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FROM THE MAGAZINE

The Faces of Medical Marijuana: An Interview With Mark Pedersen

BY LARRY LECHUGA

Due to the contamination caused by a lead-smelting factory located in Herculaneum, Missouri, Mark Pedersen fell ill and was diagnosed with “fibromyalgia with severe migraines,” a debilitating condition whose symptoms Mark manages through the use of medical marijuana. Although Mark is incapable of working a full-time job on account of his illness, he has managed to become a dedicated medical marijuana advocate—he founded not only the Cannabis Patient Network, a substantial collection of interviews featuring medical marijuana patients, but also Sensible Missouri, a statewide patient union of medical cannabis users.

Could you tell us your age and occupation?

Mark: I am 52. I’ll be 53 on March 8th. I have been disabled and a medical cannabis patient for over 14 years now. I occasionally get some side work as a computer consultant, which supplements my disability and helps with the traveling and expenses for the Cannabis Patient Network. Prior to becoming disabled, I was a certified welder and pipefitter, working in power plants for our local electric utility, Ameren/UE. I also had a computer consulting business that I founded, Serenity Computers, and a benevolence ministry, Victory Storehouse. Victory Storehouse provided a food pantry, counseling, and assisted with electric and gas bills and related services. I worked on average 80 hours a week. It all went away when I got sick.

You are very involved as a medical cannabis activist. Could you tell us a little about your current projects, the Cannabis Patient Network (www.cannabispatientnetwork.com), as well as Sensible Missouri (www.sensiblemissouri.org)?

Mark: Up until 2006, my involvement in the medical cannabis movement was largely limited to writing blogs and contacts with state representatives and senators. In April of 2006, I left Charleston, South Carolina, bound for San Francisco, California, with a group called Journey for Justice 7. I drove a support truck and was the on-road coordinator for the project, which featured three bicyclers. The lead biker, Ken Locke, who headed up this project, is also a medical cannabis patient. Our purpose was to educate people across the country about the benefits of cannabis for the treatment of the chronically ill. That was also when I began collecting the testimonies of medical cannabis patients on video. Following 4½ months on the road living out of a tent, I spent another two months in North Carolina collecting additional interviews, returning the following two years to continue the work in North Carolina.

Though many of my interviews are from North Carolina and my home state of Missouri, I have conducted interviews from all over the Union. To date, I have recorded over 150 interviews with patients suffering from multiple sclerosis, muscular dystrophy, fibromyalgia, epilepsy, chronic pain, migraines, breast cancer, lung cancer, testicular cancer, lymphoma, acoustic neuroma, skin cancer, brain aneurism, Crohn’s, lupus, Ethlers- Danlos Syndrome, post traumatic stress disorder, stuttering, chronic depression, and anxiety, other mental issues, neuropathy of the feet, neurological pain due to paralysis, and many more that I don’t venture to try to spell or pronounce. Every week, I am contacted by more patients wanting to be heard, wanting the opportunity to tell their story.

Real people with real stories. The only thing that has held me back from having literally thousands of stories has been money. Though I live quite frugally and have become accustomed to a very Spartan lifestyle on the road and at home, it takes me a very long time to save even a few hundred dollars. So most have to wait. For
some, whose life struggle is day-to-day, even a month or two is too long.

From the beginning, I have strived to make Cannabis Patient Network a means to give a voice to the chronically and terminally ill. In states like Missouri, my many interviews have formed a workable grid of contacts. Forming a statewide patient union, like Sensible Missouri, seemed to be a natural progression. As Sensible’s mission statement puts it, we’re “…committed to the task of ‘unionizing’ the chronically and terminally ill of Missouri so as to create in them a bargaining body in regard to all issues regarding the medical cannabis patient.”

The time is over for the sick of our state to remain a spectator in this devastating war that holds their very lives in balance.

I’d like to ask you a question or two about your Cannabis Patient Network — it’s a pretty impressive achievement. I’ve seen some of the videos, and it seems that as you interviewed people who use medical cannabis, things got a little emotional at times. These were people who really had gone through a lot and depended on cannabis for relief. What was the emotional journey like for you as the interviewer? Are there any lessons you took away from your experience interviewing so many medical cannabis patients?

Mark: It’s hard to sit through story after tragic story without being touched. There is a common thread that ties them all together. My personal story is just one in the mix. Perhaps that is what has given me the curious ability to gain the trust of otherwise reluctant and silent individuals. For whatever reason, this work has grown exponentially, building on previous interviews. It hasn’t been easy. I have grown close to everyone that I have interviewed. Sitting through their testimonies and the hours of editing that follow, I experience their pain and their isolation.

When I close my eyes at night, I see their faces. The thought of even one of these precious folks fading away into obscurity without being heard is unconscionable. I’m convinced that most people don’t realize the power they have in their personal testimony.

All we have to do is tell the truth. Our own, personal story. That’s all. The world wants to hear it. They know that the drug companies are killing us. What they don’t know is that cannabis could very well save their lives, or at least, make them more tolerable.

As you have noted, you are a medical cannabis patient yourself. Could you give us a little background about your medical condition?

