My Sweet Remedy
By Jacob L Massler
The cannabis industry is establishing itself as a legitimate business and the people who work in that industry are your neighbors, your brothers, your cousins, and your friends. Above all, we are members of the community who want to help make Richmond an enjoyable city to live and to do business.
For 17 years I lived and breathed home design and furnishings. I helped build an amazing company, The Wooden Duck, with my own blood, sweat, and tears that produced wonderful reclaimed and recycled furniture. But there was always something missing in my career: I wanted to help people and contribute to a larger good. The cannabis industry has provided me the opportunity to bring relief and natural medication to those who need viable and medically necessary alternatives to the current offerings of Western medicine.
One patient in particular comes to mind when I think of those for whom cannabis has been a godsend: my own mother. For years my mom was riddled with debilitating headaches from a botched eye survey and lived in pain, which plunged her into depression. She was prescribed opiate after opiate. These opiates would mute her pain but also interfered with her ability to actually live. In other words, the pain relief they provided came with its own debilitating cost.
Cannabis provided an alternative for my mother that turned her life around. Not only was she able to live pain free, but she could also function. The opiate fog had dissipated and the depression broke as well. It truly worked a miracle. The medicinal pain-relieving alternative to big pharma’s opiate paradigm is here and society needs it. The number of opiate prescriptions has jumped from 76 million in 1991 to 207 million in 2013. THC and CBD, the active pain-relieving ingredients from Cannabis provide pain relief and an option that is highly less addictive and destructive to the health of the patient. My mother is living proof.
Not only is cannabis providing a wonderful medicinal alternative to big pharma, the medical Cannabis industry has become sustainable business. Medicinal sales in California alone topped 2.7 billion in 2015, accounting for more then $49.5 million in state tax revenue alone and more in local revenue. In 2013, the city of Richmond grossed over $250k in taxes and more in operating permits. With the increasing revenue, the windfall could help save Richmond from the projected $21 million budget deficit by 2021.
Green Remedy Collective is, and will continue to be an active part of the Richmond community. We love helping our patients and we love our community. See you all soon.