By Lanny Swerdlow, RN, LNV
At the request of police agencies across California, federal police have mounted an invasion to close the state’s large-scale medical marijuana distribution system that provides medicinal marijuana to California’s one million medical marijuana patients.
By sanctioning this action, President Obama has caused a surge of stress-related problems in California as operators of medical marijuana collectives fear arrest, prosecution, imprisonment and bankruptcy, and patients fear loss of their only source of legal medicine thereby being subjected to the dangers and uncertainty of obtaining their medicine from criminal sources.
The President should be ashamed of himself for causing all these problems as unneeded stress is not a good thing.
Notice I said “unneeded” stress as all stress is not bad. When you are threatened or feel threatened, your stress system kicks in with a stress response. The stress response helps you meet challenges, protects you from danger and enables your body to marshal the resources needed.
That is all well and good, but enabling the stress response exacts a toll on your body so you only want it enabled when you really need it. If you can prevent whatever it is that is causing the stress, that would be best.
Stress, whether controllable or out of your control like when Obama unleashes the federal police, causes serious health problems such as increased blood pressure, suppression of the immune system, increased risk of heart attack and stroke, infertility, acceleration of the aging process and brain tissue degeneration. Stress also exacerbates existing health problems like pain, depression, heart disease, obesity, insomnia, digestive disorders, autoimmune diseases like arthritis and skin conditions such as eczema.
Since President Obama is unconcerned about all the stress he is causing, California’s one million medical marijuana patients and the millions of taxpayer dollars that are being wasted causing the increased stress levels, what can you do about it?
If you cannot eliminate the stress, like quitting your job or having [former New Mexico governor and pro-legalization politician] Gary Johnson assume the Presidency, there are steps you can take to mitigate the negative consequences of being subjected to unremitting stress.
Exercise is the No. 1 treatment for stress and has been proven to have beneficial effects on a person’s mental and physical state. Following Arnold Schwarzenegger’s former regimen of consuming cannabis before exercise will help assure compliance and make the most mundane exercise pleasant and enjoyable.
A good night’s sleep is essential and stress can make that very difficult. A quiet dark cool environment will aid in obtaining the therapeutic benefits of a good night’s sleep. If you are having difficulty falling asleep, cannabis has been used for thousands of year to effectively and safely treat insomnia, especially when it is caused by stress.
Relaxation techniques such as yoga, meditation, and deep breathing activate the body’s relaxation response, a state of restfulness that is the opposite of the stress response. Many people find the use of cannabis to have a synergetic effect when used in conjunction with these relaxation techniques.
A healthy and well-balanced diet that reduces caffeine and sodium intake will counteract some of the insidious effects of stress. Eat healthful quantities of fruits and vegetables and stay hydrated by drinking plenty of water. Significantly reduce or eliminate your consumption of tobacco, alcohol and other drugs as all of these substances have severe debilitating consequences and make it difficult—even impossible—for your body to repair the damage caused by stress. Many people find consuming cannabis can help decrease their use of alcohol, tobacco and other legal and illegal drugs.
Cannabis is an integral part of the above stress reduction steps as well as being beneficial in its own right. These benefits can only be achieved if you can get cannabis, but President Obama is intent on making access difficult and dangerous.
Although he may succeed in closing collectives, it is unlikely he will succeed in closing the Mexican Mafia, so you will still have access. Even so, it would be a prudent course of action to stock up now so as to put off the day when you will once again have to turn to an illicit source to obtain your medicinal marijuana.
Lanny Swerdlow, RN, hosts Marijuana Compassion and Common Sense. The show can heard every Monday at 6pm on Inland Empire talk radio station KCAA 1050 AM and simulcast at www.kcaaradio.com.
