‘I’d Rather Be Illegally Alive Than Legally Dead’: Boy Using Cannabis Oil To Treat Crohn’s Disease (VIDEO)

June 18th, 2015

Awake Goy

Coltyn Turner is 15 years old, but he has already endured a lifetime of pain. Turner has Crohn’s Disease, which he developed after he almost drowned at Boy Scout camp in 2011.

“He got a bacterial infection, and we thought that it was all it was, but what happened is it triggered Crohn’s disease,” his mother, Wendy Turner, said in a 2014 interview. And that day changed Coltyn’s life forever.

Since developing the disease, Coltyn’s (and his parents’) life has revolved around his illness. “The last three years have revolved around Crohn’s disease, doctor’s appointments and hospital visits. It was hard,” his mother told KSDK.

In February of last year, the family was given three options: surgery that would stunt his growth, medicine that already was not working, or cannabis — which would mean a move to Colorado. The family chose the final option — something that is becoming increasingly common for parents desperate to get help for their children.

“We had already been researching [cannabis] because he had been sick for so long and nothing was doing anything right,” Wendy said. “It really can’t hurt anything, the only side effect that it could have, was that it may not work. The decision to go with the cannabis was that there wasn’t any side effects, so we just picked him up and left.”

Since moving to Colorado, Coltyn’s condition has improved. His mother told the station that he’s doing “great,” and joked that they should “buy stock in Doritos.”

Coltyn’s symptoms have largely disappeared since beginning his cannabis oil regimen. The teen has done so well on his medication, cannabis oil taken four times a day, that he has gone from being wheelchair-bound to climbing mountains.

“I was just on every pharmaceutical there was out there until I wound up in a wheelchair,” Coltyn said

Coltyn Turner, via CBS

Coltyn’s mother refers to her family as Colorado refugees. To obtain Coltyn’s medication, they had to uproot themselves from Illinois — but Wendy says that there are some difficulties because of current marijuana laws.

“He’s a prisoner in the state of Colorado because of medication,” she explained. “Coltyn can’t go, he can’t go back home, he can’t go see his friends, he can’t go see his family, he is stuck in the state of Colorado… He can’t live a normal life in the place where he grew up and the place where he has six generations of family. It’s just tough.”

Ultimately, to Coltyn, his life as a prisoner in Colorado is worth it. He said:

“I’d rather be illegally alive than legally dead.”

“It’s great because I can finally do stuff that I wasn’t able to a long time ago, like I can finally ride my bike after three or four years, shovel snow, hike mountains and it’s just amazing,” Coltyn said of his situation. “It’s had a larger positive effect on me than any other pharmaceuticals have, and the pharmaceuticals, all they did was make it worse.”

Coltyn’s case was highlighted at a Marijuana and Health Symposium at National Jewish Health on Saturday — just one of numerous cases in which cannabis and its derivatives have been central to helping patients cope with severe illnesses.

“We are very proud of this program in terms of the potential,” said Ken Gershman with the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment said. Gershman says that nine current and upcoming studies are exploring marijuana as a treatment for anything from insomnia to inflammatory bowel disease and post-traumatic stress.

“We can’t bury our heads in the sand. We need to learn more and make sensible decisions based on evidence,” Gershman said.

Currently, marijuana remains a Schedule 1 drug at the federal level — something that may cause some problems for Coltyn as he gets older.

While cannabis is legal under state law in Colorado, the state Supreme Court recently ruled that Dish Network was legally able to fire a medical marijuana patient –a quadriplegic man — under the company’s Zero Tolerance drug policy when the employee failed due to the THC in his system.

The court ruled that medical marijuana patients are not protected from termination over their medication because there is no exception for medicine under federal law. In fact, federal law says that marijuana has “no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse.”

Not everyone has the option to move to Colorado. It’s time to do something for millions of Americans who could benefit from marijuana as medicine. To truly help people like Coltyn, we need to change the laws. Period.

Watch Coltyn’s PSA about his disease and cannabis oil, below:

Featured Image via YouTube

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