MARIJUANA HAS BENEFITS

I want to inform Judy Nathan (letters, May 25) about my mother. I was there
with her in 1991 when she had her breast removed because of cancer. I was
there with her during the chemotherapy treatments and the radiation. I saw
the tatoos they put on her so they could pinpoint the spot they wanted to
irradiate. I helped her when she was sick and couldn't eat.

Even to this day, I don't know how to react to the helplessness I felt at
not being able to help her all that much. But when my mother asked to smoke
a little marijuana to try to get the feeling of hunger again and eat, you
bet your life I found her some.

Here we are, 10 years later, and my mom is still a survivor. The two puffs
she could take back then, in one way or another, helped her eat and
survive. Was it the pot. I don't know. What I do know is that she requested
something that she felt would help her. Isn't that the important thing
after all, that the patient felt it would help.

Like it or not, marijuana has a very defined medical benefit to the user.
For some reason, the plant appeared here on Earth. It was part of creation
somehow, some way. The decriminalization of marijuana to stop filling our
jails with marijuana possessors is a sensible and responsible thing to do.
It is not a ploy on anyone's part for any dark, sinister secret to obtain
the drug.

I hope that someone would help Nathan in her time of need. I hope that
someone has the compassion to help her feel better each and every day of
her life. That's what my mother taught me: love yourself, love other
people, and most of all love life.

Greg Harris

Springfield