Mark: It was there in Herculaneum, while remodeling my home that I was exposed to very high levels of lead, cadmium, and arsenic. Soon after, I became very ill. After an exhaustive line of expensive medical tests at the hands of the best physicians and specialists St. Louis had to offer, my condition was labeled “fibromyalgia with severe migraines”—hardly a suitable description for the agony I suffered daily.

Most weeks, I experienced two to three moderate to severe migraines a week. Each migraine was like a mini seizure, with a little more of my short and long term memory disappearing with each episode. The pain, weakness, and confusion made it impossible for me to work. I had to leave my well-paying job with Ameren, close my computer consulting business, and shut down our much needed food pantry.

Later, my wife and I lost our cars, our home, and eventually our marriage. In 2001, my eldest daughter passed away unexpectedly from the illness that has affected my whole family, including my two surviving children, my now ex-wife, and just about everyone we knew there, in our hometown.

During that time, Herculaneum was on local and national television regarding the large number of varied illnesses due to the pollution that the local industry has created. My ex-wife and I, along with other residents, were featured on local news programs and on the ABC News Program 20/20.

Presently, I live alone in a small, modest apartment in St. Louis. My activism consumes virtually every part of my life. Fielding questions from patients via email, Facebook and telephone, as well as editing video and writing, pretty well sums up my average day. When I’m lucky, I pick up a little side work with the few clients I am still able to service on occasion. That supplements my disability and helps keep me off the streets. It also keeps gas in my car and helps to pay for my trips.

Bad days (I still have bad days) are spent on the couch or in my chair—usually alone. Fortunately, I have been blessed with generous friends who have sustained me with medicine, for the most part. When cannabis is not available, I’m sick; very sick. Though the fibromyalgia pain comes and goes and the degenerative joint disease in my shoulders and lower back has been slowly progressive, it’s been manageable so far. My migraines are perhaps my greatest fear. It’s been very long since I have had a bad one. But as lean times have shown me, they are a constant companion.

Have you tried medication other than medical cannabis to help you manage your condition?

Mark: As has been the case with many of the people that I have interviewed, I have run the gamut with prescription drugs. Because of my relatively long list of general practitioners and migraine and ENT specialists, I have been on everything including anti-inflammatories, muscle relaxants, opiate pain relievers, anti-depressants, and even Ritalin. The pharmaceuticals did little to control the headaches. Back in the day, my
migraine specialist occasionally injected me with experimental drugs, often with horrific results. The memory of laying flat on a bed for twenty four hours with an I.V. in my arm, an ungodly pain in my head and uncontrollable nausea—with the sensation of worms crawling under my skin—is permanently ingrained into my memory.

My stomach used to be constantly upset; from the illness and the continually changing regiments of prescription drugs. I rarely knew which symptoms were caused by my disease and which were caused by my conventional pharmaceutical treatments.

Has medical cannabis proved to be a more effective alternative than the medication you have tried?

Mark: I discovered information regarding cannabis and its treatment for fibromyalgia in an obscure comment on a fibromyalgia newsgroup. Since pharmaceutical regiments only exacerbated my illness, I saw little harm in trying cannabis. What followed was anything short of miraculous. After just a few weeks of dosing with cannabis, my short and long-term memory began to return—a bonus I didn’t expect. The pain from the fibromyalgia lessened substantially. After a few months, my migraines became largely nonexistent. Now, after over 14 years, my memory has continued to sharpen with the years. My ex-wife and I often joke about the fact that I have a better memory than she does; how I often recall obscure memories that are decades old—with startling clarity.

Are there any particular strains of cannabis that are especially helpful in relieving the symptoms of your condition? Which?

Mark: The first profound relief that I experienced came from very poor grade Mexican brick, believe it or not. As my good friend George McMahon told me in an interview that I did of him, even the poor grades of cannabis, like what is grown for him and the other IND patients in Mississippi, can be life changing.

However, my migraines did not completely subside until I began regularly dosing with true medical grade cannabis. For me, I have experienced positive results from many indica/sativa blends, like White Rhino, Jack Herer, G13, and Great White. Though, I’m sure there are a host of different varieties with similar blends that would be every bit as effective.

How do you intake your medical marijuana (joints, baked goods, vaporizer, etc.)? Do you find any method of intake more effective than others?

Mark: I prefer to vaporize whenever possible. Unfortunately, my work requires that I am on the road a lot. Consequently, I must rely on smoking my cannabis much of the time. I have respiratory problems as a result of my illness, but that’s not a problem as long as the cannabis that I obtain is medical grade — properly cured and free of contaminants like mold and dust.

I do, on occasion, consume baked goods made from “canna-butter” when available, but I have generally found that they are not conducive to daytime medicating in that it’s far more difficult to regulate the dosage. However, I have found that one to three cookies that are made with a predominantly indica strain, taken roughly 30 minutes before bed time, are an excellent treatment for insomnia, without the hangover and other side effects that accompanies pharmaceuticals like Ambien.

Thank you, Mark

Do you have a medical marijuana story of your own? We’d like to hear your story. Email to us at: faces@the420times.com.