Let This Be the Year for Medical Marijuana
Two years ago, at the age of 31, a diagnosis of multiple sclerosis turned the life I'd known upside-down and signaled an end to my career as a commercial pilot. Now, forced to break the law to have some semblance of a bearable existence, I am appealing to the New York State Legislature for help.
My career in the air began in the Army in 1993, where I was a paratrooper with the 1st Battalion 501st Arctic Parachute Infantry Regiment at Fort Richardson, Alaska. Since then, I've trained at flight schools and become an FAA-certified airline transport pilot. I've been a pilot for US Airways and flown corporate jets commercially for several different companies.
But now, at 33, I have had to relearn how to walk three times. My disease has progressed rapidly, and the pain -- ranging from pins and needles to shooting pains throughout my body -- never goes away. At times my arms and legs move on their own, twitching all over uncontrollably. I feel sick to my stomach frequently. Falling asleep is a chore. I've dropped 20 pounds due to the illness.
I've been on several different medications, but the help they give is limited. One medicine really does increase my appetite, ease the sick feeling in my stomach, help me fall asleep and calm the pain and twitching, but it's illegal: marijuana.
So every day I am forced to break the laws of the state of New York in order to use the medicine that does the most to relieve the constant torture I've been condemned to live with. But it doesn't have to be this way.
Thirteen other states -- home to one-quarter of the U.S. population -- permit medical use of marijuana. These laws protect patients from criminal penalties if they use medical marijuana as recommended by a physician to treat MS, cancer, AIDS or other ailments that cause severe pain, nausea or vomiting.
In New York, medical marijuana legislation has passed our state Assembly twice, only to stall in the Senate. Now, identical bills -- A.B. 7542 and S.B. 4041 -- have been introduced in the Assembly and Senate, and a change in Senate leadership has given us hope that 2009 will be the year that this simple, humane measure will finally become law.
All that is required is for our representatives in Albany to stand up and do what's right.
That medical marijuana is helpful for some patients who don't find relief from conventional medicines is no longer in question. Studies published in recent years have confirmed that it can be particularly helpful for what's known as neuropathic pain -- pain caused by nerve damage, precisely the type of pain those of us with MS must endure.
And it's clear that the existing medical marijuana laws -- including those in nearby Vermont and Rhode Island -- have protected patients without causing problems for law enforcement or increasing drug abuse.
Medical marijuana laws passed overwhelmingly by popular referendum in blue states like Michigan and red states like Montana. Here in New York, polling has shown overwhelming public support -- including among registered Republicans and Conservatives.
But we don't have the ability to change state laws at the ballot box. If patients like me, simply seeking relief from the symptoms that haunt us every day, are ever to avoid living in fear, it will require our state legislators to stand up and protect us.
This should be the year. I don't want to be a criminal anymore.
