I am going to admit something I really shouldn’t.  I am a pot smoker. Not frequently, because the truth is with my life it is really hard to get it.  Where do I go, my son’s school?  My daughter’s daycare?  I can’t simply stop someone on the side of the road and ask them where the best place to get the stuff is?  And even if I did, where am I suppose to stash my kids so I can go pick it up? And where are the published prices so I know that I am not getting ripped off?

I have always respected and followed the law to the best of my ability.  I don’t even speed that much.  But this is one of those “prohibition” laws that just doesn’t make much sense to me.  I understand both sides arguments, I just question the necessity of the argument.

I suppose I have a liberal view of the drug because I have used it successfully for years.  I started it in college because it was the cool thing to do, and have continued throughout these many years.  I certainly abstained when I was pregnant, not because of any direct fear, but more the knowledge that risking myself was fine, risking my child was never fine.  Because there was never a definitive study on what it could do to the development I wasn’t willing to risk it.

Taking drugs when you are bipolar is risky, in of itself.  You don’t know how the drug is going to react with the thousands of other pills you are taking, and you don’t know how it will effect the basic chemistry of the brain.  Heroin, cocaine, LSD scare me to dealth.  Not because I care whether you take it, but because I don’t know how those chemicals will interfere with the chaos I am already experiencing.  I can’t imagine watching Pink Floyd’s The Wall, high on drugs.  I would probably just kill myself.

But marjiuana and bipolar is an interesting combination.  For one thing, more than any pill I have ever taken, it instantly and completely calms me down.  I have sometimes extremely painful tremors; in my hands, in my hips, sometimes in my jaw.  After hours of basically shaking, my muscles and joints radiate pain.  Marjiuana literally stops the tremors and I can always, always breathe.  I know in seconds if I have a good product in my hand, simply by how fast the tremors stop.  And they stop cold turkey, and it almost feels like the band around my chest has relaxed and that deep breath I have been longing for is right there.

And then there are the voices.  Marjiuana doesn’t take the voices away; I don’t think any drug can take the voices away.  But it does limit those voices to one or two; and usually those voices are in harmony, if that makes any sense.  They become softer, not as intrustive. They become a parrell to me instead of perpindecular.  And as a woman who suffers these overbearing and oftentimes discontant voices, harmony is sweeter than a Mozart symphony.

When I participate in these drugs I don’t do it while my children are awake.  I certainly don’t do it at work, or when driving.  I do it after a long day, when the night is just finding its stride, and the ability to be calm is not only something I am capable of, but something I can actually have.  My life is my life, and it simply doesn’t allow much time for peace.

I don’t think those with bipolar should necessarily try this drug.  I don’t think that those who want to try this drug should use a disease as a reason.  I simply don’t like to tell anyone what to do with their own bodies.  I don’t have that right. What you do to yourself, is your right.  God gave it to you, by giving you a brain, a heart, and sometimes a soul.  Now when said person violates others, that’s when my right to interfere is engaged.

I don’t advocate drug use, but I don’t condemn it.  What really worries me, is this idea that those that don’t know, that haven’t educated themselves are going to tragically die.  Mold on marjiuana is no better than mold on fruit.  Salmonella isn’t easily detected but it can be there.  Do you know how to spot it?  Could you spot it?  We take so much for granted with this drug, that my concern is for all those who trust in a system that is broken.

The rage and the anger about this drug will continue long into the future.  There are still women protesting alcohol and that has been legal for decades.  As marjiuana gets more popular and more available, the problems with the distribution with begin to be regulated. But at what cost?  When does a government body step in? After four deaths of mold? After 100?  The fight is coming and will continue to come, but who will be brave enough to find the solutions?

Don’t discount marjiuana if you have never tried it.  Don’t use your own prejudice to create answers that don’t follow questions.  Don’t forget that the fight you are so admant to fight, is taking a very real place of a fight that needs fighting.  When you are speaking about the degradations of pot, you are not speaking of children’s hunger, child abuse, or even the cure for breast cancer.  There are only so many hills to fight on, pick the one you need to fight.  If it is still this one, good luck to you.

In the meantime, I am going to long for another day of peace and cannibas.  I am going to dream of the time I can stop shaking, the voices quiet, and the peace that so easily eludes me is still enough for me to catch up.  I am going to long for a day when that much deserved tranquility is as easily to obtain as a kiss from my child.