The Old New Miracle Drug

This is one goes out to the single fastest-growing population of marijuana users: older Americans.

Yup, we gray hairs are jumping into the medical and recreational pot thing with both feet. At a recent holiday party, it was all people were talking about.

Well, pot and an apparent overdose some experienced because they ate seven or eight brownies laced with the stuff when they were supposed to have one.

I guess they were new to the most recent miracle drug.

There were no reported serious aftereffects from their excessive dining experience except for the shakes and an evening of paranoia.

But let’s slow down a bit and see what we oldies are really diving into.

There has been a lot of coverage about the health benefits of pot and the oils extracted from it – but I’m not sure I’m convinced.

Yes, the market for pot products is expected to hit $146 billion by 2025 – just six years from now. That’s a big number, and it looks like there’s a ton of money to be made. But hold on…

Pot-derived CBD – not the THC that gets you high, but the oil extracted from it – is said to offer health benefits for things as serious as cancer, mental illness and chronic pain.

What concerns me is that the so-called “pot doctors” in the clinics offering medical marijuana aren’t necessarily MDs. One article called them “budtenders.”

And what I have been reading indicates that this doesn’t work for everyone. The advice being offered if CBD doesn’t do the trick is to add some THC to the mix.

(That’s the part of pot that gets you high.)

Another article stated that CBD may not work the first time you use it, but you should try again. The article also referred to pot use, whether through oils or otherwise, as a “journey.”

The last time I heard anything like that was when a friend sold me a bag of pot back in 1970. No, I’m sorry – he said to have a good “trip,” not a journey.

We’ve come so far – but not really.

People are being encouraged to experiment with pot and its oils to see if they work for them.

The medical professionals I know tell me there are some health benefits from pot: some pain and anxiety relief. My neighbor swears by it for back pain. But it also seems that some of the relief comes from the hallucinogenic part of the weed – THC.

Heck, we knew that 40 years ago…

Well, if it helps with pain, I say go for it. It can’t be any worse than the opioids doctors have been doling out for decades.

But please, let’s call THC use what it is… getting high.

If CBD doesn’t work, the pros say to add some THC to the mix and keep trying.

Now that’s funny: doctors telling us to use THC oil.

But the money this will make is not funny. This market is real, and it is exploding. So take a look at it as an investment or as a good party addition.

I guess with the advent of oils, rolling papers is now a short…

Good investing,

Steve