Medical Marijuana

This is a sketchy topic to discuss but I feel the need to share my experience so far. Please don’t view me as a "pot head" because I am far from it.  I personally think there is something amazing about marijuana. I believe it truly is a miracle plant. And here is why. 

First of all, do a YouTube search, "Marijuana cures" and you will be bombarded with people stories of how cannabis has cured all sorts of diseases, especially cancer. It’s a tragedy that or government is making research so hard because it is illegal. I think the drug companies in power are stopping research from being done because the legalization of marijuana would cripple their business. For sure. 

Anyways, let’s talk about my experience. I was introduced to cannabis when my younger brother offered me a pot cookie he got from his friend. With my knowlege of canabis now, there was probably around 50 to 100 mg of THC in that cookie. A normal dose is 10mg. This was 4 months ago and I would try anything to relive the pain. So I ate it. Not much happened in the first 30 min - so with the limited knowledge about editable I decided to eat more... and 15 min later I was stoned! I mean really stoned. I was not expecting the body high that I got. I couldn't talk or even think clearly. And to be honest I was freaking out. I was Paranoid! And now looking back I know exactly why I felt Paranoid. 

Here is what I thing marijuana does. When ingesting marijuana your body processes it way different then smoking it. It converts the THC to other compounds that induce a stronger high, and the high can be 4 times stronger the smoking it. But it is this high where the healing can begin. Let me explain...

Besides taking pain away (which it does greatly), I think marijuana is literally a time machine for your mind. Yeah now I sound crazy haha. For me personally (each person is different) when I eat a pot cookie alone (alone is different than with people around, trust me) I start analyzing my life. I go back and look at my childhood experiences and memories and see how they made me the person I am today. It’s like the marijuana slows down your brain frequency and like tuning into a different channel, you tune into a different perspectives on your life. You can make connections you wouldn’t normally notice. Things like houses, people, places all have a history and feeling associated with them. When I had the cookie at my parents house I could literally hear voices from the past and memories would flash before my eyes. At certain times I wanted to cry. Not until you eat the marijuana you can start picking up those frequencies. For me, the first couple times eating the cookies I felt anxious and afraid. This is because my subconcious was opening up and exposing so much information to me that I didn’t know how to handle it. My brain and emotions were overloaded.

It is meditation on these profound thoughts and truths that enable the healing. You can clearly see where and why the sickness is occurring. Where you went wrong. I can tell that my body will take a long time to recover but I can also see the path. I can see how bad I screwed by body up :( I wrote the other day while high this: "The creams made my skin look healthy but my truth was burried. The sickness and longing my spirit would weep through the skin. When I was two months in and looked like hell. That what my spirit looked like underneath my skin-- puke, that is so disgusting, why i would do that too myself."

It is a clear understanding like this that you begin to fully understand. You begin to understand who you are and how we are so tightly intertwined with nature and the energies around us. The artificial creams blocked that perspective and made me sick.

I feel the inflamed skin cells moving up and out of my body now. It is a very very slow process. But I see it and understand it now. Give me another year and I will be a totally renewed person.

 Let me note I sometimes smoke it now but it gives me bad asthma sometimes, so I will continue to eat it. Smoking it is way lighter on a high. Every person experienced eating marijuana/ editable different. And if the edible has butter in it, the high will be stronger because of the way it fuses with the fat proteins. But for me it seems to be helping. What I have been doing is like have 2 days out of the week to "medicate” myself, then take a couple days to analyze my experience and how my body is changing. 

Marijana also exposed to me how f'd up our society is. Living in corporate America you can see how businesses and cooperations choose profits over the well being of others. Not all businesses are bad but there is a lot of greed going around these days. It will be this greed that tests America to its limit, and if the people are not carfull and fight for their freedoms it could overtake the world. 

Anyways, leave any comments or questions below!

Also watch this video (ignore the first min or so where they talk about the bodies haha), there is a place in this video where Joe Rogan perfectly describes the power of editable!  http://youtu.be/TuH5We_WEQo

Amost 5 months!!

So I havent updated my blog in a while mostly because I just wanted to unplug myself and really focus on healing. And healing is what I have done :) I would say I am a little more the 50% through this and the worst has passed!! I am starting to see large improvments even though I still flare a little every other day. I can tell about 50% of my body still has the inflamation in the cells. But that is much better then 95% of my cells being enflammed. And more then 75% of the day the cells show no inflamation, not untill I disturb my skin with a shower or excercise is when I see it. 

