The excruciating pain of MS made me want to chop off my legs with a chainsaw – but medicinal cannabis gave me my life back

A person with multiple sclerosis was in severe pain and wanted to cut off her legs with a chainsaw, says marijuana changed her life.

Alexandra Fisher was diagnosed with MS in 2014 and had to quit her job as a part-time athletic trainer that year because of her pain.

The 51-year-old, from Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, was confined to a wheelchair after the NHS prescribed medication to ease her chronic pain.

But after being dosed with medicinal cannabis in 2021, Ms Fisher claims she can now walk her dog again.

She is also less dependent on her chair and feels a great improvement in her mental well-being.

But after getting medicinal cannabis in 2021, she claims she can now walk her dog (pictured), is less dependent on her chair and feels a huge improvement in her mental well-being

That year she had to give up her job as a part-time sports trainer and was confined to a wheelchair after a series of NHS treatments failed to relieve her chronic pain.

Ms Fisher, who was also diagnosed with fibromyalgia in the 1990s, said: ‘My pain is finally something I can think of as constant annoying crunching instead of ‘Oh my god, my legs are on fire.’

Her pain still hits an eight or nine out of ten when she does “too much” – but claims she now averages a four, which she described as “tolerable”.

She said: “It doesn’t make me want to break my legs in half or chop my legs off with a chainsaw, which I have threatened on many occasions.”

Unlike recreational cannabis sold on the street, medicinal cannabis is grown and processed according to pharmaceutical standards.

Certain species are legal in the UK following a landmark decision in 2018 , but very few patients were able to get a prescription. Doctors are reluctant to prescribe it on the NHS.

READ MORE: I give my 11-year-old marijuana to stop him from having 500 seizures a month – he punches, kicks and screams at me

Medicinal cannabis usually comes as an oil or spray containing cannabidiol (CBD) or tetrahydrocannabinol (THC).

THC is the psychoactive component of cannabis that causes the “high,” although some formulations of medicinal cannabis contain both CBD and THC.

In 2014 Ms Fisher, who lives with her partner and stepdaughter, received approval for an experimental cannabis injection called Sativex for her MS.

However, her local NHS trust was not one of 39 in the UK to prescribe and fund the treatment – which costs a whopping £500 a month if prescribed privately.

But in 2021 Ms. Fisher, again working as a grants administrator at a local school, receives a private prescription for 30g of medicinal marijuana from the Lyphe Clinic.

It costs just £150 a month, which is a saving of £4,200 a year compared to Sativex.

She uses an e-cigarette-like vaporizer to ingest the medicinal marijuana instead of smoking it – which doctors advise against.

Before using marijuana, Ms. Fisher tried medications such as gabapentin, pregabalin, diazepam and tramadol, but none of them relieved her pain.

Ms Fisher added: “I can go to concerts again and not just exist in four walls.

“What cannabis has given me back is the ability to participate in life again, albeit part-time.”

Medical cannabis was legalized in the UK after parents of two sons suffered from severe epilepsy campaign for its legalization.

Billy Caldwell’s mother was forced to break the law by importing THC-rich cannabis oil to try to reduce her son’s seizures, while Alfie Dingley’s mother temporarily moved to the Netherlands to access it.

In June, it was revealed that around 9,000 patients in the UK are currently being prescribed medicinal cannabis, mostly from private providers, for conditions such as chronic pain, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder.

Users believe that smoking or inhaling vaporized marijuana can help relieve symptoms, but experts say clinical evidence is lacking.