, would that be a drug-free holiday? If so, no it would not.

The only thing that qualifies as drug free is not drugs, prescription or otherwise. No kratom, no MM, no pharma, etc.

if I misunderstood, please let me know.

[figflower]

Here's an article designed I believe for highschool teachers to help them teach student's about marijuana/THC's (and other substances) affect on the brain and its mode of action. Have to keep hitting the "next" button but it's a very short read, yet right on point. Seems THC enhances release of dopamine, so Ann is right, not much different from DAs. I would imagine same is true for CBD? And since this is the non-prescription section I might as well mention that I believe that potassium can also cause a fairly quick sharp pop of dopamine. And like Marijuana it probably has to be in the right form at the right time, in the right amount. Potassium is scientists go to substance to evoke a release of dopamine from the brains of mice. Of Mice and Men? I'll see if I can rustle up an article on potassium and dopamine.

http://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/t ... ne-opia-11

[figflower]

Here we go, a study where scientists (as they usually do) used a boat load of potassium to evoke a release of dopamine from the striatum of mice. I've tried it. It works for me. I had to take more than the recommended daily allowance for potassium, it took a full hour to kick in and it only provided a few hours of relief. But that's me. And I assume that after awhile I would have to up the dose. Or not? But maybe that's why people get relief of RLS from a banana for a few nights and then not. Same reason people sometimes get relief from the DA's for a few nights at a certain dose and then not. And it sounds like that's happening with MM. Potassium is cheaper and more readily available:

http://www.researchgate.net/publication ... _male_rats

[NatWest]

I tried Potassium a year or two ago, after an rls webinar reported that studies had indicated low potassium levels might contribute to rls symptoms. I took it in pill form for 4 months (along with eating lots of bananas). For me, there was no relief from rls. My blood test results showed my potassium levels were very high, above the normal range. At this point I stopped taking it. And, unlike the da drugs, Requip and Mirapex, there was no withdrawal to go through. I just stopped and that was it.

While, to my knowledge, there have been no scientific studies done for mm and rls, they have been done for other diseases and medical conditions. Addiction and withdrawal have not been reported in the studies I have read about. A close friend of mine used high THC mm to help her get through chemo treatments. When she stopped, there was no withdrawal.

Pretty much everyone I've talked to has suffered addiction, withdrawal, and side effects (such as augmentation) with Requip, Mirapex, and other da drugs, while the same has not been true for people using mm or potassium. So that would be one difference.

Thanks for your post, I had not seen this report before.

[ViewsAskew]

I tend to go back to the theory that there truly is an underlying difference in us in some way - or that something is at issue that is extremely dependent on each person's state, so that this item only works if these conditions are present. After ten years here, I've seen many people such as NatWest who get no relief from the easy, OTC, mineral or supplement items that you see many report about. And, seen others who did get relief. For every one that someone reports here (or elsewhere), there are several people here or elsewhere who've tried it without success. I am not saying not to try - just to temper hopes. The hardest thing I've found is having my hopes dashed, over and over. Even now, after trying minerals, supplements, diets, things alone and in combination....I still get my hopes up at least a little when I hear of something. In the last few years, I try these more to report to the group, rather than with too much hope. Yet I'm a bit surprised at how much I really wanted it to work and how sad I am that it doesn't.

[NatWest]

Thanks, ViewsAskew, you've summed it up nicely! If we could all figure out what our triggers are and eliminate them, that would be helpful, but, again, they seem to vary widely for each individual.

[figflower]

Me personally, I think MM is a great emergency med and probably has numerous health benefits that have yet to be discovered. Remember when alcohol was demonized? Now it's a heart healthy substance and doctors are encouraging their patients to enjoy a glass of red wine with dinner. On the other hand, I also know that there was a point in time when cigarettes were thought to confer some health benefits. Few substances are all bad or all good. I believe nicotine has been shown to benefit Crohn's patients, but that's about it for cigarettes. So too may come a day when marijuana is used as is red wine. I think we should all have as many substances in our arsenal as possible.

