After years of watching a cruel, incurable genetic disorder called Dravet Syndome rob their daughter of her basic bodily functions and send her into convulsions that caused head injuries and broken teeth, they had reached the end.
Then, in an act of desperation, or inspiration - or maybe both - Matt called Paige from overseas, where he was working, and suggested a radical approach to Charlotte's treatment.
"We need to try cannabis for Charlotte," he told Paige. "We live in a compassionate state."
Fifteen months later, Her seizures have dropped from 1,200 a month to three, and the ones she has are shorter in duration and less severe. She's off all the other medications with their troubling side effects. And, as one of the youngest medical marijuana patients in Colorado, her dramatic turnaround is starting to draw national attention, with a CNN report on the horizon.
"Charlotte, when I first saw her more than a year ago, she was listless, really lying in her mother's arms. She did not speak, she could not walk," says Dr. Alan Shackelford of Denver, one of the two doctors who recommended medical marijuana for her. "And when I compare that child to the little girl who bounded into my office when I last saw her, and laughed and danced, it was a different human being who was there."
To Paige, there is no other explanation for the stunning reversal in Charlotte's condition than the marijuana.
"That plant is worth everything to me," Paige says.
No comments:
Post a Comment