Legalize It…….

The Illinois Senate has passed a bill that would legalize medical marijuana. The next step is to pass the bill in the House. I had heard rumors about this for years  now so it may be a few more years before the legalization is complete.

I think this is good news on the one hand. I don’t feel that marijuana is a dangerous “drug”. Instead, I see it as a potent herb. The brain rot that is associated with this herb is also proving to be false. Not long ago, the results of a study were announced. Red Wine and THC  (rats didn’t roll joints and toke away, so I assume they were fed a liquid version in food)   were both proven to grow brain cells. Yes, grow them. The excitement of this study had a great deal to do with the potential of helping Alzheimers patients.The Red wine study went on to gain more press coverage while the THC study seems to have gone underground. The researchers on the red wine study were confident while the THC people were cautious in their statements.

On the other hand, if you keep tabs at all on the states that have already legalized medical use of marijuana, you know that a battle rages with the Feds. Drug raids on dispensaries, patients who grow their own for medical use are also raided, plants confiscated and patients arrested.

The opponents argue old school style, that is they bring up notions that are reminiscent of the first war on the herb, fueled by personal agendas and societal fears that belong in a bygone century. I leave it up to the reader to research the history in the United States.

Like all herbs, not everyone will need it. And like say……codeine, some may become habitual users. That is just human nature in the first place and then there is biological and genetic reasons that one may become a habitual user of any drug.  I personally can’t see doctors around here prescribing marijuana. Its like pulling teeth to get them to give any kind of pain killers (as I found out recently). They prefer to send you off to specialists like physical therapists in order to keep the medical profession thriving and the patient as uncomfortable as possible thereby dependent on the parts of the  system that insurance pays a lot for.

I grew up in a hippie area. I knew lots of pot heads. They didn’t progress to heroin as the commercials will have you think. The brain rot? Maybe its the ZigZag papers or the glue on those papers and not the drug? Maybe its pesticides? Have you ever heard somebody tell a story of smoking pot and getting high only to find out later they were ripped off and had bought a bag of parsely? And yet they got high anyway? Maybe brain rot works the same way. Smoke this and you will be a vegetable and so we have stereotypical pot  users convinced that they are vegetables.

I don’t claim any of the above to fact. Merely speculation.

As a mother, I don’t fear drugs in general. I am the responsible party when it comes to raising my kids and I have been pretty open about drugs in that we talk about them, not as taboo things but as a reality. I talked to the kids about medical marijuana and asked them one simple question. “If I used it when it became legal, how would you feel?” They thought it was  joke and kept on joking but I don’t think that they found it odd in anyway. They just thought the idea of their mom being a pot head was too funny in the same way they laugh on the rare occassion that I get a little too tipsy!

At 16, they are not invovled in drugs. They have friends who do smoke pot and they are not tempted as of yet. We keep that line of communication open. If they want to do it, they will tell us. I know many parents think their kids will  lie about it but mine wouldn’t. Besides its not like I couldn’t tell.

So what are the potential problems that you all see if marijuana were legalized for medical use? Do you fear it would be legalized across the board and then all hell will break loose? Just how would the legalization make children more vulnerable to using drugs? I can’t see it myself. So tell me if I’m missing something.