Nat, if you took some marijuana in the morning or all day long, as you did say the bananas and potassium pills would that daytime marijuana help an attack of RLS at 1am? I'm not recommending potassium as a supplement or a cure, and with the outside possibility of magnesium and uridine monophosphate, I too have not found a supplement that is a long term cure, including iron. What I'm saying is that if scientists routinely use potassium to evoke a quick large pop of dopamine in mice why can't we do the same? I'm not recommending that we get our potassium levels up, I'm recommending that it could be yet one more substance that encourages the release of dopamine when we want to sleep. And like MM, it probably has to be in the right form, in the right amount, at the right time. My only emergency med is iron. I could take iron all day long, every day, but when I get an attack at 11am then it's obvious that it's not working, at least not when I take it by day. But if I take one tablet of iron bis-glycinate with water at 11am when I have that attack and my stomach is empty, I'm down and out. And the same is true for MM, you have to take the right kind at the right moment. I haven't experimented enough with different types of potassium to know which ones work and which ones don't. I've only used cream of tartar. The relief was so short lived. Iron provides a full night relief. I've even used iron when I was restless (not RLS) and couldn't sleep and it worked. A lot of people swear by a tablespoon of mustard in water right before bed. It didn't work for me but my stomach was not empty so I will try again. Yuck!!!

I refuse to play the victim card, or claim that my RLS is different from other peoples and poo poo what works for other RLS sufferers. If it works for someone else and it's not cyanide, I'm trying it. And I'm trying it in the same way, at the same time and in the same amount that they did. Nat, I am 99.9% sure that if I used the type of MM that provided you with relief it would do the same for me. How long that relief would last at that dose might vary between us but a DA is a DA and RLS is RLS. And a cold is a cold. Your cold may last two days, mine may last three. Your cold may cause you to sneeze, mine may cause me to cough, but few people these days are claiming colds to be some strange unusual condition with numerous variables and causes. I believe the same is true for RLS. You know why doctors tell us to wash our hands, because that's a common way to catch a cold. You know why Dr. B has a whole list of substances to avoid, because those substances are bad for people with RLS. Or do you know why he prescribes DAs (or used to) because they worked for the majority of his patients. That's why DAs and iron infusions work for so many of us and why anti-virals work for colds.

The similarities between those of us with RLS are profound. Much more so than cancer or MS or eczema or IBS. Those have greater variables and sources and treatments. Don't get me wrong, RLS is one of the worst conditions on earth, but thankfully scientists have done a tremendous amount of research in this area and like colds and viruses, we pretty much know that RLS is caused by shoddy dopamine receptors that most likely got that way and stay that way because of low brain iron. And we are so very lucky to have that knowledge. Think about asthma, what if we never found out about allergens, and thought people had defective lungs. People would be dying left and right. What if we never found out about dopamine receptors and thought it was due to defective legs. People would be killing themselves left and right because amputations wouldn't work. There's always going to be someone that thinks their cold or flu isn't caused by a virus but personally, I don't care, I'm charging full steam ahead with that fact and I'm going to take zinc (a natural anti-viral) despite them. Or maybe if I'm miserable enough I'll take a prescription anti-viral or get a flu shot. Thank heavens researchers ignore those people who say their colds and flus aren't caused by viruses and charge ahead in finding good vaccines each year.

[NatWest]

Hello Figflower,

Unlike da drugs, which are taken to be in your system 24 hours and prevent rls, mm can be taken when rls occurs, and it will stop the symptoms in a few minutes. It works great for immediate relief, including if you wake up in the middle of the night. An edible, eaten at bed time can be in your system in about 2 hours, and can last up to 6 hours. It--mm--is a little more trouble than swallowing a pill, but it doesn't have the side effects of da drugs, so I consider that an advantage, and I'm willing to put out a little more effort to avoid those negative side effects. I think the immediate relief would be effective for a majority of rls sufferers, but the amount to take for longer lasting effect will vary from person to person. There would not be any reason to take it in the morning unless you were having symptoms and were unable to get up and walk around. And really no reason to take it all day. I just take it right before bed, if I go to bed at 10 pm, I would take it at 9:55 pm.

[crazy joe]

Yes Ann---- drug free holiday was anwsered correctly---- off everything for 10 days... that sounds brutal

[Rustsmith]

Figflower, the article on THC was interesting. But it only addressed the THC component of marijuana. That was appropriate for an audience of high school teachers who need to address marijuana use by teens, but does not address what may be the more important parts of medical marijuana. The marijuana (and hemp) strains that are being developed to treat children with epilepsy, cancer chemo, migraines and quite possibly RLS are the strains that are high in CBD and have much lower concentrations of THC. CBD is thought to be the component that helps with pain and sleep where THC creates the high/stoned feeling. This article talks about how the mechanism for how CBD provides these benefits is still not known. It appears that CBD can function with a number of neural receptor sites and the ones that are important have not yet been identified. If only it were possible to do more mmj research, but as long as it is a Class 1 drug, no researcher in the US is going to bother with all the red tape to get funding and to actually do the work. There are much more accessible low hanging fruit to pick.

https://www.projectcbd.org/how-cbd-works