I want to re-enforce that getting here was a nightmare that I had to settle with. I lost a lot and my life took a 180 down hill. I lost my job, I lost friends, I lost my girlfriend, I lost money and probably my ego too haha. But what I have gained??!!! Alot! Extreme enlightment is what I have gained. I feel I am closer to my family. I have got to spend a lot of time with my mom, and dad which I am greatful for! I have gained gratitude toward those willing to help me :) I feel loved, and see how important this is in life. Before I felt I was blind, living a fake and somewhat materialistic life that the cortisones provided. I was not facing reality. Now I know why I had to go through this journy. Who knows what I would have become without this experience. 

I still have a long way to go. I feel the 1 year mark I will be near completly healed. But I am healing fast now! I have been able to play soccer and tennis! I have been going to the gym! I am regaing strength and getting intouch with who I really am and the real person under all the false medications I had lived under. 

I have been taking photos of myself. I will post them all when I am healed... But here is a before and after. 

Before (2 month in): 

After: (4 and 1/2 months in) 

End of Month 2 into Month 3

So I have been going through this day by day and glad to say I am almost at the 60 day mark. 60 days is a long time but to me it feels like an eternity. I am not going to lie, this has not been easy. My condition has kept me indoors which really starts to put a toll on the psyche. I really miss being able to go out and drink and just have a good time with friends. I wish I could go to work and have the energy I used to have. I wish I could snowboard and play soccer. I wish I didn't look like shit! But yet I remain optomistic. I know my life will have to change during this experience,  wether I like it ir not, and I am just going to have to get used to that! 

Now to be optomistic I have noticed good improvments :) My legs are no longer swollen, My skin is sweating and shedding way less. I seem to shed every 3 days now instead of twice a day. My skin will turn red, dry and tight then the next day will start to fall off and peel. Each time the skin seems to be a little better. Although at the moment I am in a pretty bad flare :( But after the shedding I am sure I will get a little break again. 

I am trying to meditate and pray a lot. To keep my spirit strong and optomistic. This involves relaxing and trying to free my brain of negative thoughts and contant business. I replace it with a glowing light that penitrates and relaxes my body and mind. If I am lucky I will get an hour or two of scratchless sleep. Which is huge! 

So how about some pics? 

47 days in:

58 days in: 

47 days in: 

58 days in: 

Month 2 - Welcome to Hell!

So my last post in December was pretty optimistic, little did I know I was just on the verge of entering the gates of Hell! Wow these last 2 to 3 weeks have tested my humaity to the core. Infact I think at one point I was close to dying... let me explain!

So things took a turn for the worst right after the 1st of January. Before, I was able to make it through the day, and was going to work. And for New Years I went to a party... it was a little uncomfortable but managable. But after, within the first week of January my skin turned red, full body bright red! Red sleeves and everything. This my friends IS NOT ECZEMA... this is a completly different beast. My skin was on fire! This is Topical Steroid Withdraw. This is what it feel like to rid your body of poison you have been applying your whole life. It took a month to hit my body and it arrived like a brick wall. Let the detox begin...

It was around Jan 9th when I woke up in the morning, looked absolutly terrible and decided to hop in the shower! Bad move! The mixture of pain, my adrinals all messed up, not eating breakfast, and the heat almost caused me to blackout. No one was was home so I just hopped out of the bathroom, cralled to my phone and called 911. I nearly lost conciouness while I waited for them. Luckly they gave me some  food and I was fine. My blood pressure had dropped to a dangerous level. Of course I had to try and describe topical steroid to them which was hard but they were a little understandable. 

So basically for the last couple weeks my skin has been hell and sheading relentlesly! I wake up in the morning and look like a zombie with skin falling off everywhere. Oozing like freaking crazy. I wake up completely wet with ooze. And the grity skin falling off on top of the ooze is extreamly nasty. Very hard to sleep. Luckly I went to the doctor and got hydroxisine, which is an anti histamine to help sleep and calm the itching. I take some around 12pm, wake up around 3am or 4am all sweaty and then go soak in the bath till 8am. Yeah! 4 hours in the tub, but its the only place I can get some good rest! I havent been to work for the last week. Just told them I am taking medical leave... Anyways, this is really testing my physical strength, have resorted to prayer, faith and hope. My parents have been coming over to help and my roommate is making me meals! Having a care tender is important as I have learned I cant manage this all my self! Cant thank the people in my life who are helping through. They are a God sent! Tierd, going to bed now. More later.  

