cannabis can do

Last night I had a dream about the THCa cannabis oil I am making for my son Calvin to treat his intractable epilepsy. In it, I was describing its properties to someone, educating them, as I am known to do in daily life. Some might like to call my son's success with cannabis anecdotal. I call it plain, palpable, real.

My husband is generally more cynical than I, but we have both seen cannabis' positive effects. It has helped our son sleep better, a boy whose sleep has been interrupted for years by nasty, addictive, deleterious benzodiazapines, which have never completely controlled his seizures. It has calmed him even in the face of taking high doses of two drugs that cause him to bounce off of the walls. Since taking the cannabis oil, a kind that is high in the non-psychoactive cannabinoid THCa, he wakes happy and content instead of irritable and whining.

Long before cannabis, there were months on end when Calvin used to sit—stupefied—in the middle of the room like a floor zombie and do nothing. The dust bunnies were more responsive than my boy. The drug cocktail (way too nice of a moniker) of zonisamide, lamotrigine and clonazepam sent him into oblivion, yet he'd still have a dozen grand mal seizures every month. His current combo of clobazam, brand name Onfi, a relative of Valium, plus leviteracetam, brand name Keppra, has for over three years caused him to be hyperactive beyond belief, unable to sit still and be read to, or to play with his toys for more than a few seconds before having to get up and move. Thankfully, over a year ago we eliminated the third drug in that crazy concoction, rufinamide, brand name Banzel, that turned him into an anorexic, raving lunatic. Since taking cannabis, Calvin now plays with his toys for several minutes at a time.

Besides being calmer, more focused, happier, sleeping better, walking better and standing stiller, Calvin is having substantially fewer daytime seizures. In the months before taking the cannabis oil he was having one daytime tonic-clonic (grand mal) seizure every three to fourteen days. Since taking a therapeutic dose of the THCa cannabis oil he has had only one daytime seizure in seventy-one days! Moreover, we have weaned Calvin off of 25% of his benzodiazepine, clobazam. By the way, for those of you who hope to do the same, benzodiazepine weans should be done very, very slowly, in 10% increments every several weeks at the very least. Done slowly and safely in order to prevent benzodiazepine withdrawal syndrome—a serious condition that your child's neurologist might not inform you of—weaning can take many months to achieve, perhaps longer than a year depending upon the dose. If your child is on clobazam (Onfi), this can be more easily accomplished using the liquid suspension of the drug rather than cutting pills. Your child's neurologist might fail to tell you that, too.
 
Calvin is still having a small handful of nighttime seizures each month, likely because we do not wake him and struggle to administer his cannabis oil in the middle of the night. Instead, we have increased his bedtime dose and, if need be, we will soon be adding a high CBD (cannabidiol) oil to his bedtime regimen. With luck, the cannabis combo will knock his seizures to the ground, allowing us to successfully continue reducing his pharmaceutical meds.

And in case you were wondering, we have seen ZERO negative side effects that could be contributed to the use of cannabis, only positive ones.

If you live in a state where high CBD cannabis oils or plant strains are not available—and even if they are—consider trying a non-psychoactive THCa cannabis oil, which might be just as effective for your child, perhaps more so, and very likely more cost effective. You can find and download the free Epsilon Apothecaries recipe I use here. It's as easy as pie.

P.S. Cannabis has also proven effective in treating other conditions, including various forms of cancer.

Calvin playing with his toys for over ten minutes