Three-year-old Josie Mathes takes doses of cannabis oil every day in order to combat the seizures she gets from her condition called Infantile Spasms. When she first started on the medicine, she was experiencing 500 to 1,000 seizures per day. Now she is down to about 30 "on a good day."
Three-year-old Josie Mathes from Greene County, Tennessee, wakes up every morning with the normal morning routine of most toddlers – but along with something extra. Josie receives three doses of medical cannabis oil daily to decrease her seizures.
She began having seizures at two months and then was diagnosed a month later with a medical condition called Infantile Spasms, a magnified form of childhood epilepsy. Her development then began to be delayed, not only because of the condition, but also the seven total seizure medications she was prescribed, none of which were working at all.
Josie’s mother Stacie worried, as any mother would, about the wellbeing of her then less than 1-year-old daughter.
“Her little body was already addicted to the medications she was on,†Stacie said. “She had withdrawals, agitation, her appetite decreased.â€
With Josie’s condition simply worsening because of the medications, Stacie desperately sought another form of numbing her daughter’s pain. She saw an article on Facebook about Tennessee’s 2014 medical CBD bill; however, she did not immediately make the connection about how it could help Josie.
“Not long after, I reached out to an old friend after remembering an article in our local paper about them moving to Colorado to treat their daughter with cannabis,†32-year-old Stacie said. “From then on that was all we researched and studied.â€
Stacie and her husband Logan, a police officer, decided this was what would help Josie the most.
“When doctors give you no hope and a prognosis of a few years, you will seek a treatment that is safe and natural – cannabis is that,†Stacie said.
The family wanted to relocate to Colorado immediately to get the oil for their daughter, but it wasn’t that simple.
“In October 2014, we traveled to Colorado to obtain to her medical card,†Stacie said. “We were then put on a waiting list, which was one more reason we couldn't move as quickly. In January 2015, before her first birthday, we flew to Colorado to get it.â€
Tennessee’s bill allowing medical CBD oil let the Matheses bring the oil back home rather than move to Colorado, unlike if it was a THC product.
“CBD (cannabidiol) works as a neuroprotectant amongst other things and has no psychoactive feeling or ‘high,’ Stacie said. “THC (tetrahydrocannabinol) offers great benefits, even if given to a child, small amounts are very sufficient and can treat many illnesses.â€
Stacie said she often heard uninformed questions from people who were not fully educated on the topic.
“No child smokes it; no parent blows smoke in the child's face,†Stacie said. “It's given orally in an oil form – a very unbelievably small amount in comparison to all other previous medications, and she doesn't mind taking it at all.â€
Stacie said it did not take effect immediately. Josie was on four medications when they first got the CBD oil and had to been weaned off those, which took 11 months.
But Stacie noticed that as she gave her daughter less and less prescription seizure medications, and very slowly started the cannabis oil, Josie’s seizures went down drastically, and “she started to have life about her.â€
 “She smiled and giggled for the first time in her life,†Stacie said. “She cried – it's like she never had emotions. Josie laid as though she was a baby doll in a catatonic state. We actually began meeting her for the first time.â€
Josie’s seizures have decreased from 500 to 1,000 per day when they first began trying the oil to now about 30 a day. Her condition has become more controllable thanks to the cannabis oil, but Stacie and her family are not done pushing for the reform of medical marijuana laws in Tennessee.
“Because of her seizure type, THC would greatly benefit her, as well as other cannabinoids,†Stacie said. “Current Tennessee law only allows for CBD up to .9 percent. We are advocating again this year for a full medical cannabis bill that will allow for multiple conditions with the possibility of in-state cultivation.â€
Stacie and her family have been working with a few Tennessee congressmen, namely Rep. Jeremy Faison (R-Cosby), to introduce a bill for medical cannabis in state legislature.
Tennessee legislator Jeremy Faison, R-Cosby, holds Josie Mathes. Faison is one of the Tennessee legislators working with the Mathes family to make it easier for children like Mathes to receive the medicine needed.
Faison’s bill would allow Tennessee residents to obtain medical marijuana cards from their doctor if they are diagnosed with a qualifying condition. They would then go to a dispensary in Tennessee to obtain a marijuana product made in Tennessee.
“I see the good in that plant,†Faison, who met Josie when she was just an infant, said. “There are some very sick people and little kids in Tennessee who this would help.â€
The bill failed to be approved through the Tennessee Senate, and Faison took it off committee.
“(People who disagree with the bill) don’t believe it – they just think it is a snake hole and will bring a bunch of potheads into the state,†Faison said. “They also don’t like that the federal government is still against it.â€
There will now be a task force for the bill to meet a few times over the summer to discuss the benefits and drawbacks of the bill, Faison said. But Faison and the Mathes family will be pushing relentlessly for it up until the next election season.
Arkansas passed a bill allowing medical cannabis last election season, and surveys show that the red state of Tennessee is warming up to the idea. Tennesseans for Conservative Action surveyed 600 state-wide Republican voters, and 52 percent said they would support medical cannabis.Â
