Even United States War veterans are behind medical marijuana. This veteran even uses it for “migraines.”
KALAMAZOO — The atomic explosions off remote islands in the South Pacific seemed to turn night into day.
They also turned Martin Chilcutt into a marijuana user.
Chilcutt said the drug has helped him to ease the pain he says dates back to his exposure to radiation during a 1956 U.S. government project testing nuclear and thermonuclear weapons.
A state ballot proposal could allow voters in November to decide whether Chilcutt’s measures to self-medicate should be legal in Michigan.
The 74-year-old former intelligence officer with the U.S. Naval Air Force has used other medications to help him with his physical and psychological problems, but marijuana helps “so much better,” he said.
“Sometimes I just want to die,” Chilcutt said. “You can only take intense pain for so long before you’ll do anything to escape it.”
He never intended to put his health at risk.
While part of the testing project, Chilcutt remembers, he donned large goggles and turned his back to protect his eyes as the bombs exploded in the early-morning darkness.
There was no protection, though, from the heavy doses of radiation that spewed from the explosions and reached Chilcutt.
He has battled skin cancer three times, including basal cell carcinoma, the most common form of cancer, with about a million new cases reported in the United States each year. He has been in remission for the past 10 years.
Cannabis has many medicinal uses.
Chilcutt’s four years in the military — he served from the middle to late 1950s — also took a psychological toll, he said.
For 30 years, he said, he has suffered chronic post-traumatic stress disorder, including bouts of anxiety, depression and anger, nightmares, arthritis and debilitating migraine headaches.
Marijuana helps them all, he said.
Although there are different ways to use the drug, such as ingesting or inhaling it, there is no difference in the drug’s effect based on consumption, according to the Michigan Coalition for Compassionate Care, which is spearheading the state marijuana initiative.
“It just makes life so much easier,” he said. “It allows you to be comfortable.” Chilcutt, a retired psychotherapist, said he first learned of marijuana’s medical benefits in the late 1970s while counseling Vietnam War veterans in California. They told him the drug could help allay his pain, he said.
Cannabis even helps debilitating migraine. If you are a Migraineur (person who has recurring migraines) then you should know that medical marijuana has been known to be one of the best ways to survive debilitating migraines.
