MARIJUANA DISPENSARY RAID WAS OUT OF LINE

I am writing in response to the recent shutdown of the Metrotown
Medicinal Marijuana Dispensary.

There has been a new wave of these shutdowns by the RCMP in B.C. since
June.

Unless someone needs to use medical marijuana dispensaries for their
medicine, they may not understand the importance of having them
available to us, the patients.

Unless they have been prescribed opiates for long term usage, they
cannot understand the anxiety of waking up in the morning and not
knowing what day it is or where they are. Sure, these moments are
momentary but they cause great anxiety and stress.

The simple things like writing a letter to a friend become so
challenging as you sit in front of the computer and try to figure out
what to do next.

Try making yourself a meal to eat and forgetting it's in the oven.
Some may say they've done that before, but I can bet it wasn't on a
daily basis.

Try going to bed and forgetting to lock the doors--or not--but getting
up seven or eight times just to make sure.

I'm sure you haven't cried in pain as you try to go about your morning
bathroom duties because the opiates are destroying your kidneys. Or
spent hours vomiting your dinner because now the opiates have attacked
your liver.

These are all things that happen to you when you have to take
prescribed opiates for long term usage.

Opiates were designed as a means to make the dying feel comfortable.
Now they prescribe them for headaches. Do you not see the "wrong" in
this?

Those of us who have gone through this and who still are know how the
so-called "cure" to the effects of our illnesses destroys our lives,
and far too much how it feels to die from the inside out.

We have chosen a safer route to manage our illnesses. I suffer from
Fibromyalgia. It is debilitating, much like Multiple Sclerosis without
the plaques. I live with excruciating pain on a daily basis.

The opiates were destroying my kidneys and I did not want to be on
dialysis in the future.

I chose to use medicinal marijuana and I have gotten my life back. I
can function again.

My head is clear--I'm sure to your surprise. I can paint and sketch and
garden. I can volunteer in the community. I can walk my dog and play
with my grandson. I can run my business.

I am alive.

I depend on the dispensaries to make that possible. I know many others
who feel just like me. Closing the dispensaries is wrong. It would be
like denying pharmaceuticals for those of you who need your heart
medicine or insulin.

It is hard enough to have to choose between your food and your
medicine (because you see, our medicine is not covered by any
insurance) without also having to deal with the stress of the drama
that this drug war has created on a daily basis.

Look at the research, please. It is not the dispensaries, nor the
grow-ops, nor the cannabis plant that have created the situations you
fear. It is the war on drugs.

Taking away our needed dispensaries will not put an end to that war,
it will only help fund it.

While we, the people, take the time to respect and follow legislation,
perhaps the police could take the time to study, to research, to find
solutions. To understand.

D. Williams

via email