- You have to understand this medicine
in order to fully make use of it.
There are two critical principles.
Number one is strain selection.
You have to have the right strains.
And number two is the dosage.
So if you don't get these two right,
you're either too stoned or you're not cutting the pain
or whatever the symptoms are.
So (inhales deeply).
So there's about, there's two puffs (inhales deeply)
and (exhales loudly).
(calm instrumental music)
I'm already feelin' the relaxation, so within seconds.
(calm instrumental music)
We threw a great medicine out to the state of Arizona,
but no one's helping people understand how to use it.
And I caught a vision of somebody that could help people
that really wanted to use this medicinally,
not recreationally.
Here? - No, just--
- Here. - Right here.
- The head. - And I say preventative
maintenance is better than-- - That's exactly it.
- We've been married 62 happy years.
- Not happy, they're wonderful.
- The secret is a sense of humor.
- Yeah, we tease a lot,
we kid a lot. - Yeah, we kid a lot.
- But I never gonna get better.
It's gonna get worse and worse and worse.
- [Bill] Okay, I can live with that.
- Yeah. - Especially 'cause
you can live with it. - Yeah, I can live with it.
- [Bill] So what it's about is making life manageable.
- Just gonna push this little button down quickly,
and I'm gonna wait for it to turn green.
(exhales loudly)
(inhales deeply)
- [Bill] Do you see she pulled in some more air
after she put it away? - Yeah.
- [Bill] That's, we gotta get it way down here
in your deep lung, okay?
- So it's just a little bit.
- Now in. - Now inhale.
- [Bill] And I'd watch these old people,
and they had no idea what they were doing.
Pull away. - Pull away, don't empty it.
- Just hold it! - Hold, hold, hold!
- [Bill] Exhale as you want.
(exhales sharply) - How's that?
- [Bill] That's why we call ourself a coach.
We can help people reengage because
of what we've been through.
- I don't feel my neck clicking.
- Good!
That, there's what we, there we go right there.
- So it did make a difference, dear?
- Yeah!
I had all this bone clicking.
- Her nurse suggested Bill Meeks and Dorothy Meeks.
You have to start somewhere
to get some ideas of what to try and how to try it.
'Cause we wouldn't have any idea.
We're not familiar with cannabis.
It's not a cure-all, but-- - Well, no, but it's a--
- It feels a little better.
- You feel a little more relaxed.
- The medicine works for you.
We just have to be consistent about it.
So when the old man says, hey,
how 'bout a little more medicine, the answer is yes, okay?
(calm piano music)
Born in Arizona, Safford, and moved to Tucson
when I was just a little guy.
CDO High School, we moved up,
where I met Dorothy goin' to school.
I made All-City as a high school football player.
I had pro tryout with the Canadian Football League.
Decided by about age 21 I was about as broken
as you can imagine, I mean, physically I was a wreck.
And I started with the sheriff's department in 1978.
Worked the streets, was with the undercover narcotics team.
Worked my way from the streets
all the way up to assistant chief.
And in 1984, I was in a really bad car wreck on duty.
Back was hurt really bad,
but nobody diagnosed it for 20 years.
So I went into my doctor, I said,
Doc, I can't do this anymore.
He said, "You're retired," and that was the first time
I got a prescription.
This is what I took every day of my life just for pain.
We came up with a nickname for the guy that took that pile.
We called him Morphine Bill, and Morphine Bill was a jerk.
I'd be in bed 12 to 14 hours a day and then sit
on the couch for the rest of the day eatin' pills!
My boys came down from Washington,
and they said, Dad, this has gotta stop.
I said, what do I do?
They held up a newspaper, and it said,
Medical Marijuana, We Dare You to Research It.
And I laughed at 'em.
Do you really picture your dad, an ex-cop,
a Mormon boy, I don't drink, I don't smoke,
I don't do anything, do you really picture me
smokin' a doobie? (laughs)
- Hi, welcome to NatureMed. - Hi.