3 Weeks -Things are getting a little better

Things are improving for me at the moment. Hopefully I stay this path. Fingers crossed.  It's only been 3 weeks but the cycles my skin have gone through has been interesting to say the least. Basically its been like 1 or 2 days of intense itching, redness and nerve tingling, and sensitive to temperature, then after the flare my skin stops itching but still am pretty red for a 2 or 3 days, then my skin will peal. Then I am good for about 2 days and then the whole cycle will repeat. I have gone through about 4 cycles but each one is less intense in nature. Also my skin has been getting way thicker and harder to break and cause bleeding. This has been great. And slowly but surly my skin is holding moisture better. A couple weeks ago I would wake up sooo dry I didn't want to move. It felt like my skin could crack so easy. Now it's still dry and a little red but Its much more bearable. I have been snowboarding 3 times in the last 2 weeks and I've think this has helped. It seems to get some adrenaline flowing and the adrenal glands back to a normal state. I know more flares will come but I definitely think overall my skin is in much better condition then without the steroids. I am hoping when spring and summer hit and I am able to get some sun, then my skin will be cured :)

How it begins...Topical Steroid Cordisone Withdraw

I have been using topical steroids my whole life. From hydrocortisone to some of the more potent creams. For the past 7 years or so I have been using Triamcinolone Acetonide 0.1% all over my body.  That is a moderate to strong steroid.

Recently, back before Thanksgiving 2013 my eczema was not getting better, even with the creams. It was all over my body and driving me crazy. I try to avoid the doctor, but I went anyways. I haven't had oral prednisone in a couple years but I knew it would make me feel better, so I asked the doctor to give me some. I also asked for a refill on the triamcinolone. As I was at the pharmacy picking up the meds the pharmacist said "whoo, thats a big jar of cream, I hope it takes you a long time to go through that". She said "don't use that cream for more then 2 weeks as it can cause the HPA Axis to dysfunction."  It my mind I was like ha, I've used this cream for I don't know how long... And then it dawned on me. Perhaps my body is screwed up because of this cream. So when I got home I google the symptoms of long term steroid use, that's when I started coming across some of the blogs and people who have gone through cortisone withdraw. Everything kind of made sense now, the medicine is not making me better, its making me more sick. This is when I decided to stop using the cream.

Ironically I did decide to take the prednisone though, because my body was all torn up. I figured, If I am going to quit steroids lets clear my body up first, then start the withdraw. So I started. For 3 days I took 3 15mg Pills of Predisone, and my skin cleared! I lived this opportunity up as I new this was the last time my skin was going to be better for a long time. Then 3 more days of 2 pills. The eczema slowly started to pop up. then 3 days of 1 pill. The eczema returned, AND then no more pills!  I stopped 12/5/2013

I knew all hell would break loose now. And it did....

Starting the tortures of withdraw.
I was panicking because of what I knew what was to come. I showed my mom and a friend of the video on Itsan.org (very good video by the way) and told them I am going to try it. They gave me positive reinforcement and told me to try it. And so I began. The first 2 days actually weren't to bad probably because the predisone was still in my system. But the 3rd day I was starting to feel it. My body was swelling up, my skin was turning violent red. I felt cold, especially my hands and feet. My skin hurt, like a sundburn almost but deeper inside. I started shaking... By day 4 my glands were swollen as well as my face. Its weird though, my skin didn't have much eczema on it but it was red and on fire. Day 5 was the worse I felt. I didn't go to work. It was painful to wake up and take a shower. I felt sick, my body was begging for the Triamcinolone cream. I almost considered saying screw it and put it on, but I didn't. Then before going to bed I decided to take Nyquil (the cold medicine) because I knew I wouldn't sleep. But damnn that stuff made me sleep. Didn't wake up at all that night. When I did wake up my skin felt gross, it felt matted, felt dead, it was soo dry and painful. At least I felt rested though and my glands didn't feel swollen. I took a shower and put lotion on. The lotion I have been using is Curel Itch Defense, which is amazing stuff. It doesn't leave your skin greasy or too dry, and takes the redness away as well. This brings me to my current day, day 9. My skin has been shedding and falling off now...Severe shedding I would call it. My mattress looked like it had gone through a snowstorm. The good thing is there seems to be new skin underneath, that isn't as red (Although my skin is still pretty red...). My skin is also oozzing in places which is not comfortable at all... My skin feels very tight and dry. Especially waking up in the mornings. I don't like to turn or stretch too much because it feels very uncomfortable. My face is also still a little swollen and red. Luckly it doesn't look that bad yet. The good thing is I feel like I have more energy, it feels like my body has returned to producing its own cortisone or wherever the medication was blocking. Also my skin feels thicker, more natural. I am not bleeding anywhere. Before it was so easy to scratch and start bleeding because the steroids thin the skin. Overall I feel like crap, but feel like I have gone through the worst part. Although, according to others there will eventually be worse times then this. I hoping in a couple months I will be much better but I know some take up to 3 to 4 years to heal.

Here is a pic of my current state (Note I have a cast on because I have a broken wrist from snowboarding):