For Greens senator Peter Whish-Wilson, the crack of a temporary tooth cap against an airport lounge peanut was the end of life as he knew it.
What followed was three years of intense pain, fatigue, brain fog and a daily struggle which left him seriously considering leaving politics to conserve what energy he had left for his family.
A gum infection, compounded by an ear infection from surfing in dirty water, laid the conditions for shingles, a virus known for its painful blistering rash.
For Whish-Wilson, the disease made its home along his C3 nerve, spreading across his face, scalp and ear drum. The pain was excruciating. His local hospital administered opioids to try to bring relief. It didn’t work.
By the time the rash healed, Whish-Wilson had developed postherpetic neuralgia, a debilitatingly painful complication of shingles. In addition to the pain was the challenge of extreme fatigue and a brain that no longer seemed able to hold information. He has been told he will most likely have it for life.
“Some days would be perfectly fine and other days I could barely get out of bed,” he said.
“I’ve always been really strong and fit and I’ve never had any health issues and suddenly I could barely walk up stairs. I couldn’t retain information.”
Whish-Wilson said he faced living the rest of his life as a ghost of his former self. He’d tried almost everything medical science had to offer and found no relief. Then a friend suggested an alternative medicine and his “open-minded GP” helped with referrals to specialists.
He was assessed and found to be a candidate for medicinal cannabis. He now takes CBD oil to help with inflammation and the neurological effects. He also takes THC oil each night to combat bouts of neuralgia, chronic back pain from a life of surfing, and to allow him to sleep.
Whish-Wilson said medicinal cannabis – along with lifestyle changes – has given him back a life that for years he considered lost. In the nine months he has been prescribed it, he has been able to return to the gym two or three times a week. He’s able to surf without spending weeks in bed in afterwards.
Whish-Wilson is quick to acknowledge medicinal cannabis is not a miracle cure. He knows it does not work for everyone – and it has taken time and working with his medical team to get his own dosages right. It’s expensive, not all GPs are onboard and it doesn’t work in isolation.
“If it does work for you, you still have to do the work to change all those things you can control,” he said.
For Whish-Wilson though, CBD has also helped bring a focus that has re-energised his career.
“There’s nothing psychoactive about it at all. It just basically took away a lot of the noise in my brain and allowed me to focus.
“I’ve given some of the best speeches in my life on it, where I haven’t needed to make notes – it is all from memory.”
Despite that, the senator was nervous to come forward as one of the estimated 3% of the Australian population using medicinal cannabis. He knows all the jokes – he’s a Greens senator and he’s never shied away from having used marijuana recreationally as a young man.
“But the more I talk about it, the more people open up about their own health issues and want to know more about it. This is about breaking down the stigma that is still attached to a legitimate health therapy that could help more people.”
That point was driven home at a recent cross party parliamentary friends for medicinal cannabis meeting. Stakeholders told the 29 or so MPs interested in learning about its uses, the industry and barriers to expanding it in Australia, about the issues with driving regulations, the cost, competition from the black market and outdated workplace laws which could force people to disclose confidential health information against their will to comply with drug testing.
They also spoke about the ongoing stigma attached to the treatment.
“And they said – do what you can to try and change that. And I had been sitting quietly in the back listening to all this and I thought, here is something I can work to change.
“I’m a senator and this has worked for me – it has been absolute gamechanger. So I thought if I came forward and told people some of my story, it might start some more conversations around this.”
But he hopes his story might spark “some more adult conversations” and lead some people to getting the help they’ve been looking for – as well as help normalise a medicine already used all around the world.
“If anything it has helped my performance but I’m not sure everyone’s going to feel the same way especially in the kind of competitive environments they’re working in or corporate culture, that they’re part of,” he said.
“I think they’re the kind of stigmas that we’re being asked to try and break down. And I can do that by campaigning as a Green who wants to see change, but I can also do it by saying ‘well actually, I’m on this stuff’. I think the more people who talk about it, the more we normalise it as a therapy. And that can only be a good thing.”