- Thank you. - Thank you.
- [Receptionist] Oh, have you been here before?
- Yes. - A few times, okay.
So I set out a research project to prove 'em wrong.
I need a quarter of Blueberry Kush.
- Okay.
- And then I need one gram of the Gold Label,
but I need heavy, heavy indica.
I studied and studied and studied,
and the more I learned, the more I realized
the problem was not with cannabis,
it was with my personal biases.
- Dr. Who, no way! - Smells really good.
- Really good, okay.
- And there's the Berry.
Just because our society calls it evil
for so many years doesn't make it evil.
The study shows that it's a very beneficial plant.
- When they started talking to me about using marijuana,
I said, absolutely not, absolutely not.
I mean, why would I tell my children
that that was wrong in the '70s,
and now I'm gonna say it's all right for me now?
- I was raised in the '60s, so we knew the other side
of experimenting with it.
- A lotta people have an idea that, you know,
you do medical marijuana, you walk around
like Cheech and Chong.
If you do recreational marijuana, you will. (laughs)
But medical marijuana's a different thing,
a sustainable long-term treatment plan.
- I've been, was on oxycodone for 30 years,
gradually increasing.
My primary doctor said, "We've gotta get you off of this."
We'd been trying, she'd been trying for several years.
- A lot of these people are just trying
to keep their pain at manageable levels.
A lot of our geriatric population
are on 20 or more medicines, and that' a problem.
Polypharmacy is a big problem.
It's not unusual to see Mrs. Jones
on 10 milligrams of oxycodone four times a day.
- It's hard to understand how bad I was before
and how depressed.
(calm guitar music)
- She was just balled up on the sofa.
Hopelessness, just pure hopelessness
because of undaunting pain.
- [Kathleen] And I didn't know how to go about doing it.
So I was really happy to find out
there was such a thing as a coach around.
- I think she woulda quit all on her own.
- On the 6th day of April, I started my program
with Bill and Dorothy.
I had withdrawal like you wouldn't believe.
I mean, really bad.
And I got through it, it took me a year.
But on March 31st of 2018,
I took my last oxycodone.
I couldn't have done it without the marijuana,
and I still forget where I came from.
I still have a lot of pain, but nothing like
I used to have, nothing like I used to have.
And my children and grandchildren are like,
wow, grandma, you look so different
that you did last year! (laughs)
- There's a medical purpose and a medical use for this
that can change your life.
By and large, it'll be symptom improvement,
reduction of pain, reduction of muscle spasms,
and improved sleep.
- I've slept better than I have in my life.
I just sleep like a baby when I use this.
- So let's just keep goin' the way we're doin'.
- Life has really picked up.
A lot more conversation between the two of us,
where before when you're in pain,
you're just in your world.
And so I don't feel as isolated now.
- If people ask me today what is the most rewarding
thing I've ever done, it's not my police career, it's this.
Besides our marriage and our four children,
it's the most rewarding thing we've ever done.
- Nobody's ever shamed us, but sometimes you think,
you know, maybe that person isn't as friendly
(laughs) as they were before maybe.
You know, people have their biases,
and I can't do anything to control that.
- I got 28 grams of flower.
I got 280 milliliters of coconut oil.
- [Dorothy] Our bishop knows, our state president knows,
and they're very supportive because they see
what good we're doing to educate people
and help them to learn how to use this as a medicine.
- It is a medicine, and we respect it.
In 2018, the world that we're talking right now,
there is an obvious conflict between
federal law and state law.
The checkpoint down there, the federal officers
are seizing people's medicine, and that's wrong.
- I really seriously think that if
the opioid crisis wasn't coming to a head,
that this would probably be delayed further.
Because again, it's a stigma about something being illegal.
- I don't understand why it cannot be legalized
and why it can't, why you can't get some insurance relief.
You know, if it's doing me more good
than the oxycodone was doing,
I just don't understand why the government
feels so strongly about not making it legal.
(calm guitar music)